What is up with Pidgin (prev: Gaim)

[kwaanens]

April 6th: "Now that the settlement is signed, we hope to have the final Pidgin 2.0.0 release late this week or early next."

It is now 20th, and there's no changes to the web page, no packages, no nothing. Why do these guys first get my hopes up, then disappoint me horribly? I thought maybe they had a good excuse what, with the legal problems and stuff, but looks like they might be procrastinaters.

I loved Gaim, and will love Pidgin, and that's my general problem. I keep getting på hopes up for an update, because they tell us it's coming. And after a while of daily checks to see if something's coming, I give up.

Such a dissappointment!

- Ketil

[TimJBart]

I just came on the forum to ask just that, where is Pidgin 2.0!? It's been weeks and no news.

[kwaanens]

Look at Milestone tickets here: http://developer.pidgin.im/

For example: Logo hasn't had any ticket-changes since January.
A designer should be able to do this in an hour. maybe it's already done, but there's no way to know, because they don't communicate it.

The same tickets (more or less) have been there since pidgin was announced 2 weeks ago. I remember I thought Gaim was more or less dead, and suddenly they announce Pidgin. I'm starting to get the dead-ish feeling again...

- Ketil

[rko618]

Look at Milestone tickets here: http://developer.pidgin.im/

For example: Logo hasn't had any ticket-changes since January.
A designer should be able to do this in an hour. maybe it's already done, but there's no way to know, because they don't communicate it.

The same tickets (more or less) have been there since pidgin was announced 2 weeks ago. I remember I thought Gaim was more or less dead, and suddenly they announce Pidgin. I'm starting to get the dead-ish feeling again...

- Ketil

That's a shame because I really Gaim 2.0........ a year and a half ago when the first beta came out...

What are the gaim alternatives besides Kopete?

[TimJBart]

aMSN
http://amsn-project.net/

But I personally much prefer GAIM so going to wait and see what happens with pidgin

[sunexplodes]

What's the huge rush for it? What will 2.0 be able to do that 2.0 Beta 6 can't do? Is 2.0 going to relieve some degree of undue stress?

I use beta 6 and it's great. I'll upgrade to 2.0 final when it comes out, but i fail to see why this issue is so pressing.

[karellen]

for me gaim 2.0 beta works just fine :)

[Nonno Bassotto]

I think the point here is if it is developed anymore at all...

[sunexplodes]

I think that's a lot of jumping to conclusions. There are a lot of projects out there with MUCH slower development cycles. It's impatience.

[kwaanens]

No, it's not impatience.

It's about devs doing one (at least) of these things:
1) Overrating how fast development will go
2) Lying
3) Poor communcation

I really do not think devs are lying, so I think it's down to overrating how fast they work, and not communicating it.

AFAIK Gaim was never facing legal problems that would make future develpoment of the application uncertain. And the devs themselves must have been able to program and stuff.
So, I would expect that after announcing Pidgin 2.0 the release would be just days away, and judging by the the announcement, it looked like that was the case. But it's nt.

Generally I like having an official stable version (if there were no significant problems, we would have an official stable just like "that"). And I'm also annoyed (although Gaim/Pidgin devs probably are blameless in this), that Pidgin did not reach Feisty's feature freeze.
But in the end, I love Gaim, and would like promises about it to be kept.
Don't get me wrong, I love the hell out of these guys for making Pidgin, and making it free. But I'm still a user. I want to evolve.

- Ketil

[gamma]

Well on a slightly technical side of things libgaim (now libpurple) is pretty solid. Someone could easily make a UI fork if they ever felt like it. AdiumX uses gaim for a backend.

Personally I think Pidgin will be great. The UI has changed a lot from 1.5 and it looks similar to Adium now. I personally love how the status (away, available, etc) is built into the buddy list so you don't have an away message window always open. The art looks great too.

Personally I'd rather have something released "when it's finished" instead of rushed. Although like an above poster stated 2.0 has been in beta for quite some time now. Are they pulling a Web 2.0 and using the beta term loosely?

What they could do is update the status of the project. Maybe make a request that they're in need of developers or something.

