First Look at Gems Messenger

Development of Gems Messenger has been underway. This week, the Android version beta was released for download on the Google Play store.

Readers may note that the Android version of the software wouldn’t be published for several months initially, but has now become available.

In a statement the company told Coin Fire,

We have decided to do what’s best for the project, not be afraid of a bigger challenge and bring an Android version up to speed. We’ve decided that a fully working Android version, months ahead of schedule, will increase public confidence in Gems and highlight what our team is capable of doing.

Upon installing the application, the user is walked through the process of setting up a username. The user is required to provide a mobile phone number in order to receive an SMS message that contains an activation code and the passphrase for their Gems wallet. As it stands currently, users are able to take a screenshot of the passphrase but can’t easily copy the plain text out.

Users of Dropbox or other apps such as BTsync should keep this in mind if they have pictures set to be automatically uploaded. The passphrase will now be in the cloud if users opt to save a screenshot of the passphrase.

Since Gems is now using Telegram, users might already have some other users to chat with upon sign-up.  Telegram features 35 million users and can instantly connect now using Gems Messenger with them.

When the Gems Messenger project was initially launched, it did not include support for the Telegram protocol and platform. This has since been added.

The messenger also contains the ability to send photos, voice messages, and other attatchments. This is another feature that was promised later, but is now appearing in the application at launch.

The iOS version of Gems Messenger is not live yet and it appears the Gems team has run into minor roadblocks with the Telegram protocol implementation on iOS in addition to standard delays of iOS application approval.

The iOS telegram protocol source has not been updated by the Telegram team at this time which has led to some delays for the Gems Messenger team. We spoke with the support staff at Telegram to confirm this delay and were told that the iOS telegram protocols would be updated soon.

The new Gems application does allow users to send bitcoins or GEMZ, the new currency created for use by Gems users. Sending either currency is a fairly simple process.

Gems Messenger still has a plethora of features remaining in development, but releasing the Android beta version with more features than initially slated is a step in the right direction.

Development continues on the iOS version while the Android version beta is running. Coin Fire will provide more details on the development progress as we receive additional updates.