{"slug": "tether", "name": "Tether", "category": "communication", "category_name": "Email and chat", "description": "", "recommenders": 3, "commenters": 7, "warners": 2, "score": 1.404, "rising": 3.0, "first": "2026-08-29", "latest": "2026-10-30", "why": "You can use the app that is the subject of this thread", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 3, "neutral": 1, "compare": 1, "warn": 2}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 3, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "You can use the app that is the subject of this thread", "kind": "", "icon": false, "domain": null, "github_repo": "github.com/kmg/tether", "official_url": "https://github.com/kmg/tether", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["Tether", "tether"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 791919040, "item_id": 49494940, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49494940", "by": "d3Xt3r", "date": "2026-08-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Tether seems like it could be useful to bridge that gap", "excerpt": "Any possibility of handling phone calls too? Like making and receiving calls. Also, any plans of making Tether itself mobile-UI/UX friendly? My plan is to get a Linux phone (or convert an Android phone to Linux) and use it as a daily driver, but keep an old iPhone around for regular calls and texts, and for compatibility with some apps like banking apps. Tether seems like it could be useful to bridge that gap, so all", "context": "planning a Linux phone", "use_case": "iMessage/SMS bridge on Linux phone", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}, {"id": 791917313, "item_id": 49494832, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49494832", "by": "erikwb", "date": "2026-08-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love that Tether is helping to figure out all the quirks there", "excerpt": "Hey! I made blueferry - the bluetooth connection works great on certain adapters, but ANCS is the wild west. I love that Tether is helping to figure out all the quirks there - I had lots of time a month ago and almost none now.", "context": "", "use_case": "iMessage on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}, {"id": 791870976, "item_id": 49491936, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49491936", "by": "bestnameever", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "You can use the app that is the subject of this thread", "excerpt": "You can use the app that is the subject of this thread: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/tether-linux-companion/id6762097135", "context": "", "use_case": "Sharing iOS clipboard with Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 804833424, "item_id": 50302089, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50302089", "by": "grey-area", "date": "2026-10-30", "stance": "warn", "quote": "run by crooks closely associated with SBF", "excerpt": "You missed out that it is run by crooks closely associated with SBF and shady banks like Deltec https://dailycoin.com/sbf-tether-deltec-secretly-colluding/ Also, it's not decentralised, they just unilaterally froze 2 billion in funds.", "context": "", "use_case": "Stablecoin", "switched_from": "", "story": "Binance-hacker-1029 \u2013 $5.6B stolen from Binance"}, {"id": 791907488, "item_id": 49494218, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49494218", "by": "starik36", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "From what I understand, Tether requires a companion app running on your iPhone.", "excerpt": "I am not sure that it is. From what I understand, Tether requires a companion app running on your iPhone. And as such, is subject to being shut down by the OS for various reasons (inactivity, etc...). So sometimes you would have to restart the app. I use LocalSend and every now and then the connection does not work and I have to restart it on the phone.", "context": "", "use_case": "iMessage/SMS on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}]}], "who": [{"by": "d3Xt3r", "context": "planning a Linux phone", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49494940", "date": "2026-08-30"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["imessage/sms on linux", "stablecoin", "imessage/sms bridge on linux phone", "imessage on linux", "sharing ios clipboard with linux"], "compared": [{"slug": "claude-code", "name": "Claude Code", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [{"id": 792641039, "item_id": 49540064, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49540064", "by": "entaroadun123", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "static goroutine leak analyzer on x/tools/go/analysis", "excerpt": "Location: Renton, Washington (US Pacific) Remote: Yes, remote only Willing to relocate: No Technologies: Ruby on Rails, PostgreSQL, Sidekiq, Hotwire, Python, TypeScript/React, Go, Elixir/Phoenix/Ecto, AWS, Kubernetes, Playwright Resume: https://levelbrook-resume.s3.amazonaws.com/levelbrook-consulting-resume.pdf Email: levelbrookteam@gmail.com I run Levelbrook Consulting, a Rails-first practice on the US west coast. T", "context": "Rails-first consultant running Levelbrook Consulting", "use_case": "Go goroutine leak detection", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (September 2026)"}, {"id": 791900368, "item_id": 49493773, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49493773", "by": "zackb", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I wanted everyone to have it.", "excerpt": "This is a very good point and I'm not sure why you're being downvoted. I considered contributing to KDE Connect but decided against it for many reasons: 1. This would be a major subsystem added to KDE Connect and I have no history with the project. 2. The KDE Connect roadmap explicitly lists iMessage / SMS support as \"Won't Implement\" 3. My project requires a browser extension and mail extension, I can't imagine I ha", "context": "", "use_case": "iMessage/SMS on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}, {"id": 769300672, "item_id": 48081292, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48081292", "by": "zackb", "date": "2026-05-09", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "And the things I do miss I write programs for [1][2] and give them to people.", "excerpt": "This was perhaps the biggest reason I moved to Linux full-time about a year ago. I just got sick of not being able to write software and have people use it. The solution might be an \"I trust this author\" VS Code style dialog and that's it, but even that misses the mark a bit. I've been having a blast building on Linux and miss almost nothing about macOS. And the things I do miss I write programs for [1][2] and give t", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "Linux utility", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is increasing my cortisol levels"}, {"id": 755195664, "item_id": 