One of the “I thought it would never come” moments in the open source software industry would be audio and video support in Pidgin. Now it is here! Almost… Windows is not yet supported.

With the release of Pidgin 2.6.1. audio and video is finally supported in the xmpp protocol (used by GTalk). I have to say I haven’t tried it yet since my default IM client is now Empathy (already having audio and video support), which will be the default multi-protocol IM client for the Ubuntu 9.10 release.

Hurray for the release of the new feature! I’m pretty happy for it since it might place a dent in the market share Skype has for VoIP and could make Pidgin more popular for Windows users in comparison to other proprietary solutions.

The eco-system around Pidgin is fantastic, below is yet another cool plug-in tip for it.

Pidgin-Twitter plug-in works with Linux and Windows for you to get back into posting to and receiving notes from Twitter (also works well with Identi.ca too!). Steps to get it working:

1. download and install the plug-in the plug-in;
2. go to Pidgin menu under Tools > Plug-ins you’ll find Pidgin-Twitter to activate and configure;
3. place your username / password and define a couple of other options (such as show users’ avatars)
4. Add a buddy to your GTalk account called twitter@twitter.com and choose to display it even when it is offline.

You’re good to go! Open the chat window for the buddy you just created and instantly it’ll display your messages.

Our favorite IM client has just gotten a really cool plug-in, Facebook chat for Pidgin. So now we can connect to 16 different IM protocols with Pidgin. Pretty cool, right?!

The plug-in itself comes in a pretty easy installer for Windows and Linux. Tested and works very well.

After a week offline due to health reasons, we’re back! Apologies to our readers

Pidgin,  the milti-platform, multi-protocol, instant messaging client has released its version 2.4.0. There were several updates and bugfixes implemented, such as:

• Added support for offline messages for AIM accounts
• Support for Yahoo! Messenger 7.0+ file transfer method
• Input text area in conversation windows auto-resizes to fit more lines (up to a maximum of 4 lines)
• Typing notifications are now shown in the conversation area

For a list of the complete changes, please check the change log. Enjoy!

Over the years I’ve created several email accounts and shared them with some friends and family to be in touch through Instant Messengers (IM). Being online for each account meant I had to open 4 different programs, each for one specific IM (AOL, MSN, Google Talk, Y!IM).

That was before all before I found Trillian, a proprietary program. It has a free version, I’ll give credit to that but the application was starting to slow down my computer a lot. That is when I switched to the open source Pidgin, formerly known as Gaim.

Pidgin is fast, simple to use, and cross-platform so I can use it on Linux or Windows computers. With it I’m constantly logged on to my 5 IM accounts. It hasn’t crashed on me once. Another nice thing about Pidgin is you can add plugins to increase its potential even further (encryption, message notification, new email notification, etc etc etc.). The list of plugins is pretty big but my favorite and most essentials are Guifications and Extended Preferances.

The only negative side of Pidgin is that you can not chat with voice or video, you can only use text. Making it clear, this isn’t Pidgin’s fault, the ones to blame are  the other proprietary messengers that have closed programming codes.

Many Linux distros already have it installed, for more info and download please visit their website. You can also add it to a USB pen drive with Portable Apps with to carry your messenger with you.