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Skype For Linux To Be Open-Sourced "In the Nearest Future"
rysiek writes "Seems like there might be a revolution in the works, as far as VoIP software for Linux is concerned. After mailing Skype support about Skype providing Mandriva RPM packages, Olivier Faurax got an answer which suggests that the Linux Skype client will be open-sourced. After asking for verification of whether that was the case, the tech support answer claimed it is going to happen, and that it's supposed to happen 'in the nearest future.' Now, this probably only means the client (the underlying protocol will probably be handled by a binary-only library), but even if that's the case, it seems like there is still reason to celebrate."
I use a lot of voice software on my laptop, and Skype is one of the few that is fine with my not using a headset. I'm not certain how it does it, but I assume they're filtering the sound coming out of the speakers against the mic input. I've always wanted to take Skype's client and plug it into, say, Ventrilo.
Could this open up that possibility?
Can someone please translate? Does that mean that an open client could be forked that works with skype but is not skype? Like, say, gizmo or ekiga? Thanks for enlightening a non-techie Linux enthusiast (yes, we exist :-) ).
*Could* that be possible, you would lose interoperability with windows clients, so why not relying on one of the truly foss voip projects availble?
I recently took my Warcraft guild down a voice-comm path from Ventrilo to Mumble. Mumble had a lot of things going for it - open source, penny-for-a-year server deal, and a much better experience overall. Everyone could hear everyone and the software worked great without a hitch. That being said, as of today we are back on Vent.
See, while it worked great for us, no one else had ever heard of it, and no one would switch to it just for the benefit of talking to us. In the end we found Mumble made our lives more complex and in sum-total was not a better choice than Ventrilo.
Vis-à-vis Skype - yes you would need a special client to handle encryption, but a simple checkbox could re-enable traffic with those Windows clients. What truly foss voip project inter-operates with those?