Forward to the future! Switch from ICQ to Jabber
*Preamble*
In connection with the global trend of transition of smart people to Jabber, and inert resistance to this transition by people accustomed to ICQ, it was decided to write a well-reasoned qualitative article about why all the same it is worth changing the means of communication.
So, the article:
For many of us, ICQ is synonymous with the words “communication on the Internet,” we use it on business and for fun, we find new friends with it and keep in touch with old ones. Over the years, this program has accumulated hundreds of contacts in the list and a long history of correspondence. In general, everything seems to be satisfied, and the idea of ​​switching to something new immediately comes up against the logical question: “Why? I feel so good. ”
So, Jabber is not just another ICQ client. This is a new generation online communication system.
She replaced the outdated messengers, whose place has long been on the Internet dump.
')
1. Wide range of functionality. Opportunities tend to infinity
Jabber, in addition to standard functions such as the transfer of messages and files, status changes, offers additional options, such as:
The XML data transfer format used by Jabber, because of its structure, is acceptable for transmitting anything. And the openness of the standard allows you to protect users from transmitting unwanted data.
2. Freedom of choice
If there is one service for registration in ICQ, plus several regional distributors, the choice of services for registration on the Jabber network is not that rich, it is almost limitless! Starting from the personal server of your neighbor-admin and ending with the official jabber.org . In addition, services such as LiveJournal and Gmail provide Jabber accounts automatically when you register for them.
In this case, all the servers are connected to each other, that is, by registering on one of them, you can safely communicate with users on other servers.
The client programs for Jabber are a great variety, among them are universal - QIP Infium , Miranda specialized - Psi , Pandion and others .
3. Safe
Jabber supports such data protection and encryption tools as SSL / TSL , PGP / GPG , SecureIM , OTR .
ICQ can not boast of any of them without the help of third-party programs.
In addition, Jabber is an IM system with decentralized servers. That is, if one of them fails, it will not cause the fall of the entire network in general. And its support by such serious services as Google and others, testifies to the correctness of the choice.
4. Absolutely free and open
Many people believe that ICQ is free. In fact, this is not quite the case; for using the AOL service, it forces us to watch ads and thus gains benefits. Of course, advertising is shown only by the official ICQ client, third-party programs do not. But they still download it! Otherwise - disconnect.
Total: a simple banner of 463x60 pixels, an average size of 8.3 KB is downloaded from the AOL server every ten minutes ... During the working day it is downloaded:
8.3 KB * 8 hours * 6 times / hour ~ = 400 KB / day
This month comes out: 400 * 25 = 10 MB of pure advertising, the money for which goes straight into AOL's pocket.
If the advertisement is not such a strong argument, then you can go to the ICQ protocol itself.
In recent years, it has changed dozens of times for no particular reason. As a result of these changes, various glitches began: messages did not reach the addressee or came several times, and sometimes they surfaced a few days after departure.
The reasons for these mystical modifications of the protocol are unknown and, in general, uninteresting to ordinary users, but sometimes it seems that their main goal is to fight against competing programs ICQ. Each time a protocol was changed, third-party clients (QIP, Miranda, and others) stopped working correctly, developers had to hastily redo them and release new versions, and users, respectively, had to download them.
Jabber is an opensource IM system. That is, all source codes of programs and protocol are open and well documented. This allows developers-enthusiasts to write high-quality free programs, and opensource-community - to supplement them, fix bugs and check for vulnerabilities.
Using open source software, you may not worry that someone wants to steal your personal information or otherwise harm it. All software code is verified and approved by the community.
5. No faceless numbers
ICQ UIN is often a nine-digit set of numbers that does not say anything about its owner, and it is not always easy to remember.
And if you have a beautiful number? Have something to brag about? It may soon not be.
Most of the short or beautiful ICQ numbers are stolen, some are several times. Hijacking an ICQ number is not so difficult, there are even entire websites that are engaged in the resale / distribution of beautiful stolen numbers ...
Jabber instead of faceless numbers uses unique identifiers nickname @ server (for example, vpupkin@jabber.org), which are easily remembered, and even better when they match the e-mail address. Also, JabberID is very hard to steal, and in general, why?
