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Trillian 3.0 Released
Octagon Most writes "Cerulean Studios has released Trillian Pro 3.0 which is still interacting with AIM, Yahoo, MSN instant messagers with impunity. It has a cool new Instant Lookup feature which links to Wikipedia, and a serverless messaging mode using Rendezvous. The free version is now Trillian Basic 3.0. Trillian is still Windows only, and if you don't like the FAQ response regarding Linux and Mac support let 'em know."
I like Trillian, it has a lot of nice features and looks pretty. However I switched to gaim because of it's cross platform support.
I was honestly surprised to see this on slashdot this morning. After all, there aren't many slashdot posts proclaiming excitement over new versions of SQL Server, right?
/^[A-Z0-9._%+-]+@[A-Z0-9.-]+\.[A-Z]{2,4}$/i
Ill come back when they support HTML profiles/away messages, and fix file transfers.
So why use Trillian?
The cake is a pie
I switched to Win32 gAIM simply because I found everything about Trillian annoying as Hell. The interface felt too clunky and bloated with visuals (this was really a problem with multiple protocols). My situation is such that the network admin on campus has denied access to AIM and has provided no alternative. Initially, I would just install Trillian/Miranda/gAIM each time I logged in, but I found the installation process for each a bit tedious after logging in 2-3 times a day at different workstations.
When I bough a USB thumbdrive, I started putting all my essential apps such as FireFox on it so I could avoid reinstallation with each login. Trillian gave me some trouble with installation on a USB key (it wouldn't keep my profile data on the USB key nor would it make it apart of my Windows roaming profile), so I just finally completely migrated over to gAIM. It installed on my USB key without a hitch, has a cleaner interface, keeps logs of everything in my roaming profile and is easy to update. Even file transfer works for me now.
"You and your third dimension."
It's good to emphasize that, although Trillian and GAIM are competitors, they share information with each other when things go awry. Whenever Yahoo! makes a change that screws up GAIM and Trillian, you can bet the devs on both sides will be helping each other out. Now that's a good proprietary/open source relationship.
Wikipedia in-depth comparison of instant messengers, including gaim and trillian.
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
Almost all of the IM services support voice and video but, none of the open source ones seem to. I would have expected Jabber to be leading the way in this area but, Jabber's development seems to have stagnated. I'm really surprised that the open source clients haven't got the features that the closed source ones do.
Sigh. Look, take a hint boys and girls. The FAQ entry for Mac and Linux support makes it abundantly clear that Trillian developers have NO interest in supporting anything but Windows, and by badgering them, you'll just make it even less likely.
I don't understand why it's so difficult for the OSS community to just get the point -- some people don't want to play in your sandbox. Yet, invariably, I see the constant calls to hassle developers because of the choice they've made. Sure, some of them may not be aware that non-Windows users have an interest in their product, but I will bet dollars to doughnuts that the vast majority just choose not to. Is it so hard to accept that not everyone wishes to adopt or assist in your cause?
If I were a Trillian developer, and my inbox was suddenly filled with the typical bizarre sense of entitlement found here at Slashdot, even after I had posted an absolutely clear disinterest in supporting Mac or Linux in my FAQ, I guarantee that your grandchildren would be in their cold graves before I'd ever produce a non-Windows version.
This Just In -- you can't make people comply by pissing them off.
-
Inventor of the term 'pardon my French'.
I've been running the Beta for about two weeks now, and I really do like it. I've been using Trillian itself for about 2 years.
Honestly, Trillian was one of the first programs that I've used that, well, I was using a cracked version of... and decided after about 28 hours of use that it was worth my money.
I am a happy paid user... 3.0 Really does seem to work better. The connection manager is MANY times improved. I can connect to all three of my yahoo accounts with no muss or fuss now.
I will admit the daily (or more often) updates with the beta have been somewhat annoying, but it shows that the Cerulean team really is working hard to address problems.
Still seems to have somewhat of a problem with deleting users from your list who are on MSN, but I can live with that.
So far... after beating the hell out of it, my only gripes are:
1) The default "user icon" display is set *way* too big for starters. A problem that is easily corrected by the user, but it certainly didn't make a very good first impression with me there.
2) The new "Chat History" window and browser is useless. With it I can see the first line of a conversation that I had with someone, but I can't seem to get any deeper than that. Granted, there may be something simple that I am missing, as I have been concentrating the most on my primary problem,, which is...
3) My webcam seems to be completely useless now. I've tried the updates, tried re-installing my quicktime drivers and codecs (Why God? Why Quicktime?) I've updated my cam software... and even went out and bought a NEW camera because the one I had was 5 years old. Still no good. I get a very nasty looking green and yellow window when I start my webcam, then the cam crashes. HARD.
In fact, Trillian will not release the camera until I shut the program completely down.
All that being said, the support staff at Cerulean have been very good at keep me abreast of updates and possible causes for the problem. I know I am not the only one with the webcam problem, but there seems to be little rhyme or reason for it.
Would I advise my friends to use it? Hell yes! I do that on a daily basis.
However, I am hoping that the news about 3.0 being released public is swallowed by the firefox wave.
Seems to me that everytime something good happens with Trillian, either Yahoo or MSN change things to break it.
(eep, after previewing I realized how rambling and poorly worded this post is, but its been the 48 hours from hell here, and I just don't have the energy to correct everything)
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order- Ed Howdershelt Via Tass
So does Trillian
Miranda can run it all in a single nice window.
So does Trillian
Miranda has fully customisable skins and icons.
So does Trillian.
Miranda has no adverts, ever.
Neither does Trillian (both free and pro)
Miranda has plug-ins galore...
Trillian has plenty of plugins, and most of them are actually useful. The whole list of Miranda's plugins is not only scary, but a vast majority of them are completely mundane.
Miranda is totally free, is open source, and simply is better than Trillian, and even Gaim.
Trillian also has a totally free version. Granted it's not open source, but why should we hold that against them? They've also been known to help out: when the folks at Trillian figured out a bug with the Yahoo! IM connection stuff, they sent the fix to the folks at gaim.
If you really want to compare things, the 'out of the box' experience in Trillian is far superior to that of Miranda. I recall spending an hour on Miranda a couple of months ago to get it to look/work just right, and it still ended up looking ugly as sin. On the other hand, all I need to do is install Trillian, and a vast majority of these 'plugins' that Miranda needs are already built in.