Posted by
ryuzaki0
on from the keep-on-IMing-in-the-free-world dept.
sidesh0w writes "Today the folks from Gaim released an alpha version of their Instant Messenger client for Win32." Gaim is the only IM client I've ever used; I still don't like IM, but Gaim is one sweet program.
Re:Compare and contrast
by
uchian
·
· Score: 4, Informative
Gaim is client side, rather than server side. The main advantage of this is that AOL, etc. cannot block GAIM from accessing their networks, whilst it is fairly simple for them to notice that a jabber server is acting as a gateway and to block that.
IM in companies: a bad idea
by
kipsate
·
· Score: 4, Informative
[ Slightly off-topic ]
I'm somewhat sceptic to Instant Messaging in companies. I've seen it fail at our company, where they insisted to try it out.
I see it like this: if you have a message for someone and you don't need an instant reply, e-mail is perfect. If you want to send code snippets, or need to transfer information that is somewhat complicated, use e-mail. It enables you to write down everything in a structured way and the receiver can archive the message for later retrieval.
If you want an instant reply, because you need to discuss something, USE THE PHONE. It is much faster than typing, no matter how fast you type. It is much more convenient, you can exchange information really quickly. Especially in combination of a tool like VNC, which enables you to see eachothers screen and take over mouse and keyboard remotely.
In our case there was another unfortunate side-effect of IMing. Within weeks, the IT guys were chatting for hours per day with the girls in the office. Some of them often had three chat sessions open simultaneously. Productivity dropped significantly.
IM silently died.
-- My karma ran over your dogma
Re:IM in companies: a bad idea
by
Trinition
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
If you want to send code snippets, or need to transfer information that is somewhat complicated, use e-mail
Didn't you just say you might not get an instant reply? So what if you need to show someone a code snippet but DO need an instant reply?
archive the message for later retrieval.
Don't know what IM client you used, but I use Trillian, and it does archive things for me.
If you want an instant reply, because you need to discuss something, USE THE PHONE. It is much faster than typing, no matter how fast you type
OK, I have a little exercise for you. Read the following out loud on th ephone, and imagine someone on th other end trying to transpose this back into text:
for(int index = 0; index < list.length; index ++) {
x &= ((Integer)list.get(index)) << index; }
Do you seriously think saying "curly-brace", "binary shift to the left", and "cast to Integer class" are easier to say than type/read?
And what of presence? Do you have some way of known if the person you immediately need is available on the other end? Suppose there were three people who could answer your question... you might have to call all three to determine that no one is available, or sometimes at least more than one if the first guy isn't available. With IM presence, you ca see that immediately befoerehand.
Especially in combination of a tool like VNC
So you want people to mix-and-mach tools to try and come close to something that a new paradigm, IM, does perfectly well? Why even use a phone when you could use a telegraph? Why use a computer when you could use an abacus and some paper?
Within weeks, the IT guys were chatting for hours per day with the girls in the office
And they never did this with the phone? Or send each other e-mails? IM just made it so convenient that they started doing something they had so little drive to do before IM lowered the hurdle? Or maybe they're sepdning less time sending frivilous e-mail and using a more efficient conversational medium, saving disk sapce on the corporate mail server and gaining productivity?
Now, for some business cases that DO work!
Tier-3 support in city A conversing with Tier-2 support in city B, cutting out long distance costs.
Tier-3 support being able to participate in multiple conversations with Tier-2 simulatenously.
Completely tele-commuting-based company keeping their phone lines free for important calls while cutting&pasting code snippets back and forth.
Development office in city A conversing with development office in city B to get information immediately to anser the customer's question on the phone without perceived iterruption.
I don't know why everyone thinks IM is so teenagers can ask each for age/sex/location checks. It is a communication tool, and a very fast, conversational convenient one at that. People can use any conversation medium for good or bad (i.e. e-mail is getting overwhelmed with spam!) Don't chuck out the whole medium just because you've found one malignant thing growing in it. Just use your own judgement, and rules in the case of the fomer poster who works at a company where teh employees have no ethical control over their use of their work time (and the big bosses don't have thecalls to fire them).
