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Taking Web Messenger out of the browser (Mac)

April 8, 2008 on 9:25 am | In Web version | 6 Comments

Yahoo! Messenger for the Web is really handy when you’re on the road or can’t download and install the full version of Messenger. But there are a couple of things that may prevent it from becoming your everyday version of Yahoo! Messenger. One is that Yahoo! Messenger for the Web runs in a full browser window which makes it easy to close accidentally. The other is that while it does play a sound when a new IM comes in, there is no “in your face” pop-up reminders for a new message like on the full version of Messenger.

Recently one of our engineers that worked on Yahoo! Messenger for the Web, Jeremy Johnstone, decided to try an experiment on his Mac that would alleviate some of these issues with the product. Using a free program for Mac OSX Leopard called Fluid, he developed a site-specific browser application for Yahoo! Messenger for the Web. By customizing the Fluid application with some code, he was able to create a desktop version of Yahoo! Messenger for the Web on his Mac that includes:

  • A full window interface but without the usual browser clutter
  • Growl notifications for IMs received when the application isn’t in focus
  • Dock badge updates with the count of unread IMs

Visit Jeremy’s blog for more details on how to do this on your own Mac (including the customized code you’ll need for Fluid), or watch the quick video tutorial below:

Thanks Jeremy for this interesting experiment!

Sarah Bacon
Product Manager

6 Comments »

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  1. What no windows ver. !!

    Comment by FarStrider — April 8, 2008 #

  2. Hi FarStrider,

    Mozilla offers a program like Fluid called Prism for Windows:

    http://wiki.mozilla.org/Prism

    Jeremy only did his mashup on Fluid for the Mac but if you’re game, give it a try on Prism!

    Sarah Bacon

    Comment by Administrator — April 8, 2008 #

  3. messenger yahoo is the best….video..chat..telephone….its just great..

    Comment by Djp — April 8, 2008 #

  4. Great! I’m glad I see something new for the Mac.

    I think you should make separate RSS feeds of Mac posts and Widows posts. That way you might remove some of the heat from the comments.

    Comment by Lucky — April 8, 2008 #

  5. Um… ok. why not just download and use the program?

    Comment by Jeremy — April 28, 2008 #

  6. ok maybe i dont know whats userscript? is this a program?

    obviously i am not a programmer..

    Comment by wayne — December 9, 2009 #

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