Pidgin (software)

Pidgin (also known as Gaim) is a instant messaging client that can work on Linux, Mac OS X and Windows. The software can use most instant messaging protocols, which will let the user log into different instant messaging services from one program.

The number of Pidgin users is thought to be more than 3 million in 2007.Luke Schierer discusses Pidgin, Open source and life . Interview by PC World Australia, 10 October 2007
Released under the terms of the GNU General Public License, Pidgin is free software.

 Supported protocols 

.NET Messenger Service
OSCAR (AIM/ICQ/.Mac)
XMPP (Jabber, Google Talk)
Gadu-Gadu
Internet Relay Chat
MySpaceIM
Novell GroupWise
SILC
Yahoo! Instant Messenger
Zephyr
Lotus Sametime
Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) (only chat at present)
Bonjour (Apple's implementation of Zeroconf)

 History 
The program was made in or before 1999 by Mark Spencer, an Auburn University sophomore. It was made to give the features of AOL Instant Messenger for Linux.

 Naming dispute 
The original name was GAIM, which stood for GTK+ AOL Instant Messenger. After pressure from AOL, the program was renamed to gaim.

However, on April 6 2007, the project development team announced the results of their talks with AOL. This included some name changes: gaim became Pidgin, libgaim became libpurple, and gaim-text became finch.

Due to the legal problems, version 2.0 of the software was stuck in beta stages. Following the talks, it was said that the first official release of Pidgin 2.0.0 was hoped to happen during the two weeks from April 8, 2007.  However, Pidgin 2.0 did not release on time, but on April 22, 2007.

Pidgin 2.0.0 was released on May 3, 2007. This was the first version to be called Pidgin. It also contained a completely new graphics design.

 References 

 Other websites 

Pidgin website, with "Planet Pidgin"  (developer blog)
Pidgin project on SourceForge
#pidgin on freenode

Category:Linux software
Category:Cross-platform software
Category:Instant messaging software