47199729, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47199729", "by": "LC_58008", "date": "2026-02-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "So I built Tether.", "excerpt": "I've been running multiple AI models side by side (Claude Code with Opus, and a separate CLI with Kilo Code running MiniMax M2.5 on the free tier) and got tired of copy-pasting JSON blobs between them to share context. So I built Tether. What it does: Collapse any JSON into a tiny content-addressed handle (&h_messages_abc123 \u2014 28 bytes). Pass the handle to another model. They resolve it to get the original data. Same", "context": "", "use_case": "Shared MCP memory between LLMs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: An inter-LLM mailbox MCP tool"}, {"id": 754832946, "item_id": 47177059, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47177059", "by": "kmg", "date": "2026-02-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I built a helper [1] that adds a monitoring layer on top", "excerpt": "Good use case for away-from-laptop access to Claude Code. For a CLI product, Tailscale + tmux is a solid foundation \u2014 which many in this thread have converged on. I built a helper [1] that adds a monitoring layer on top: it watches tmux output and sends a push notification when Claude transitions from working to waiting for input. [1] https://github.com/kmg/tether", "context": "", "use_case": "Push alerts when Claude waits", "switched_from": "", "story": "Claude Code Remote Control"}], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49415386", "title": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux", "mentions": 7}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50296470", "title": "Binance-hacker-1029 \u2013 $5.6B stolen from Binance", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49522896", "title": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (September 2026)", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48075366", "title": "Apple is increasing my cortisol levels", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47199728", "title": "Tether: An inter-LLM mailbox MCP tool", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47148454", "title": "Claude Code Remote Control", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {}, "2026-08": {"recommend": 3, "neutral": 1, "warn": 1, "compare": 1}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {"warn": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 804833424, "item_id": 50302089, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50302089", "by": "grey-area", "date": "2026-10-30", "stance": "warn", "quote": "run by crooks closely associated with SBF", "excerpt": "You missed out that it is run by crooks closely associated with SBF and shady banks like Deltec https://dailycoin.com/sbf-tether-deltec-secretly-colluding/ Also, it's not decentralised, they just unilaterally froze 2 billion in funds.", "context": "", "use_case": "Stablecoin", "switched_from": "", "story": "Binance-hacker-1029 \u2013 $5.6B stolen from Binance"}, {"id": 791943313, "item_id": 49496457, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49496457", "by": "rmnclmnt", "date": "2026-08-30", "stance": "compare", "quote": "Isn\u2019t iphonebridge[0] doing the same but without browser extensions?", "excerpt": "Isn\u2019t iphonebridge[0] doing the same but without browser extensions? (Haven\u2019t used neither but been looking for such solution in the past) [0]: https://github.com/gabrielmeir53/iphonebridge", "context": "", "use_case": "iMessage/SMS on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}, {"id": 791919040, "item_id": 49494940, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49494940", "by": "d3Xt3r", "date": "2026-08-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Tether seems like it could be useful to bridge that gap", "excerpt": "Any possibility of handling phone calls too? Like making and receiving calls. Also, any plans of making Tether itself mobile-UI/UX friendly? My plan is to get a Linux phone (or convert an Android phone to Linux) and use it as a daily driver, but keep an old iPhone around for regular calls and texts, and for compatibility with some apps like banking apps. Tether seems like it could be useful to bridge that gap, so all", "context": "planning a Linux phone", "use_case": "iMessage/SMS bridge on Linux phone", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}, {"id": 791917313, "item_id": 49494832, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49494832", "by": "erikwb", "date": "2026-08-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love that Tether is helping to figure out all the quirks there", "excerpt": "Hey! I made blueferry - the bluetooth connection works great on certain adapters, but ANCS is the wild west. I love that Tether is helping to figure out all the quirks there - I had lots of time a month ago and almost none now.", "context": "", "use_case": "iMessage on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}, {"id": 791907488, "item_id": 49494218, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49494218", "by": "starik36", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "From what I understand, Tether requires a companion app running on your iPhone.", "excerpt": "I am not sure that it is. From what I understand, Tether requires a companion app running on your iPhone. And as such, is subject to being shut down by the OS for various reasons (inactivity, etc...). So sometimes you would have to restart the app. I use LocalSend and every now and then the connection does not work and I have to restart it on the phone.", "context": "", "use_case": "iMessage/SMS on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}, {"id": 791872048, "item_id": 49492003, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49492003", "by": "kvemkon", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "", "excerpt": "That's what I thought at first but then discovered: > universal clipboard is synchronized over internet, it is not done trough cable connection. it uses apple continuity service, what you put into UC is uploaded into apple cloud,.. https://github.com/libimobiledevice/libimobiledevice/issues/1143 That's why I'm a bit confused now. > don't let the \"KDE\" fool you Being GNOME2-then-MATE user, it really would.", "context": "", "use_case": "iMessage/SMS on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}, {"id": 791870976, "item_id": 49491936, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49491936", "by": "bestnameever", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "You can use the app that is the subject of this thread", "excerpt": "You can use the app that is the subject of this thread: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/tether-linux-companion/id6762097135", "context": "", "use_case": "Sharing iOS clipboard with Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}]}