6. Down with the language barrier
Have you ever had to communicate on ICQ with foreigners, or just with people who are in another country? Most likely, they, knowing your language and having a dictionary at hand, will still not understand what you have written, because they will receive a set of unreadable characters or question marks. What's the matter? In the coding!
There are a large number of encodings, each region has its own, often they are incompatible with each other (especially Cyrillic with exclusively Latin encodings).
Jabber has no problems with encodings. For communication, one universal utf-8 encoding is used, which contains characters of almost all languages ​​of the world, as well as a large number of special characters and even Chinese characters.
7. International Standard
Jabber as a corporate communication standard has chosen a large number of corporations. Google, LiveJournal and other Internet services offer their communication systems based on Jabber and fully compatible with it.
8. Unlimited communication
Probably, more than once in ICQ one had to see: “The message is too long and cannot be delivered.” In Jabber there are no restrictions on the length of messages, their size and frequency of distribution.
9. You can forget about spam
The structure of Jabber networks by itself almost completely eliminates the possibility of spam. No more advertising and annoying messages.
10. Anywhere
In one Jabber-account, you can simultaneously log in from several computers without fear of losing important correspondence. Some services (in particular, GoogleTalk ) save the correspondence history on the server, that is, no matter where, under which client and system you communicated in your Jabber, not a single word will be lost. Also, to use Jabber, it is not necessary to have an installed client at hand.
Enough browser!
11. Without losing old connections
Switching to Jabber does not mean that all contacts from other protocols, acquired by overwork, will be lost. Not at all! Jabber implements a system of gateways - gateways to all popular ІM protocols, such as AIM, ICQ, MSN, SMS (yes, good old mobile SMS) and others. That is, having only one Jabber account, you can communicate with people from other networks, and the old contact list will not go anywhere. It is even better when it is replenished with new Jabbermans :).
Here you can see a list of public icq-gateways, and how to configure them.
12. Stop Fearing New
Most often, the fear of moving away from our old place, fear of the new, keeps us from moving to something new. Do not be afraid, this is evolution, and it is quite natural.
Register a Jabber account on any server, even a child can.
Client programs are easy to use and easy to configure.
The gates are also no big deal, everything is simple and clear.
So, out of doubt! Forward to the future!
The last item. For those who have made a choice
The first step is to choose a client:
For windows
MacOS X
Linux
There are also cross-platform clients that are independent of the operating system :
More complete list of clients
For familiarization with Jabber, Pandion is probably best suited - free, small (1.2 MB) and pleasant to use. A step-by-step setup wizard will help you perform actions such as registering, connecting gateways, etc. No difficulties should arise even for novice users.
Lover of breadth of functionality and settings fit Psi.
After that you need to choose a server for registration.
If you are a happy owner of a Gmail account or Livejournal - you can skip this step =)
Most common servers
List of public Jabber servers
Registration and connection
Registration on the selected server is carried out using the client program. There is nothing difficult in this, you just need to enter your nickname and password, if you want to fill in personal information.
Configuring the client - also no difficulty
You must enter:
Additional links, articles, manuals
Jabber Community Official Website
Jabber on Wikipedia
Jabber vs ICQ - MirandaIM Wiki
List of ICQ transports. Howto on their setup
Article and Psi configuration links for working with ICQ gates
Psi configuration for GTalk
Setting up GoogleTalk
Configure QIP Infium for LiveJournal
Setting ICQ gates in PSI
Authorship and thanks
Further reading is not necessary =)
It so happened that a whole bunch of people worked on this article, so:
Authorship - meako .
Editing and correction of the Ukrainian version - nilb0g .
Translation into Russian - Skakruk .
Correction of the Russian version - sunnyfox .
Special thanks to all the people from whose articles the material was taken. In general, no one is forgotten, nothing is forgotten =)
Thanks to the creators of Jabber for Jabber.
Many thanks to all who read to the end and made their choice =)
There is also a Ukrainian version of this article.
In connection with the global trend of transition of smart people to Jabber, and inert resistance to this transition by people accustomed to ICQ, it was decided to write a well-reasoned qualitative article about why all the same it is worth changing the means of communication.
