Glossary

Alphabetical list of terms used throughout the documentation and in the SDK.

Channel

Where conversations take place between two or more chat users. They contain a list of messages and have a list of member users that are participating in the conversation. A channel is identified by its type and id.

Chat Client

Low-level wrapper around the Stream Chat API. Contains basic model objects, such as User, Channel, or Message. Allows operations like user authentication, event handling, channel creation and message sending. Represented by the ChatClient class.

Chat State

Data that can be observed in a reactive way through StateFlows, like loading state, list of available channels, messages, members and more. Provided by the low-level client as a plugin and used in both of our UI component libraries. It can also be used directly, with a custom UI layer on top.

Event

Mechanism that allows the client to react to changes in the chat. Events are triggered under various circumstances, such as when a new message was sent, a user avatar update, a new reaction, or a member joined the channel. Events are only received when the client is connected to the socket and the application is in the foreground.

Message

Single communication inside a channel. Besides typical communication-related fields like text, created date or message sender, it also contains other useful components like attachments and reactions.

Offline Support

Refers to the implementation of the OfflinePlugin, a persistence layer designed to improve the user experience on mobile devices that may not have a network connection. It offers several advantages, like reduced initial load times, the ability to view cached channels and messages, and sending messages and reactions while offline.

Theming

Process of customizing aspects of the UI, such as font, text color, background, text style, drawables and more. For our XML-based UI Components it can be done via XML View attributes, by using the TransformStyle object or by using themes. For our Compose UI Components it can be done using ChatTheme.

UI Component

Pre-build View or Composable offered by Stream Chat in the UI Components or Compose UI Components libraries. Built on top of the low-level client.

User

A person who uses chat and can perform chat operations like viewing channels or sending messages. Represented by the User model, with a unique ID and defined set of permissions.