Re: [LUG] Linux IM clients

[Nicholas John Murison <N.J.Murison@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 2002-03-15 at 20:43, Luc Hands wrote: 
> I'm just wondering if anyone knows of any linux im
> clients particularly for MSN, that will work behind a
> proxy server.
> 
> The only way i can do this is by running Trillian
> under wine, which works, but not brilliantly and i'd
> profer a native linux client.
> 
> any ideas anyone??
<shameless plug> 

At the University of Exeter, Dave Barker has just set up a Jabber server, so students sitting behind the University firewall can keep in touch with friends on different IM systems through one client.  The system currently has about 20 subscibers.  Clients are available for pretty much any platform, and a lot of them are open-source (so is the Jabber IM system in itself). 

Jabber works much in the same way as Trillian, only it connects you to all the different IM systems on the server level, rather then the client level, so the client only needs to know one protocol.  Also, the contact list is kept on the server, so the client can be lightweight. 

The latest version of Gabber, a GTK based Jabber client, has proxy support for both HTTP proxies and SOCKS proxies. 

The Exeter Uni Jabber server currently provides connectivity to ICQ, MSN, Yahoo, and of course the native Jabber protocol.  Support is also being planned for AIM (a bit dodgy at the moment, we're still trying to figure out what it thinks it's doing) and IRC.

There are a few pitfalls associated with the AOL based IM systems.  Other Jabber servers have had their connectivity to ICQ and AIM cut off when AOL twigged they were not "real" AIM or ICQ clients.  This means if we get too many users of ICQ or AIM on our server, we'll most probably get cut off.

A demonstration will hopefully be held at the Open Source Day on the 27th of April by Dave.  If you want to try the system out yourself, get a Jabber client (http://www.jabber.org), and point it either at the main Jabber server (jabber.org), or some other public Jabber server.  The Jabber server at Exeter is currently (unfortunately) only for University use only, due to trafiic and hardware restrictions.

The Jabber server at Exeter is being provided on a test basis for now, with the blessing of the University IT Services.  Also, it's running off Xnet, the Guild of Students server, with the kind permission of Xnet, the Guild Net Team (http://www.xnet.ex.ac.uk).  If you want to get in touch with Dave, his e-mail address is D.R.Barker@xxxxxxxxxxxxx 

</shameless plug> 

Regards,

-- 
Nicholas John Murison
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Don't mess with penguins
http://www.urgusabic.net

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