So, the article:
For many of us, ICQ is synonymous with the words “communication on the Internet,” we use it on business and for fun, we find new friends with it and keep in touch with old ones. Over the years, this program has accumulated hundreds of contacts in the list and a long history of correspondence. In general, everything seems to be satisfied, and the idea of ​​switching to something new immediately comes up against the logical question: “Why? I feel so good. ”
So, Jabber is not just another ICQ client. This is a new generation online communication system.
She replaced the outdated messengers, whose place has long been on the Internet dump.
')
1. Wide range of functionality. Opportunities tend to infinity
Jabber, in addition to standard functions such as the transfer of messages and files, status changes, offers additional options, such as:
- Conferences (themed chat rooms for unlimited users)
- voice chat (e.g. GoogleTalk)
- video chat support and more.
The XML data transfer format used by Jabber, because of its structure, is acceptable for transmitting anything. And the openness of the standard allows you to protect users from transmitting unwanted data.
2. Freedom of choice
If there is one service for registration in ICQ, plus several regional distributors, the choice of services for registration on the Jabber network is not that rich, it is almost limitless! Starting from the personal server of your neighbor-admin and ending with the official jabber.org . In addition, services such as LiveJournal and Gmail provide Jabber accounts automatically when you register for them.
In this case, all the servers are connected to each other, that is, by registering on one of them, you can safely communicate with users on other servers.
The client programs for Jabber are a great variety, among them are universal - QIP Infium , Miranda specialized - Psi , Pandion and others .
3. Safe
Jabber supports such data protection and encryption tools as SSL / TSL , PGP / GPG , SecureIM , OTR .
ICQ can not boast of any of them without the help of third-party programs.
In addition, Jabber is an IM system with decentralized servers. That is, if one of them fails, it will not cause the fall of the entire network in general. And its support by such serious services as Google and others, testifies to the correctness of the choice.
4. Absolutely free and open
Many people believe that ICQ is free. In fact, this is not quite the case; for using the AOL service, it forces us to watch ads and thus gains benefits. Of course, advertising is shown only by the official ICQ client, third-party programs do not. But they still download it! Otherwise - disconnect.
Total: a simple banner of 463x60 pixels, an average size of 8.3 KB is downloaded from the AOL server every ten minutes ... During the working day it is downloaded:
8.3 KB * 8 hours * 6 times / hour ~ = 400 KB / day
This month comes out: 400 * 25 = 10 MB of pure advertising, the money for which goes straight into AOL's pocket.
If the advertisement is not such a strong argument, then you can go to the ICQ protocol itself.
In recent years, it has changed dozens of times for no particular reason. As a result of these changes, various glitches began: messages did not reach the addressee or came several times, and sometimes they surfaced a few days after departure.
The reasons for these mystical modifications of the protocol are unknown and, in general, uninteresting to ordinary users, but sometimes it seems that their main goal is to fight against competing programs ICQ. Each time a protocol was changed, third-party clients (QIP, Miranda, and others) stopped working correctly, developers had to hastily redo them and release new versions, and users, respectively, had to download them.
Jabber is an opensource IM system. That is, all source codes of programs and protocol are open and well documented. This allows developers-enthusiasts to write high-quality free programs, and opensource-community - to supplement them, fix bugs and check for vulnerabilities.
Using open source software, you may not worry that someone wants to steal your personal information or otherwise harm it. All software code is verified and approved by the community.
5. No faceless numbers
ICQ UIN is often a nine-digit set of numbers that does not say anything about its owner, and it is not always easy to remember.
And if you have a beautiful number? Have something to brag about? It may soon not be.
Most of the short or beautiful ICQ numbers are stolen, some are several times. Hijacking an ICQ number is not so difficult, there are even entire websites that are engaged in the resale / distribution of beautiful stolen numbers ...
Jabber instead of faceless numbers uses unique identifiers nickname @ server (for example, vpupkin@jabber.org), which are easily remembered, and even better when they match the e-mail address. Also, JabberID is very hard to steal, and in general, why?
