What Makes a Good IM Client?

thesaint05 asks: "So I was sitting here at my job where and IM is a pretty integral part of communicating intra-office. However, I have 3 different clients installed, and each has a different user base. Within the office we have an SIP server and use Windows Messenger. The Google Talk client is for colleagues and friends on the cutting edge, and AIM is used by pretty much everybody else (including a bunch of clients). So, after holding 3 different conversations simultaneously on all 3 clients (Windows Messenger with a colleague, AIM with my girlfriend, and Google Talk with a friend at a different tech company) I got to wondering, what are the strengths and weaknesses of all of these clients? Which do you use and why? If you could combine features from all of the IM clients out there, what would they be?"

Comments

Each Protocol Has Its Good Points

[duerra]

I was asked this question a few days ago, my response was that there is a little something from every network that I would like to combine for use into one standard.

MSN - Ability to change your nick. Ability to accept or decline others from adding you to their buddy lists.
AIM - Ability to set auto-reply messages. Direct connect for quicker file transfers.
Yahoo! - Ability to send messages to people that are offline that they will receive next time they sign on. Ability to go invisible.

There's stuff I'm missing, no doubt, and I didn't cover every protocol out there, but those are the major things for me.

I'm not sure of all of the Jabber specifications, but I know there's things in there that specify encryption stuff, among a number of other nice things.

Right now, I think strong encryption (like with the gaim-encryption plugin) between client to client (not client to server) is one big thing that all of the major players need to address.

Fess up

[Anonymous Coward]

This was just an excuse to use the words "my girlfriend" in a Slashdot story.

Re:Fess up

[GetPFunky]

Once I heard the words "my girlfriend", I assumed this story was urban legend.

well...

[daeley]

If you could combine features from all of the IM clients out there, what would they be?

Adium? ;)

Re:well...

[JazzCrazed]

Or Gaim for the Linux/Windows users, the core library of which Adium uses.

Re:well...

[zootm]

Thing with Gaim is that the interface isn't as polished as that of Adium — it could use a bit of work. The back-end (which, as you say, Adium uses) is top-notch, though.

Go with GAIM

[Anarke_Incarnate]

and be done with it all. Googletalk is just Jabber which works with GAIM. Windows/MSN messenger and AIM work, as do Yahoo and ICQ.

Re:Go with GAIM

[kryten_nl]

From the GAIM news page:
Summer of Code

Meanwhile, Google's Summer of Code has drawn to a conclusion and we are very happy with what our students accomplished. Support for Apple's Bonjour protocol, UPnP NAT traversal, AIM and ICQ file transfer proxying, and support for the SIP/SIMPLE protocol are a few of the additions. See the news post at the top of our Summer of Code page for a detailed list.

Working at Google

I (Sean) have been hired by Google, moved to Seattle, and have been working on the Google Talk team for about a month and a half. The goal of Google Talk is to make real-time communication as open as possible, and in that regard, I've been working to offer all of Google Talk's features into other clients. Currently, I'm working on making it as easy as possible for other clients to use Google Talk's voice features. You can expect Gaim and other clients to be interoperable with Google Talk's voice features in the near future.

Two major ones

[Bananatree3]

Two commonly used ones are (and fairly good ones I might say) are Trillian and GAIM

GAIM is an Open Source program, and therefore is completely free. Trillian has a free and Pro versions, but the free version is still quite capable.

lol

[Anonymous Coward]

aside from the encryption, icq had all of these and more in 1997

Re:lol

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

I'd rather everyone have a numeric id, but not sequential. Unique id should be the hash of your public key, which is then used for verification/encryption.
You then do the rest icq style. I still don't remember my uncles icq uin, nor do I know his aim screenname, but I know if I type his name in the Find User dialog, I'd find his icq account. Long aim screennames are no easier considering aols db is merged with netscape/compuserve/a few other services by now. The number of unused old accounts wasting space is astonishing. I couldn't even register my full name as a screenname because it was already in use.

Unique numeric ids keep people from fighting over that stuff, and rarely have to actually be displayed, you just display the nick they set as the displayname. Then only show the numeric id in case of duplicate names when trying to find people. Even then you dont have to show the full digits, you can use graphical representation of the key. Forgot the name of the tech, but it looked promising when used for PKI.

Adium, Adium, Adium

[illtron]

A good client will handle multiple protocols.
A good client has a beautiful, well thought out interface (including the prefs)
A good client does not have games.
A good client does not have a stock ticker.
A good client does not have a giant SUBMIT button (Everybody knows enter/return sends).
A good client will let you organize/arrange your contact list to suit your needs (Sorry iChat -- yes, even in Tiger)
A good client is extendable.
A good client has a no-brains-needed logging feature.
A good client plays well with others (Growl, baby)
A good client has tabs (Nobody wants a dozen chat windows).
A good client will not try to reinvent the wheel (Why does control+Z minimize the chat window in Gaim?)
A good client will let me effortlessly send files (uhhhh....)

I'm thoroughly sold on Adium, but since I'm stuck on Windows at work, I use Gaim there, because it is the simplest. Trillian is extremely overrated. AIM is absolute adware garbage.

On the Mac side, only iChat lets me transfer files without issue (official AIM might, but I won't install it to find out).

Proteus and Fire are nice, but Adium is *nicer.* I won't fault anybody for trying the others, but I think it's worth anybody's time to give Adium a day or two to win them over.

Did we read the question?

[hubbah]

I think the poster is asking what makes a good IM client, not which IM client we happen to prefer. Related questions to be sure, but not the same.

Contrary to folk wisdom, IM clients can be specialized, they're not all trying to outdo each other at the same tasks. So it's important to ask yourself what you're looking for. Fun & features? Try Yahoo's 'IMvironments' (or whatever silly thing it's called), sharing pictures? 'Hello' has some picture oriented, well-designed UI affordances in their chat client.

Personally, I look for the following things in a client:

- Simplicity (I want to think about IMs as little as possible)
- Universal compatibility (I don't want to run more than 1 client, I don't want to ask my friends to get xyz client in order to talk to me)
- Configurability
- No ads

I haven't tried every available client, but Gaim fits the bill for me. It's small, simple, highly configurable and speaks pretty much every lingo out there. It's not strong in its file-transfer capabilities and its ability to send pictures, but those features are not as important to me.

Plus, it's open source.

Hubbah

The Meebo Alternative.

[crlove]

And for those who want to use these IM clients but can't from work, there's always Meebo. Pick on AJAX all you want, but I can IM on MSN, Yahoo, Google, and AIM through port 80.

One feature none of them has (as far as I know)

[Atario]

A filter that slaps you in the face if you start typing in IM-speak.

"u" for "you", "4" for "for", etc.
More than one instance of "lol" per minute
More than two exclamation points (possibly mixed with ones) in a row
Smileys on more than one quarter of your messages
And so on.