New Messenger, New Features
| Tuesday, June 20th, 2006 | --jr |
Just found out that Yahoo! Messenger Beta Version 8 is out. So, why use this one?
Well, a bunch of reasons.
First off, this version introduces Plug-Ins. Yep, you can build modules that folks can install into messenger (just like the Launchcast, 360, Answers, Maps, eBay & Amazon ones.
Second, you can play sounds and MP3s while doing voice chats (I can't see a way to do that with normal chat, but now that I think of it, that's a good thing). I see you can also set "custom" ringtones for certain contacts (Huh, it'd be nice to be able to do that for contacts in a group).
Looks like they also added a tiny search box to the conversation windows. I like it. It fits on the menu bar and doesn't eat real-estate.
As a nifty easter egg, Windows+Y now brings up messenger from anywhere and focuses on the Contact Search box. (I'd be nice if this worked like Windows+M. That key combo minimizes all the windows, Shift+Windows+M restores them. It's a great way to get to the desktop.)
As always, if you want to just run the lean-mean version, you can turn off most of the new things by going under Messenger | Show/Hide >.
Oh, and something else I found out. The long heralded merge between Yahoo Messenger and MSN is coming soon. In fact, the messenger team has upped the list limit to 1000 friends in order to accomodate it. Sorry, no date on when "soon" is.
Not a bad upgrade.
June 20th, 2006 at 12:02 pm
Any word on an OSX update? If so, please tell me that it will accomodate 10.3.9!
June 20th, 2006 at 1:13 pm
No, no word about an OSX update. Funny thing is that there are a lot of engineer folks here who use OSX.
In fairness to the Messenger team, I’ll note that there isn’t a lot of folks working on Messenger, and the non-windows versions are actually volunteer efforts. They are VERY aware that the non-windows versions are way behind and would love to get them up-to-date, but, frankly, there’s bigger fish to fry. (Fighting spammers and abuse, merging with MSN Messenger, fixing bugs, etc.)
The good news is that when the OSX update comes out, I’m fairly certain that it will work with the latest version of OS that Apple produces, since all those MacBooks wandering around campus will demand it.
June 28th, 2006 at 3:34 pm
[...] In a comment posted earlier by Earnest, he asked, “Any word on an OSX update?” The word is: Yup. [...]
August 13th, 2007 at 5:20 am
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