open source messaging application development

[...]... 2: The Open Source Development Process As an open source application, Gaim is developed with processes unfamiliar to many people However, the open source development process is very powerful and is gaining in popularity This chapter will explain how the process works and how you can become part of it Chapter 3: Development Tools Chapter 3 will introduce you to the development tools used in the development. .. Gaim is free and open source software xxi Egan_467-3Front.fm Page xxii Monday, June 27, 2005 11:00 AM xxii ■I N T R O D U C T I O N Figure 1 A screenshot of the Gaim application “Free software” and open source software” are terms that differ slightly in semantics but describe essentially the same thing When downloading Gaim, you are offered the source code Having unfettered access to the source code is... this, we provide binary packages for a wide assortment of different platforms on our Web page at http://gaim.sourceforge.net/downloads.php What differentiates free, open source software from proprietary software, though, is that as an open source project, Gaim also provides source packages Source packages allow you to make changes to the code and compile the changes into your own binary packages Because... exciting to participate in the development of related technologies Because it is free and open source, Gaim is an excellent way to involve yourself in IM software development In this chapter, I will present an overview of instant messaging and Gaim I will then instruct you in creating a build environment suitable for building Gaim and any other networked, cross-platform, desktop application It will be from... Gaim as an example Today, I’m the lead developer of the Gaim project, and I work closely with a group of developers to maintain and enhance the most popular open source instant messaging application on the planet About Gaim Gaim is a modular instant messaging client that supports a wide variety of IM protocols, including AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo!, and Jabber Although it was originally written for Linux, it... results—faster and cheaper—with e-mail and instant messaging Hundreds of thousands of people do so every day with Gaim, a multi-protocol, cross-platform, open source instant messaging (IM) client IM is the combination of two technologies: messaging and presence notification Messaging allows one to send short messages to another IM user in real time Presence notification is the technology behind the “buddy list.”... development of Gaim and other open source (and proprietary) software I will explain how to use editors, the GCC compiler, make, GNU Autotools, CVS, and SourceForge.net so that you will be able to contribute to Gaim as well as start your own projects from scratch Chapter 4: Programming Gaim In this chapter, I will discuss the powerful programming techniques used throughout Gaim’s source code I will discuss... operating system Wanting to contribute to that development process, I quickly downloaded the Gaim source code and started coding At the time, though, I had just started learning how to use my operating system and didn’t know any C (the language Gaim is written in) This didn’t stop me; I quickly taught myself all the skills necessary to write this hugely popular desktop application, using Gaim as an example... you will install the tools you’ll need for developing Gaim and your own applications With a basic understanding of programming and a few free tools, you should be able to follow this book and to write large programs like Gaim on your own Summary Gaim has many advantages over other clients, but its major asset is that it’s open source Because of this, anyone with an idea and the ability to code can... your changes This way, Gaim benefits from hundreds of talented developers around the world, offering their contributions back to the community Because Gaim is built entirely with open source tools, involving yourself in its development is easy, and it makes an excellent example to learn from About This Book This book will help you to learn the same important programming skills I learned using Gaim as . alt="" Open Source Messaging Application Development: Building and Extending Gaim SEAN EGAN Egan_467-3Front.fm Page i Monday, June 27, 2005 11:00 AM Open Source Messaging Application Development: . The Open Source Development Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 Open Source versus Free Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 Why the Open Source Development. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 Motivations of Open Source Developers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 How the Open Source Development Process Works . . . . . . . . . . . . .