All about Windows Live Messenger, providing news, reviews, support, and information for developing and improving your Messenger experience.
Little relation between the three, but worth a read:
Thanks to TheBlasphemer, the creator of the popular Messenger Plus! plugin StuffPlug has graciously given me a glimpse of the next StuffPlug which will no longer be a Messenger Plus! plugin. Currently the features are editing your friendly name like your PSM, CE/DP Stealer, buttons in contact list and conversation windows and hide and show ad with little button on the right. It’s still in development so more than likely more features will be added. Wanna see what its looking like? Below are some screen shots:
Two new official tabs have just been launched for Windows Live Messenger and MSN Messenger, unfortunately they are currently only being targeted at United States users.
The Windows Live Favorites tab gives you quick and easy access to all your favorites stored in Live Favorites. It really is quick and easy, it’s very stripped down just showing a list of all favorites and a search box at the top.
The bot tab is used to promote official bots on the messenger network, it currently shows three featured bots (Movie Scout, Schick: Cindy Elizabeth John and Secret Sparkle) and six others at the bottom, including a bot called Fox 24 Inside, a bot for the hit TV series 24.
Just because they only show up for US users, doesn’t mean you can’t get to use them, using TabServe you can import them into your account and away you go, just select United States from the country drop down list.
Update: The Live Favorites team have posted about the Favorites tab on their blog.
Mess with MSN Messenger have just posted their findings of a new add-in API in the leaked build 683 of Windows Live Messenger. It is reportedly labeled Messenger Client Side Plug-ins Type Library.
This new library will allow developers to create their own add-ins for Windows Live Messenger, which will be officially documented and supported, much like the limited activity API.
I just refreshed and timothy has posted a more definite list of members of the type library. It still looks quite limited, but it is a start. Many users have been waiting a long time for something like this! I know I have.
A ranty article at The Inquirer has caused bit of a stir over the past few days, the author writes about his experience with Windows Messenger and MSN Messenger which his kids use. If you have ever been frustrated with Windows Messenger, hopefully you will understand his frustration too.
There are two main problems here: confusion with Windows Messenger vs. MSN Messenger, and Windows Messenger being not so easy to silence. Take a look at my post about the differences between Windows Messenger and MSN Messenger and hopefully see why both exist. For silencing Windows Messenger, I refer back to my article on the Windows Messenger and MSN Messenger API confusion:
Don’t uninstall Windows Messenger
No matter how annoying Windows Messenger may be, do not remove it as it is a Windows component and can cause problems further down the line. Instead, just turn it off. Open it up and go into options, turn off the following two options:
For the most part, Windows Messenger won’t annoy you again.
I see bad experiences like this all the time with Windows Messenger, but not so much with MSN Messenger. MSN Messenger is a lot easier to get rid of, users instinctly go to Add or Remove Programs and the deed is quickly done. With Windows Messenger, it is under Add/Remove Windows Components and only removes shortcuts from the start menu. It even states this in the description. If you’re going to do this, also uncheck the two options beforehand as above.
Perhaps this could be easily solved by having that option “Run Windows Messenger when Windows Starts” off by default and let the user decide during install. I hope to soon see some improvements in this area with Windows Live Messenger.
