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IETF Publishes Jabber/XMPP RFCs
stpeter writes "The Internet Engineering Task Force has published the XMPP specifications as RFCs. These documents formalize the core protocols developed within the Jabber open-source community, and publication as RFCs represents a major milestone in acceptance of Jabber technologies. Read on for details."
The next version of iChat will include Jabber support.
It's worth pointing out that XMPP is not just for instant messaging.
XMPP standardizes a method for exchanging structured information streams between autonomous entities -- by they human or automated agent.
Thus, when you (as an engineer) need to set up a network of programs that all communicate with each other, you don't have to roll your own protocol, XMPP can do it for you.
Although IRC "botnets" have existed for quite some time, they are typically very primitive and exist mostly in the realm of script kiddies. Further, IRC is unformatted, unstructured, un-standardized text, making it very difficult to parse reliably.
XMPP allows networks programs to communicate with each other in a "native" language -- data structures -- rather than attempting to glean information from a line of IRC ASCII.
I'm currently using XMPP for several local applications: backup agents communicating with each other, sending and receiving mon monitors and alerts, an improved (RSS-like) syndication system, and more.
This ain't your grandfather's IM protocol.
In a nutshell, it's pretty similar to e-mail, only without indirect routing between servers, and (partly therefore) less store-and-forward, and definitely less latency. It also includes presence information. See also http://www.jabber.org/oscon/2004/jabber-bootcamp.p pt
and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jabber
It's not a IM client, it's a protocol that can be easily extended to do just about anything. I'm pretty sure there's something out there that can use video/audio conferencing, if not, then one will soon appear if there's enough demand.
The glossed over version:
jabber is multi-site, like mail. You don't need a server with like-minded people... all jabber users globally can chat with each other (unless, you know, you set up a private jabber server, etc.. same with email)
The protocol is open and extensible, and supports the idea of extended transports.. so the jabber server can act as a gateway for msn/icq/aol/foo/bar/baz. My jabber server deals with all of this... my yahoo/aim/icq/msn contacts are all stored on my jabber server.. I just sign in with whatever jabber client I want, and it all just works.