Pidgin

Review by Michael E. Callahan aka Dr. File Finder

I'm often asked if I use a program for instant messaging. I have to say that most of the time I don't. I used to, but eventually it became too much of a distraction. I was one of the first people to review ICQ and made the mistake of including a screen shot that showed my account number. Yeah, I got a LOT of messages. When I do want to send instant messages, however, I use Pidgin, by SourceForge. I like Pidgin for a couple of reasons. Firstly it supports an amazing number of instant messaging networks. These include Yahoo, AIM, ICQ, MSN, Google Talk, IRC, Zephyr, and more. That makes it great for me because the people I want to talk with are all on different networks. My daughters are on Google Talk, some of the Tucows people are on ICQ and MSN, and a few of my friends are on Yahoo. Using Pidgin I can connect with all of them at once regardless of network. Another reason I like Pidgin is because it supports multiple operating systems. There are versions for Windows and Linux. For me that means that when I'm working in a Ubuntu virtual machine I can still be connected on Pidgin. The program has support for a wide range of plug-ins that give it more features. Another cool feature of Pidgin is something they call "Buddy Pounces". These are nifty events you can configure for when a certain person comes online, goes off-line, and so on. So, for example, I have a Buddy Pounce configured so that when my daughter, Kadee, comes online it pops up a message saying "Kadee is ON!" and it plays a bit of "We Are the Champions" by Queen. Pidgin is fun and it gives me access to the people I need to talk with most. Give it a try, I think you'll like it.

(Reviews provided by Tucows)