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Apple Video Camera and iChat Updates

I'm with the people who think that iChat has been seriously lacking in a few areas that Apple has simply ignored. I will admit that I use it, I just think that I shouldn't have to go to 3rd parties for things as simple as getting my away message to pop up, or to be able to use a decent amount of lines to type in. I also hate how it has no profile, how other's away message disappears when they go idle, or how sometimes it will take awhile to realize that someone has logged off. Again, I use it, I just load it with fixes that others have made. I just wish Apple would make it good enough that I wouldn't have to rely on others to do that
 
Re: text lines

Originally posted by sweetaction
give me more than one row to type text into. that would be a start.
Click to expand...
why is that a problem? Do you often use words that won't fit on a single line? I hear this complaint a lot, and I have never understood why people need a larger window.
 
Re: Re: text lines

Originally posted by IndyGopher
I have never understood why people need a larger window.
Click to expand...

Because sometimes messages are easier to write in more than just one line (writing a list for example)..

I'd like to use iChat, but as long as it doesn't support icq (and here's where we lack a good software) I have no use for it :p
 
Re: Re: Re: text lines

Originally posted by Windowlicker
Because sometimes messages are easier to write in more than just one line (writing a list for example)..

I'd like to use iChat, but as long as it doesn't support icq (and here's where we lack a good software) I have no use for it :p
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that would be a use for a larger window, but it would also be more in the spirit of email, at least to my way of thinking. Either way, it would nice if Apple gave you the option of resizing the window.
 
Does anyone actually want to use Video chatting? I may use it on occassion, but it would be novel, and not constant.

And, until iChat can chat with Yahoo...I won't even take a look at it.

The chat world remains too fractured among competing formats to be taken seriously.
 
Originally posted by Timothy
Does anyone actually want to use Video chatting?
Click to expand...

Two kinds of people:

* Perverts, ;-)
* People who want to see loved ones.

I use it regularly to see my daughter 4000 miles away.

I've used it to let my mother see my brother working in India, and my other brother in New Zealand.

The Internet - and video chatting - is a wonderful, wonderful thing.
 
Originally posted by sticky
Two kinds of people:

* Perverts, ;-)
* People who want to see loved ones.

I use it regularly to see my daughter 4000 miles away.

I've used it to let my mother see my brother working in India, and my other brother in New Zealand.

The Internet - and video chatting - is a wonderful, wonderful thing.
Click to expand...

Are you and your family using Macs?
If so, what software are you all using?
Quality? Sound or text?
I presume you're looking forward to what Apple may be offering with ichat...
I've never used video chatting. I don't know what to expect. Thanks...
 
iChat should be adium with file transfer ability.

That would be the ultimate IM client. Adium is amazing and much more mac-like than iChat.
 
Originally posted by springscansing
iChat should be adium with file transfer ability.

That would be the ultimate IM client. Adium is amazing and much more mac-like than iChat.
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But you've got to admit that iChat has a sleek little easy-to-use interface.

Yeah, iChat 2 is probably going to be quite a bit better, though. There's definitely room for improvement.
 
iChat has an easy interface because it offers you practically no options. You can't even have a profile. It's the biggest joke from apple in a long time.
 
You all are very, very funny.

Does ANYONE remember what MSN Messenger 1 was like? How about ICQ ver. 1?

Come on people. :rolleyes:

It's a 1.0 release. Do you buy a 1.0 release of a car? Riiiiight. Do you buy a 1.0 release of a Microsoft OS? Riiiight. Do you buy a 1.0 release of an Apple OS? Well, probably. But we're still complaining about that fiasco. :p

Seriously. It's chat software. Not mission critical business apps, or productivity apps (heh - more like an unproductivity app), or even part of the iLife suite.

springscansing: Show me, point by point why adium might even possibly be better than iChat (We're talking about UI, user experience, and NOT about features or stability: BOTH are subjective). And if you can't or won't - then all you're entitled to is your opinion, for you. Not the rest of us.

My opinion: iChat is low-resource, fast, basic and clean like all my other OS X apps. It works beautifully in a business environment with inline graphics (good for instruction, explanation, file distribution and illustration), archived conversations and stability. The file transfers work through PIX firewalls (and other third party firewalls) too. Every other chat app that has file transfer capability (which, incidentally took MSN over 3 versions to implement - seems pretty basic, eh?) has failed to accomplish.

And of course, this is just my opinion. :D
 
Apple making another camera???
Could be good depending on the design (and what type of camera)

I remember at Primary School, my school was 95% all macs and they had the QuickTake (or QuickCam or whatever it was). Nice camera for a thing so bulky. The first digi-cam i can remember
 
Originally posted by Sonofhaig
Are you and your family using Macs?
Click to expand...

yes, and i wrote it all up here:

http://homepage.mac.com/john_kenn/video.html

summary: SquidCam, and it's not great because there is a modem at one end rather than broadband all the way.