6. Down with the language barrier
Have you ever had to communicate on ICQ with foreigners, or just with people who are in another country? Most likely, they, knowing your language and having a dictionary at hand, will still not understand what you have written, because they will receive a set of unreadable characters or question marks. What's the matter? In the coding!
There are a large number of encodings, each region has its own, often they are incompatible with each other (especially Cyrillic with exclusively Latin encodings).
Jabber has no problems with encodings. For communication, one universal utf-8 encoding is used, which contains characters of almost all languages ​​of the world, as well as a large number of special characters and even Chinese characters.
7. International Standard
Jabber as a corporate communication standard has chosen a large number of corporations. Google, LiveJournal and other Internet services offer their communication systems based on Jabber and fully compatible with it.
8. Unlimited communication
Probably, more than once in ICQ one had to see: “The message is too long and cannot be delivered.” In Jabber there are no restrictions on the length of messages, their size and frequency of distribution.
9. You can forget about spam
The structure of Jabber networks by itself almost completely eliminates the possibility of spam. No more advertising and annoying messages.
10. Anywhere
In one Jabber-account, you can simultaneously log in from several computers without fear of losing important correspondence. Some services (in particular, GoogleTalk ) save the correspondence history on the server, that is, no matter where, under which client and system you communicated in your Jabber, not a single word will be lost. Also, to use Jabber, it is not necessary to have an installed client at hand.
Enough browser!
11. Without losing old connections
Switching to Jabber does not mean that all contacts from other protocols, acquired by overwork, will be lost. Not at all! Jabber implements a system of gateways - gateways to all popular ІM protocols, such as AIM, ICQ, MSN, SMS (yes, good old mobile SMS) and others. That is, having only one Jabber account, you can communicate with people from other networks, and the old contact list will not go anywhere. It is even better when it is replenished with new Jabbermans :).
Here you can see a list of public icq-gateways, and how to configure them.
12. Stop Fearing New
Most often, the fear of moving away from our old place, fear of the new, keeps us from moving to something new. Do not be afraid, this is evolution, and it is quite natural.
Register a Jabber account on any server, even a child can.
Client programs are easy to use and easy to configure.
The gates are also no big deal, everything is simple and clear.
So, out of doubt! Forward to the future!
The last item. For those who have made a choice
The first step is to choose a client:
For windows
MacOS X
Linux
There are also cross-platform clients that are independent of the operating system :
More complete list of clients
For familiarization with Jabber, Pandion is probably best suited - free, small (1.2 MB) and pleasant to use. A step-by-step setup wizard will help you perform actions such as registering, connecting gateways, etc. No difficulties should arise even for novice users.
Lover of breadth of functionality and settings fit Psi.
After that you need to choose a server for registration.
If you are a happy owner of a Gmail account or Livejournal - you can skip this step =)
Most common servers
- jabber.org - Official Jabber Project Server
- jabber.ru - First Russian server
- jabber.snc.ru - The second Russian server on Sakhalin
- jabber.kiev.ua - Ukraine. Kiev server
- jabber.org.by - Belarusian server.
List of public Jabber servers
Registration and connection
Registration on the selected server is carried out using the client program. There is nothing difficult in this, you just need to enter your nickname and password, if you want to fill in personal information.
Configuring the client - also no difficulty
You must enter:
- JabberID (user_name@address.server)
- Password
- Port (optional, depending on server)
Additional links, articles, manuals
Jabber Community Official Website
Jabber on Wikipedia
Jabber vs ICQ - MirandaIM Wiki
List of ICQ transports. Howto on their setup
Article and Psi configuration links for working with ICQ gates
Psi configuration for GTalk
Setting up GoogleTalk
Configure QIP Infium for LiveJournal
Setting ICQ gates in PSI
Authorship and thanks
Further reading is not necessary =)
It so happened that a whole bunch of people worked on this article, so:
Authorship - meako .
Editing and correction of the Ukrainian version - nilb0g .
Translation into Russian - Skakruk .
Correction of the Russian version - sunnyfox .
Special thanks to all the people from whose articles the material was taken. In general, no one is forgotten, nothing is forgotten =)
Thanks to the creators of Jabber for Jabber.
Many thanks to all who read to the end and made their choice =)
There is also a Ukrainian version of this article.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/18690/
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