Have you fired up your Adium messenger recently? Well, I did just a few hours ago, and lo and behold, it's a version update! The Adium ducks are now quacking up to version 1.1! Although the previous update was released just a month ago, Adium v1.1 has actually been in the making for about a year now.

In fact, one of the biggest changes in this version comes all the way from 2006, built on a student project in the Google Summer of Code. The project has been incorporated into Adium v1.1 in the form of PSMTabBarControl, which allows you to customize your tabbing preferences on the fly. Here's the lowdown of that feature:

• You can arrange your tabs on any side of the message view, not just the bottom. Tabs are arranged vertically when you put them on the left or right edge of the window and horizontally when you put them on the top or bottom.
• Tabs handle overflow better by presenting a chevron (») menu, just like toolbars do.
• Tabs are now spring-loaded, so that if you drag something to a tab that isn't active, it will activate, so that you can position the thing you're dragging precisely within the inputline.
• You can have each tab display the number of unread messages, if any.

Of course, there's more to this, but the Adium team is encouraging all of us to discover the other new toolbar tweaks. Other notes from the changelog include the usual bug fixes and improvements. Aside from it being prettier and faster, there's also the following:

• Changes in the contact list, such as people coming online and going offline, animate smoothly.
• The contact list's ability to hide like the Dock at the edge of the screen has been improved.
• A new type of AdiumXtra, the menu bar icon xtra, has been created to let you customize the appearance of Adiumy in your menu bar; you can download AdiumMenuBarIcons packs from AdiumXtras.com.
• Buzz on Yahoo! and nudge on MSN are now fully supported.
• AIM DirectConnect should be more reliable and less memory intensive; it is now automatically initiated as needed.
• You can now import accounts and chat transcripts from iChat.
• Adium now warns you if you run Adium from the disk image. This will especially benefit new Mac users who aren't accustomed to working with disk images.
• Right-to-left text is handled property on MSN.

Download: Adium v1.1

Chat junkies who also happen to be Mac users have a reason to be a little bit happier today; Adium version 1.0.2 has just been released. This instant messaging client might just work better for you, if you try it. It's free, it's fast, it supports AIM, ICQ, Jabber, MSN, Yahoo!, Google Talk, Yahoo! Japan, Bonjour, Gadu-Gadu, Novell Groupwise, and Lotus Sametime, as well as a beautiful WebKit message display, tabbed messaging, encrypted chat, file transfer and of course, the cute little green duck.

Adium version 1.0.2 features the following improvements:

• Fixed the crashes while performing DNS resolutions
• Fixed the situation in which an AIM file transfer could fail
• Fixed a crash when sending formatted MSN text (#5753)
• Fixed linkification of .eu domains
• Various performance improvements to the log viewer when opening it and performing searches, particularly in searching while indexing occurs.

Download Adium Version 1.0.2

More of the Adium Version 1.0.2 changes after the jump.

Back in the 1st of October, trueb*****dteddy complained of Microsoft's MSN for OS X's bitter shortcomings. Article gets dugg - from both Mac users who feel his pain, and PC users who feel a pain of a completely different sort.

What did TBT say, anyway? "Microsoft doesn't get it" with their "Universal" MSN. Why? He lists his complaints: no video and audio chat, no offline messaging, no groups, and annoying pop up dialogue boxes he doesn't need. In other words, MSN for Macs doesn't perform well compared to PC versions. He thinks that because Apple is such a small niche in the computer market, Mac users aren't a priority for Microsoft - as opposed to that larger Windows base.

Well, since that 1st of October, he'd been deluged with about six-hundred-or-so diggs that he didn't expect, as well as comments that have enlightened him on some of his complaints. Like, for example, one comment told him how to get rid of an annoying security dialog box. Another informed him that Mac-MSN actually supports groups. And the official Microsoft Mac blog released a post explaining some of the reasons why voice for Mac-MSN hasn't been implemented yet. Enlightening, yes, but it still hasn't changed his opinion of Mac-MSN.

But counterarguments can sometimes be a bit touche. After all, one Digg commenter replied "Quicktime for PC: Apple doesn't get it" (although a few replies to that comment were very critical). Another pointed out that "Rome wasn't built overnight," and neither will Mac-MSN.

Ah, all this competition between Apple users and PC users. Remember the Mac Ad? Yeah, it can be wonderful, simply wonderful, to be a cut above the rest. But does that mean you can't ever be with the rest? Nobody wants to be lonely...