Maybe apple are just going to badge one of the existing $100 Firewire webcams out there. Be nice if they made their own that matched the look of the hardware.
 
When Steve Jobs announced the iPod, he outlined a strategy as follows (paraphrased):

"We started building iApps to compliment digital devices

"Now we've decided to build devices that compliment our iApps, and we're starting today with music."

This is as close as Steve Jobs gets to a hint. If they started with music, and they talked about "devices" that can surely only mean one thing: a stills camera, video camera, DVD player, Tivo-alike...

I would say that a camera is certainly not beyond the bounds of possibility, providing that it differentiates from the competition in some way and tightly integrates with the other iApps.

I recall a lot of posters in this forum moaning about the iPod when it was released, saying it was too expensive, it would be a flop, if was nothing new or innovative and that they wanted a PDA. Time has proved them wrong. Let's see if the same comes to pass with these camera rumors.
 
ThinkSecret have been on a roll lately, iPods, iSync 1.1, Keynote 1.1 so this is a pretty backed up rumor.
 
Originally posted by Kyle?
This has been apparent ever since someone found the camera icon unused in the iChat resources.
Click to expand...

It's funny just how often that happens; Apple had the 3GPP file associations and icons in QuickTime several releases ago, but support only arrived with 6.3.

Mike.
 
videoconferencing and firewalls

Well I hope Apple do videoconferencing right and recognise that everybody these days is behind some sort of firewall and/or NAT.

To make Netmeeting work through a firewall you have to open up 10 million ports on the router or expose the whole machine. It's a royal pain in the ass and makes Netmeeting unsuable in practice.
How many people use Netmeeting on PCs in practice? It's too hard and the image quality is lousy. 'Buy a Polyphon' people say - but a modern PC ought to be able to encode images fast enough esp. with Altivec!

Now if Apple could make videoconferencing 'just work' - transparently through firewalls - that would be a winner.
 
VERY INFORMATIVE!

Originally posted by sticky
yes, and i wrote it all up here:

http://homepage.mac.com/john_kenn/video.html

summary: SquidCam, and it's not great because there is a modem at one end rather than broadband all the way.

Maybe apple are just going to badge one of the existing $100 Firewire webcams out there. Be nice if they made their own that matched the look of the hardware.
Click to expand...

Sticky- Thanks for the link. Very informative. I'm going to see what Apple does this month. If the ichat software doesn't work out, I might try your suggestions. Thanks again!

-Phd
 
Re: VERY INFORMATIVE!

Originally posted by Sonofhaig
Sticky- Thanks for the link.
-Phd
Click to expand...

It's worth pointing out that if you have broadband at both ends, SquidCam is very impressive. There are an incredible number of tweaks and adjustments you can use, very high picture quality. There is even a video answering machine.

I have a modem and a slow-ish iBook at one end, DSL and a G4 iMac at the other, and the results are variable. I don't point my finger at SquidCam, it's mostly just physics! There is only so much information you can push down a telephone wire at 56K. Results using NetMeeting over the same wires weren't great either.

It's defintely worth trying SquidCam out if you have Macs and cameras - firewire connected Camcorders work great! - and want to see who you are talking to. Plus, there is a PC version, it's still under active development and it has a very interactive author, so if you have ideas for features you should email him.
 
I really want a way to transfer pictures from my digicam to an ipod without a computer involved. Then I could really travel and take all the pictures I ever wanted without buying extra CF cards. I'd rather spend that money on an ipod anyway. I can't see apple making a still camera of their own, there's just not enough room for improvement, what with my tiny little PowerShot. Plus the digital camera market is not too terribly large. Alot of people I know already have one or more of them. What apple did with the ipod was to take something that you didn't think you needed and turned it into something you absolutely had to have. But a videocamera would be cool, there is definetly room for improvement there, and not very many people see them as a necessary item yet. In a few weeks though, that may change!
 
Originally posted by jholzner
Also notice that the article states that there will be support for addition IM protocols! Yahoo? MSN? ICQ? Most likely it's ICQ since AOL owns it but the other too would be great.
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It would be interesting to see what other protocols it supports. The addressbook already has fields for other IM screen names. I just hope iChat will support buddy groups as that's the main reason why I'm not using it.
 
I use it all the time, the only thing that bugs me is that away message thing. And not being able to send files to people on PC's and stuff. The only reason I'm not using it now is because it for some reason won't show my buddy list, etc. Then I just deleted it. I'm calling support tomorrow.:p
 
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