ICQ-Clients for Linux
Do you want to get a note when your friends
are online to challenge them to a duel, change files or chat with them?
Then you should get an ICQ account.
Although Linux is not officially supported you find enough free
clients!
[ ICQJava | gnomeicu
| LICQ | kicq | Micq
| GTK-ICQ & gicq | ICQstep.app
| -- links --]
With
ICQ you are able to create a list of people with ICQ-accounts
and then get informed if one of them is online. Probably most PC-owners
already known ICQ but that it is usable
with Linux is not so well
known. A big
collection of ICQ clients exists for Linux, all of
them having their strength and weakness. A huge
list is available
at
http://www.portup.com/~gyandl/icq/
. Although
Mirabilis promised a
Linux
version it seems that they loose this race to Linux. The GPL versions
are quite good and saved Mirabilis some work. If you still
believe
in an official Mirabilis Linux version you can sign up at their
homepage
to get informed at once they release it.
If you do
not want to
wait that long you should have
a closer look at the following clients.
If you want to be sure that your ICQ version supports all (or at least
most) of the ICQ
standards you should use the
Java version
coming directly from
Mirabilis.
This program functions with all the latest versions of the Java Development
Kit (JDK 1.1.3-2.1 or higher), even with Linux (
Screenshot).
A Java version has many
advantages but it also has some
disadvantages.
The program needs a lot of resources which is not wanted as a small client.
It takes a long time to start and reacts
slowly to user input if
you do not have enough memory. The program often
crashes if you
try to chat but this may depend on the JDK-version.
Additional Java
does not support the
multi-user function. The configuration files
are saved in a subdirectory of the program and every user has to copy the
whole program into his/her home directory. It is possible to link other
directories but at least the conf directory has to be placed in the home
directory. A "."-configuration file in the home directory is
not supported.
Mirabilis seems to be satisfied
with this Java version although calling it a
beta and it has
not
been
improved for a long time.
A special version for
GNOME users is
gnomeicu.
This ICQ-version is able to place itself as an
applet in the GNOME
panel and then shows the current status. It displays when you are online
or when you get news (
Screenshot). Of course the
version is programmed (like "all" GNOME program ) in
GTK+, runs
fast and stable but should only be used if you use the GNOME panel.
With
gnomeicu it is also possible
to
sign up at Mirabilis and you do not have to choose ICQJava for
this.
One of the
best developed
ICQ-versions is
LICQ
(
Screenshot). This program has been programmed with
QT-libraries
but is not a KDE-version.
For a short time
LICQ supported
skins and you were able to
change the appearance after your liking.
For some older versions of
LICQ
you can get a
WindowMaker-patch. This patch (also useable if you
use another window manager) changes the icons of the program to notify
you that you have mail or when you are online. The patch versions are always
a little lower than the latest
LICQ
version.
Kicq is an ICQ
clone for
KDE users and looks similar to the
Java version
(
Screenshot). The program is still in a
beta
state and does not offer all the functions ICQJava does. A
graphical
user interface for configuring
Kicq
has already been implemented
. It requires the library
icqlib.
Thanks to the author
Matthew Smith there
exists a clone with
the name
Micq. This
program is
text based and does not have a GUI (
Screenshot).
For this reason Micq is a good choice when ever
no x-server is available
and you have to work with an ANSI
terminal.
Micq
does
not support
chat but you can request at ICQ with
this tool. The password does not need to be saved in a file,
Micq
will ask for it at every login. This tool is
small,
fast
and
stable but you will miss a fronted if you are used to work with
X.
These two clones use the
GTK libraries.
GTK-ICQ
is further develop than
gicq
and offers support for
GNOME, chat and a search for other ICQ-users.
Because GTK+ (version 1.1.12 or higher) supports
skins GTK-ICQ
supports it, too.
gicq (
Screenshot)
bases on micq and also needs the
library offered by
micq.
Requesting at ICQ is not supported and just a few functions exist like
adding people to the contact list,
sending and
receiving
mails.
ICQstep.app
is not so well known and stays in a deep state of development. The
frontend
has already been completed but the
biggest part of the
network
code is still
missing. The name tells us the motivation for this
product: The frontend has to fit to a
NextStep surrounding and therefore
it fits perfectly to window managers like
WindowMaker or
AfterStep.
But it seems that we have to
wait a little bit longer before this
clone will be useable.
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