The tabbed conversation window should be enough incentive to wait for a stable release of this program on Windows. Other than that, trillian or AIM+ pretty much keep me happy.
Tabbed windows are godsend. I hate it when I have to have several windows open. It clutters the desktop and gets pretty annoying.
attn headline author/editor
by
kevin+lyda
·
· Score: 5, Funny
you have a story about gaim for windows and the headline you come up with (or allow through) is "gaim for windows." lame.
Everything is plugin...so nothing but AIM/ICQ out of the box.
I was dropped AT LEAST 5 TIMES in 5 minutes
No copy/paste in chat windows (CTRL=C brings up "Colors")
No right-clicks.
No SecureIM.
Can't click to follow links.
COMPLETELY NON-Intuitive interface
So I don't agree with the "no plugins" argument (just go and download the darn things), but the rest are serious problems.
However, it's alpha! Why treat an alpha release like the final product? So, another poster said:
I did make certain to be distinct in saying WinGAIM and not GAIM. I've not used GAIM and from what I've heard and read, it's kick-ass.
I know *for a fact* that the point in releasing their "alpha" 3 days after the Trillian release was to steal thunder. I also know that seanegan is a frequent guest in one of the Trillian channels, where he openly recruits people to try his software.
Since there is plenty of "Trillian-bashing" going on in Trillian forums, I figured I'd point out that if anyone thinks WinGAIM is a viable alternative, they'll be extremely disappointed.
And I know....it's alpha. But if you're gonna run with the big dogs, you've got to be able to piss in the tall grass.
So any Windows Trillian or AOL AIM users who have tried WinGAIM and have experiences to post?
GAIM was nice to have around on Unix. Too bad the presence of a widely-available Win32 version will force AOL to block it once and for all, in order to maintain their legal position against opening their system up to Microsoft.
Slashdot Mirror
Gaim is client side, rather than server side. The main advantage of this is that AOL, etc. cannot block GAIM from accessing their networks, whilst it is fairly simple for them to notice that a jabber server is acting as a gateway and to block that.
[ Slightly off-topic ]
I'm somewhat sceptic to Instant Messaging in companies. I've seen it fail at our company, where they insisted to try it out.
I see it like this: if you have a message for someone and you don't need an instant reply, e-mail is perfect. If you want to send code snippets, or need to transfer information that is somewhat complicated, use e-mail. It enables you to write down everything in a structured way and the receiver can archive the message for later retrieval.
If you want an instant reply, because you need to discuss something, USE THE PHONE. It is much faster than typing, no matter how fast you type. It is much more convenient, you can exchange information really quickly. Especially in combination of a tool like VNC, which enables you to see eachothers screen and take over mouse and keyboard remotely.
In our case there was another unfortunate side-effect of IMing. Within weeks, the IT guys were chatting for hours per day with the girls in the office. Some of them often had three chat sessions open simultaneously. Productivity dropped significantly.
IM silently died.
My karma ran over your dogma
The tabbed conversation window should be enough incentive to wait for a stable release of this program on Windows. Other than that, trillian or AIM+ pretty much keep me happy.
Tabbed windows are godsend. I hate it when I have to have several windows open. It clutters the desktop and gets pretty annoying.
you have a story about gaim for windows and the headline you come up with (or allow through) is "gaim for windows." lame.
c'mon, this is easy: "windows got gaim."
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Quoting the original poster:
So I don't agree with the "no plugins" argument (just go and download the darn things), but the rest are serious problems.
However, it's alpha! Why treat an alpha release like the final product? So, another poster said:
So any Windows Trillian or AOL AIM users who have tried WinGAIM and have experiences to post?
GAIM was nice to have around on Unix. Too bad the presence of a widely-available Win32 version will force AOL to block it once and for all, in order to maintain their legal position against opening their system up to Microsoft.