Apple Messages - bye, bye Jabber/XMPP

[d4gli]

As far as I can see, there isn't any support for other messengers anymore. I can understand this for older protocols, but even "Oscar" for AIM was still usable with ICQ. Since most ICQ users with Messenger would be using xmpp transports it's really a mess that eben xmpp/jabber has been dropped.

Messengers has been my central point for communications like iMessage, XMPP and with transports icq, irc. Now, I need to use two messengers like Adium again.

 

[iMacDragon]

I'm guessing it was such a minority used feature anymore that it wasn't deemed worth the complication of supporting anymore..

Those that used it will miss it, but majority probably won't even notice.

 

[j728112]

I can't make any sense of why Apple removes certain features because "few people used them" but then keeps other little used/never updated features.

They've kept dashboard and stickies around, despite them not having been updated for many years, but remove other little used, but still useful features like Jabber/AIM/Bonjour messaging and Bonjour bookmarks/RSS in Safari.

They should really make these optional downloads. That way, the OS stays away from becoming bloated and confusing, but continues to offer the features for those who use them.

 

[devel0per]

As far as I can see, there isn't any support for other messengers anymore. I can understand this for older protocols, but even "Oscar" for AIM was still usable with ICQ. Since most ICQ users with Messenger would be using xmpp transports it's really a mess that eben xmpp/jabber has been dropped.

Messengers has been my central point for communications like iMessage, XMPP and with transports icq, irc. Now, I need to use two messengers like Adium again.

d4gli, thank you for letting us know about this unfortunate change to macOS. I just submitted feedback to Apple and suggest you do the same on their Messages Feedback Page.

 

[cmaier]

I can't make any sense of why Apple removes certain features because "few people used them" but then keeps other little used/never updated features.

They've kept dashboard and stickies around, despite them not having been updated for many years, but remove other little used, but still useful features like Jabber/AIM/Bonjour messaging and Bonjour bookmarks/RSS in Safari.

They should really make these optional downloads. That way, the OS stays away from becoming bloated and confusing, but continues to offer the features for those who use them.

I’m glad when they get rid of stuff that hardly anyone uses. Messenger team can focus on other things instead of maintaining old code.

 

[swingerofbirch]

I can't make any sense of why Apple removes certain features because "few people used them" but then keeps other little used/never updated features.

They've kept dashboard and stickies around, despite them not having been updated for many years, but remove other little used, but still useful features like Jabber/AIM/Bonjour messaging and Bonjour bookmarks/RSS in Safari.

They should really make these optional downloads. That way, the OS stays away from becoming bloated and confusing, but continues to offer the features for those who use them.

My uninformed hunch is that they keep archaic features when they use them internally. I've never been internal at Apple, but I worked as a contractor for AppleCare. In our training, they encouraged us to use Stickies and there was a widget at the time for searching the Apple knowledge base.

Having said that, we also used iChat (as it was called at the time) for some sort of Jabber based messaging. Not sure if that was common among other Apple teams (there are many AppleCare teams: both various private contracted companies and then also Apple-employed AppleCare, but they use the same tools).

 

[chucker23n1]

They should really make these optional downloads. That way, the OS stays away from becoming bloated and confusing, but continues to offer the features for those who use them.

It's not about bloat; it's about maintenance cost. Making them optional downloads makes the calculus even worse, as few people will bother installing something optional, making it much harder to justify working on it.

 

[iNerdGirl]

Funny thing when I worked at AppleCare they used the jabber feature of messages quite often.

 

[TiggrToo]

XMPP seems be losing a lot of friends these days; Slack recently also announced they were no longer supporting their XMPP and the IRC gateways either...

 

[JaJaWa]

With all the legacy protocols removed, it should be much easier to add all the iMessage features from iOS – which are surely more beneficial to a far wider number of people?

 

[d4gli]

Since I won't give Mojave a try unless there's a GM, anyone tried an older Messages App (maybe from HS)? Would like to know if XMPP support is just visually removed or from core.

 

[FocusAndEarnIt]

Since I won't give Mojave a try unless there's a GM, anyone tried an older Messages App (maybe from HS)? Would like to know if XMPP support is just visually removed or from core.

I tried opening Messages.app from my High Sierra partition while on Mojave, and this was the error I got:

 

[d4gli]

Ah, worse a try. Thanks for testing @FocusAndEarnIt

 

[chucker23n1]

Your best bet is an app like Adium or Monal.

 

[Cochonou]

Well, that's really a pity. It was very handy to have both SMS, iMessage and XMPP in a single place.