part 3 of my procrastination series.
i’ve been using aim some since aol has shut down the jabber relay, and after messing w/ the client some (getting rid of the ads for one things), i do have to admit that it has some neat features and seems better assembled / way better written than icq. the text settings export, text config files, and buddy icons are slick. however, some weaknesses: can’t create aliases for buddy names, no msg delivery when a user is offline, weak presence settings, and (most importantly for me) no message archiving / history. this really makes im useless as an actual useful tool. now, admittedly, having logs of yak back to 1997 is excessive, but there’s just too much useful info that i want to look up even in passing conversation. names, numbers, urls, etc. the best ideas come up when one’s passing the breeze. if only aol would play ball with an open messaging standard, i wouldn’t have to juggle between client features and the services that my friends use… or at least allow icq and aim to interact (hey if jabber can add relays, why can’t aim and icq?)… looks like i’ll be sticking to clunky chunky icq as my primary tool for now though.