I've spent the last couple of days looking into instant messaging on the
Newton platform (MP2k). I hope somebody will share a differing experience,
because my results were rather disappointing.
The three options I discovered were:
* NCQ 1.0b. This ICQ client by Pablo Resines was able to log on and receive
messages. Unfortunately, only two of the 50 or so test messages I sent were
received by the client on the other end, although the client was able to see
my Newton as logged in. (I tried with three different desktop ICQ clients,
with luck in only 1, Proteus for Mac OS X.)
Although the interface on this client isn't the realtime "conversation" I've
come to expect with desktop IM clients, it came the closest to functioning
properly. It is now freeware, after formerly being shareware.
* NewtJab 1.2. NewtJab by Eric Schneck was able to connect to the specified
Jabber server and download my roster of contacts. But it would not receive
or send messages at all, saying it either couldn't resolve the host (again,
after properly downloading the roster) or timed out.
NewtJab's interface was close to a desktop client, although missing line
breaks after some error messages made the text run together.
http://newton.guhl.net/newton/newtjabber/
* NIM (alpha). NIM by Jake Bordens has a promising interface, and it too was
able to log in to my specified Jabber server and download my roster. But I
suspect this software isn't yet feature complete, as not only could it not
receive messages sent from another client but I couldn't figure out how to
send either. I'm not sure if the feature is there.
http://www.allaboutjake.com/newton/newtonIM.htm
Like I said, I hope somebody has better experiences they could share and I
could possibly gain from. Or, if anybody who hasn't tried wants to give the
clients a whirl, knock yourself out.
I laud the efforts of these talented developers, and wish I had a fraction
of their skills to attempt a similar effort. It's too bad, though,
especially now with a seemingly functional 802.11 driver, that there isn't a
better-functioning IM client available for the Newton.
Thanks for reading, and cheers--
--Jesse
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