Subject: [Wocky] Jabber feedback

From: Christine L Moulen <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2006 10:29:52 -0500

Hi,
I've been using MIT Jabber since the pilot was first announced.  But I
don't think I've sent any feedback.

I've been a GAIM user for quite a while (mainly the AIM protocol), and
haven't really had any issues with the client itself.

Some thoughts:

Jabber has come in handy several times as an MIT Windows instant
messenger.  I'm a long time user of Zephyr and AIM, but Zephyr never
really caught on for Windows, and co-workers here don't tend to know
each other's AIM screen names.
I've been able to quickly solve problems with co-workers across campus
when a phone wasn't handy, or it was unwieldy to type and hold the
phone, and email would have taken longer.

One thing that bugs me a bit is the inability to be signed in at more
than one location.  E.g. I'm usually working in both Athena and Windows,
and not necessarily paying attention to both.  But I can only have one
MIT Jabber signed in.  That's one thing that's nice about Zephyr, I can
use it from many places at once.

And one little issue with the client.  As I said, I use more than one
protocol.  I've got 2 accounts set to auto-login, but prompt me for the
password.  I've found that if I sign in to Jabber first, the AIM account
prompt disappears, and I have to connect that account manually.  If I
sign into AIM first, Jabber waits for me to login.

Finally, a couple people have noticed that GAIM supports a Zephyr
protocol.  It works from Athena.  But we're wondering if it can be used
from Windows.  I know that's not Jabber, so if it's beyond the scope of
this pilot, no problem.

Thanks,
Christine

-- 
Christine Moulen
Library Systems Manager
MIT Libraries, E25-131
617-253-0757
fax: 617-253-4462

---

From: Greg Hudson <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 2006 11:47:12 -0500

Thanks very much for the feedback.  I have a couple of responses:

On Wed, 2006-03-29 at 10:29 -0500, Christine L Moulen wrote:
> than one location.

You can do this by using a different resource name at the two locations,
but it's not nearly as transparent as it is with Zephyr.  Messages sent
to [email-masked] (with no specified resource) will only go to one of
your two locations, and if you join a multi-user chat from both
locations, you will have to use different nicknames.

This is a known downside to Jabber relative to Zephyr, and we are
keeping our eyes open for possible improvements.

> from Windows.  I know that's not Jabber, so if it's beyond the scope of

Unfortunately, this isn't possible.

Thanks again.

Greg Hudson
Infrastructure Software Development and Architecture
Information Services and Technology