message window features

[Florian Effenberger]

Hello,

I'm fairly new to Pidgin, coming from Windows' Miranda, and I have some
questions where you hopefully can help me. ;-) I tried out several
plugins and read the FAQ, but some features I consider important seem to
be missing.

- Can I set a background color per incoming and outgoing message, to
better distinguish them? I tried the color plugin, but it only can set
text color, not background color.

- Can I put a small line between the messages, also to better
distinguish them? It is only possible to add a single line for a new
message with the appropriate plugin, but not between all messages.

- Can nicknames be removed from IM windows? I already see them in the
title and the tab, so having them next to the time is annoying...

- My biggest problem is about conversation history. I want to close the
message window with Esc (can be set via Pidgin's config file as well).
When I reopen the message window, all past messages should be shown.
When closing the program, all history should be sweeped. This seems to
be impossible with Pidgin. There is a plugin to show the last two or
three messages when reopening the window, but not the whole
conversation. Another plugin for hiding message windows instead of
closing them exists as well, but I can't attach that menu entry to the
Esc button. Any idea on how to achieve that?

Thanks a lot!
Florian

[Luke Schierer]

Post by Florian Effenberger
Hello,
I'm fairly new to Pidgin, coming from Windows' Miranda, and I have some
questions where you hopefully can help me. ;-) I tried out several
plugins and read the FAQ, but some features I consider important seem to
be missing.
- Can I set a background color per incoming and outgoing message, to
better distinguish them? I tried the color plugin, but it only can set
text color, not background color.

The easiest way to do this would be to set your own formatting to
something distinct from your GTK+ theme. The flaw in that approach is
that you send that formatting with your messages. Alternately, a plugin
*could* do this, though I do not know of one that *does.*

Post by Florian Effenberger
- Can I put a small line between the messages, also to better
distinguish them? It is only possible to add a single line for a new
message with the appropriate plugin, but not between all messages.
- Can nicknames be removed from IM windows? I already see them in the
title and the tab, so having them next to the time is annoying...

A plugin could do each of these, though I do not know of one that does.

Post by Florian Effenberger
- My biggest problem is about conversation history. I want to close the
message window with Esc (can be set via Pidgin's config file as well).
When I reopen the message window, all past messages should be shown.
When closing the program, all history should be sweeped. This seems to
be impossible with Pidgin. There is a plugin to show the last two or
three messages when reopening the window, but not the whole
conversation. Another plugin for hiding message windows instead of
closing them exists as well, but I can't attach that menu entry to the
Esc button. Any idea on how to achieve that?

A conversation is defined as the messages writen to a given conversation
tab. When the tab closes, the conversation ends. So the plugins you
have found show the entire conversation, as Pidgin understands it.
There is no more reliable way to demarkate what constitues a given
conversation (there are other approaches, but such as a given time
range, but they do not have fewer failure conditions, simply different
ones).

While it would take more work to design a plugin that would mimic
Miranda's logging & history functionality than it would to write a
plugin for any of your other requests, it is certainly within the realm
of possibility. There are API hooks for a plugin to add a logging
method, and then it would be very nearly if not identical code to the
existing history plugin to display it back.

luke

[Florian Effenberger]

Hi,

thanks for your fast reply, much appreciated!

Maybe I just have to get used to Pidgin. :-) I've been using Miranda for
two years or so, and I really love the history feature, so I'm missing
that at the moment. However, I found an Extended History plugin for
Pidgin, will try that out.

Maybe you can put my ideas on the wishlist!

Florian

[Florian Effenberger]

Hi,

thanks for your fast reply, much appreciated!

Maybe I just have to get used to Pidgin. :-) I've been using Miranda for
two years or so, and I really love the history feature, so I'm missing
that at the moment. However, I found an Extended History plugin for
Pidgin, will try that out.

Maybe you can put my ideas on the wishlist!

Florian

[Florian Effenberger]

Hello,

I'm fairly new to Pidgin, coming from Windows' Miranda, and I have some
questions where you hopefully can help me. ;-) I tried out several
plugins and read the FAQ, but some features I consider important seem to
be missing.

- Can I set a background color per incoming and outgoing message, to
better distinguish them? I tried the color plugin, but it only can set
text color, not background color.

- Can I put a small line between the messages, also to better
distinguish them? It is only possible to add a single line for a new
message with the appropriate plugin, but not between all messages.

- Can nicknames be removed from IM windows? I already see them in the
title and the tab, so having them next to the time is annoying...

- My biggest problem is about conversation history. I want to close the
message window with Esc (can be set via Pidgin's config file as well).
When I reopen the message window, all past messages should be shown.
When closing the program, all history should be sweeped. This seems to
be impossible with Pidgin. There is a plugin to show the last two or
three messages when reopening the window, but not the whole
conversation. Another plugin for hiding message windows instead of
closing them exists as well, but I can't attach that menu entry to the
Esc button. Any idea on how to achieve that?

Thanks a lot!
Florian

[Luke Schierer]

Post by Florian Effenberger
Hello,
I'm fairly new to Pidgin, coming from Windows' Miranda, and I have some
questions where you hopefully can help me. ;-) I tried out several
plugins and read the FAQ, but some features I consider important seem to
be missing.
- Can I set a background color per incoming and outgoing message, to
better distinguish them? I tried the color plugin, but it only can set
text color, not background color.

The easiest way to do this would be to set your own formatting to
something distinct from your GTK+ theme. The flaw in that approach is
that you send that formatting with your messages. Alternately, a plugin
*could* do this, though I do not know of one that *does.*

Post by Florian Effenberger
- Can I put a small line between the messages, also to better
distinguish them? It is only possible to add a single line for a new
message with the appropriate plugin, but not between all messages.
- Can nicknames be removed from IM windows? I already see them in the
title and the tab, so having them next to the time is annoying...

A plugin could do each of these, though I do not know of one that does.

Post by Florian Effenberger
- My biggest problem is about conversation history. I want to close the
message window with Esc (can be set via Pidgin's config file as well).
When I reopen the message window, all past messages should be shown.
When closing the program, all history should be sweeped. This seems to
be impossible with Pidgin. There is a plugin to show the last two or
three messages when reopening the window, but not the whole
conversation. Another plugin for hiding message windows instead of
closing them exists as well, but I can't attach that menu entry to the
Esc button. Any idea on how to achieve that?

A conversation is defined as the messages writen to a given conversation
tab. When the tab closes, the conversation ends. So the plugins you
have found show the entire conversation, as Pidgin understands it.
There is no more reliable way to demarkate what constitues a given
conversation (there are other approaches, but such as a given time
range, but they do not have fewer failure conditions, simply different
ones).

While it would take more work to design a plugin that would mimic
Miranda's logging & history functionality than it would to write a
plugin for any of your other requests, it is certainly within the realm
of possibility. There are API hooks for a plugin to add a logging
method, and then it would be very nearly if not identical code to the
existing history plugin to display it back.

luke