I remember after reading a news article about the "merging" of the two widely used instant messengers, MSN Messenger (now Windows Live Messenger) and Yahoo! Messenger, I was ecstatic. I thought to myself, Now this is inter-connectivity and that, they should have had thought of this a long time ago. Even though both big name dot coms are being adamant in their campaigns to make their interoperability plans a reality, it seems that a big hurdle is blocking the way.

According to reports, Microsoft is still in limbo, whether to include the Mac version of Windows Live Messenger in the party. This news doesn't really come as a big shock to us of course. But, quite frankly, the whole purpose of this so-called merge, is to keep in touch with your friends and relatives from wherever they are in the world. And in my humble opinion, Microsoft is losing touch of that big picture.

Adium X is a free instant messaging application for Mac OS X that allows user to connect to AIM, MSN, Yahoo Messenger and lot more chat applications. Adium X was voted on of the top ten freeware for the Mac OS! But almost as popular as the application itself is the duck that represents it. Originally apple green, the Adium Duck now comes in a variety of colors. Now that the Adium Duck is starting to bloom into a beautiful pop icon, we felt this is a good time to tell you the true story behind the little green duck.

The duck hatched from Adam Iser's (the author of Adium X) imagination. And he wasn't green then. In fact, he wasn't that cute! The Adium Duck was kinda like an ugly blue duckling. Yes, that's him above. The one that looks like a wooden decoy duck choking on a snail. Thank goodness Iser is better at making applications than drawing icons.

Anyway, Adam Betts gave the blue duck a drastic make-over. "I loved the posture and felt that I can give it a much needed soul and feathers. I donÂ?t remember exactl y how Adam Iser reacted, but I do remember that he disliked it at first but it grew on him later." Yeah, what is it about this duck that makes you stare at it longingly..filled with animal passion...or is it just us?

According to Betts the key element of the duck is his eyes which seem to say Â?Why me worry?Â? The duck's job is to transport your messages to your friends/families, he wants none of your attention. Awwww...but we have so much love and care to give him!

But those come hither eyes are now proving a challenge for Betts. It seems the duck is due for an update to keep up with the new Apple app icon family. Bett tried to turn him into photorealistic graphic but says that "destroyed that message by being in your face with a three-dimensional head. The original Adium soul you know and love would not exist anymore. Another thing that did not work is real feathers."

Betts also took the OS X icon route (documents lying on desk, speech bubble, etc.) but he thinks those icons are beneath the duck. After trying out several ideas, Bett had a lightbulb moment: "Why should I change something that had a strong hand in developing the strong Adium community?" And what about us Adium Duck fans who spend hours customizing our duck with costumes instead of doing things like making this world a better place?

Have no fear, Quack Patrol! The shape of refreshed Adium icon will be nearly identical to current one so there wonÂ?t be much changes needed!

Adium X is a free instant messaging application for Mac OS X that allows user to connect to AIM, MSN, Jabber (including Google Talk), Yahoo Messenger, Bonjour (compatible with iChat), Gadu-Gadu, Novell Groupwise and Lotus Sametime. If you think that's a lot of chattime, this freeware is also available in Brazilian, Portuguese, Canadian English, Australian English, Catalan, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, French, German, Icelandic, Italian, Japanese, Norwegian, Polish, Russian, Simplified and Traditional Chinese, Spanish and Swedish! No wonder Adium X was voted on of the top ten freeware for the Mac OS!

Anyways, the good people behind Adium X has updated it to v.1.0b3 and its changelog includes:

• Fixed a crash when closing message windows
• Fixed connecting to AIM on non-default port settings
• Fixed MSN HTTP connect method
• Fixed a rare crash involving invalid idle times
• Fixed a crash when connecting with a SOCKS4 proxy over AIM
• Fixed a crash when connecting to gadu-gadu
• Fixed the Run Applescript action (#4456)
• Fixed a crash in the log viewer on OS X 10.3

However, this is still a beta and things may not always work properly. But if you still want to go give it a try you can download it right here at QJ. Adium X requires Mac OS X 10.2.7 ("Jaguar") or later; Mac OS X 10.4 ("Tiger") or Mac OS X 10.3.9 ("Panther") is recommended. Adium X 0.88 and later are Universal applications which run natively on both PowerPC- and Intel-based Macintosh computers.

Download [Adium X v1.0b3]