I'm guessing the lack of updates has to do something with the fact its almost finals week for most colleges so many of the teenage developers aren't working on projects right now.

[Reb]

Please, Pidgin is anything but dead, look at the mailing list...

[loell]

its alive http://www.pidgin.im/

but i think the develepment will still be slug paced.

[DoktorSeven]

I have faith that pidgin will have a release whenever they are ready to release it. Releasing a 2.0 version is a big deal, and I figure they just want to be sure they get it right.

[matthinckley]

If you look at the timeline page (http://developer.pidgin.im/timeline) you can see it is being worked on actively. At least it doesn't look dead to me.

[stokedfish]

Kopete, nothing else.

[syxbit]

the following is absolutely unacceptable
taken directly from pidgin.im

'The "we hope to have the final Pidgin 2.0.0 release late this week or early next" seems to have confused a lot of people...'

how on earth are people confused?
they said it would be out early next week, and it wasn't.
that's not confusing at all, and people are CORRECT in wondering why it still isn't out.

I'm well aware of any possible excuse. It's free/open source, people have jobs etc.... but don't promise a date, then not deliver, and then wonder why people are asking about when it will be released.

I've used Adium on OS X, and it's far superior.

[TravisNewman]

they said "we hope"
They did not say "this is set in stone and if we don't release on this day you have full reign to slander us."
They did NOT promise a release date. They didn't even SAY a date.

They ran into bugs, they're fixing them. Isn't that more important than releasing?

[syxbit]

but their estimate was WAY WAY WAY WAY off.
they don't need to write a conversion utility.
just have people rename .gaim to .pidgim.
bugs? how can they introduce bugs? they are only changing the name and theme!

I'm not saying we have the right to slander them, but I think devs should be careful when estimating.
the fact that they were estimating just a few days was odd too!

they may not have given a date, but they have passed every release date they hinted at.
Based on their estimate, even a WORST case senario would have been over a week ago.

still, they do good work, and unfortunately there isn't a better alternative in linux, so I'll have to stick with them ;)

[karellen]

but their estimate was WAY WAY WAY WAY off.
they don't need to write a conversion utility.
just have people rename .gaim to .pidgim.
bugs? how can they introduce bugs? they are only changing the name and theme!

I'm not saying we have the right to slander them, but I think devs should be careful when estimating.
the fact that they were estimating just a few days was odd too!

they may not have given a date, but they have passed every release date they hinted at.
Based on their estimate, even a WORST case senario would have been over a week ago.

still, they do good work, and unfortunately there isn't a better alternative in linux, so I'll have to stick with them ;)

then calm down and use the existing gaim beta. what's all the fuss about?...

[zanglang]

From their repository log messages, seen at http://cia.vc/stats/project/Pidgin

event counters

The last message was received 2.58 minutes ago at 01:51 on Apr 25, 2007
10 messages so far today, 45 messages yesterday
84 messages so far this week, 133 messages last week
308 messages so far this month, 0 messages last month
308 messages since the first one, 1.48 weeks ago, for an average of 0.81 hours between messages

Don't worry, there's development going on alright. I suspect the developers are too busy doing their own thing and coordinating with the new Google SoC students that no one has bothered to step up and say, "Aight. Feature freeze. No more feature check-ins, we'll release in 7 days." or something like that... but hey, Beta 6 works fine, I don't mind a slight delay in their next release. ;)

[jiminycricket]

Kopete, nothing else.

Same here. Where is webcam support? Three or so years after the gaim-vv fork and still nothing in mainline GAIM for silly reasons. I don't want to sound like a whiner, but I agree that Kopete and aMSN are excellent -now- for people who need that support.

[ricardisimo]

I've only read two or three entries in this thread and those alone have compelled me to write the following:

I'm thankful we have anything at all in the way in IM, much less a highly stable multi-ID, multi-server util. Thank you a million times over to those responsible. Release Pidgin at your leisure.

...

Did I say "thank you" yet?

[syxbit]

2 things
1. I don't mind how long they take upon release, but they said it would be out last week. they simply shouldn't have made that claim, only to then accuse people of misunderstanding. How exactly do you misunderstand a clear release date? (well, i know it wasn't an exact date, but they said end of this week or next).
we had the entire feisty fawn testing forum wondering/hoping it would make it out in time for feisty

2. they're not adding features, there is no such thing as a feature freeze. They said it would be the same as gaim 2.0b6 with the changed name/theme.

[TravisNewman]

2 things
1. I don't mind how long they take upon release, but they said it would be out last week.
Ugh, NO they didn't. they said they HOPED it would be out last week.

they simply shouldn't have made that claim
They didn't make any claim except saying what they hoped. Would you get upset at me if I said "I hope the Steelers win the superbowl" and then they didn't? Would I have broken my promise, or gone against my claims? No, because all I said is what I HOPED.

only to then accuse people of misunderstanding.
There was a misunderstanding. People misunderstood "hope" as "this is set in stone"

How exactly do you misunderstand a clear release date?
There wasn't a release date, and it wasn't even clear that they would be releasing when they said they hoped, because they used the word "hope."



2. they're not adding features, there is no such thing as a feature freeze. They said it would be the same as gaim 2.0b6 with the changed name/theme.

Then why does it matter so much?

The conversion utility is worthwhile, not everone is comfortable changing things around manually, especially on the Windows side of the mountain.

[Ateo]

Dude. You really don't understand software development do you? It'll be released when it's ready. Would you rather have a broken application or a stable one? If you don't care, then why don't you join the Pidgin dev team and quite your bitching? That way you'll have the most current version. Oh. And don't complain that you don't know how to do that.. You can learn, unless you're dumb.

I check the pidgin site every other day. Yea. It's a bummer that's it's not out but I don't go home crying and write a 3 page column on my disappointment.

[drfalkor]

What about making a fork of pidgin ? With a new crew, new ideas and working at cam support ? a fork would be great ! + faster dev cycles ! :)

[TravisNewman]

what about just making a plugin to add the support? Seems less intrusive. Forks are usually a bad idea unless there's a real need. It seems cam support is the only thing really lacking

[OmniCloud]

Has anyone ever had a problem with the sound in Gaim? When I test it it's fine, but I doesn't respond when I IM:huh:

Hmm....

I think it's some dependency I probably don't have though...

[riffic]

http://digg.com/software/Pidgin_IM_The_Final_Beta

Pidgin 2.0b7 was released today, looks like its just windows binaries and source. kudos to the person who ends up packaging this for the masses =)

[kwaanens]

They say on the main page that unlike the latest betas, which were really stable, this is a "true" beta. So, even though I can't wait, I'll be waiting. If anyone feels lucky and tries it, please post your results!

- Ketil

[visionaire]

i've never liked gaim, i hope it will be better and nicer now, anyway, aMSN rules!
The new version have sound clips, video and voice conversation, almost all the features the original client have and more

[manmower]

I've been running Pidgin 2.0 beta 7 on Windows for a day, have to say it looks much more polished than the previous betas, beautiful tango-ish icons compared to the ugly Gaim "MSN-men", rounded avatars on the buddy list etc. The changes are mostly cosmetic though so let it be clear that Pidgin = Gaim (this should be obvious to most, but some people in this thread seem confused).

[feranick]

http://www.ubuntugeek.com/install-pidgin-instant-messanger-in-ubuntu.html

[dspari1]

Some of you guys are acting like the world owes you. Honestly, if you don't want to wait, then don't. Complaining about free stuff isn't right.

For the record, I use Kopete, so I'm not being a fanboy.

[jiminycricket]

It's just opinions. Most developers don't read forums like this or they would probably get over-discouraged; at least, I would. The separation between user (forums) + developer (tend to use mailing lists) is a good thing, IMO. I'm ok with getting my webcam support elsewhere, it's just that Pidgin is still the GNOME default and so newbies to Linux won't know about other apps, and will think Linux is behind in terms of supporting webcams.

There's also a discussion thread about replacing it with a new app called Colligo in the Gutsy Gibbon forum.

[TravisNewman]

Which is a bad idea because it doesn't support most protocols yet.