Jabber on SDF

Jabber is the former name for the Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP), which is a set of open XML technologies for presence and real-time communication developed by the Jabber open-source community in 1999, formalized by the IETF in 2002-2004, continuously extended through the standards process of the XMPP Standards Foundation, and implemented in a wide variety of software, devices, and Internet services. Jabber service on SDF is run on ejabberd.

Jabber is popularly used as a decentralized instant messaging service. This means that you can create an account on one server such as SDF and talk to users from any other Jabber service. It is also possible to use a transport to communicate with users on other types of instant messaging services as well.

Connection Settings for SDF's Jabber Server

Server: jabber.sdf.org
Port: 5222
SSL: enabled

SDF's Jabber server uses a self-signed SSL certificate, so you will see a warning about this. It is safe to accept this certificate.

Jabber Clients

Available on SDF:

finch (Unix shell)

Others:

iChat (Mac OS X)
Pidgin (Unix/Windows)
Adium (Mac OS X)
Bitlbee

Some clients for mobile can be found here

Account Registration in SDF's Jabber server

This is not needed if you are going to connect to a Jabber/XMMP server than SDF's Jabber server.

In contrast with other Jabber servers, accounts in SDF's Jabber server are created from the shell with the 'maint' utility.

Log in to the password server by running the maint program.
Type o to select optional features and social networking
Type j to set your Jabber password.
Quit from maint utility and wait one minute.

After one minute you will be able to connect to SDF's Jabber server using your prefered Jabber client.

Connecting with Finch from Unix shell

This steps are valid to connect to SDF's Jabber server or any other Jabber/XMMP server like GTalk.

To move around Finch's fields and buttons use the TAB key. You can learn more about using Finch here.

Press ALT + a and select Accounts
Select Add button to open New Account dialog box
Choose XMPP as the protocol
Fill the appropiate field with you desired Username
Fill the Domain with: jabber.sdf.org
Save
Now you just can select your newly created account from the Accounts list to get connected to SDF's jabber server.

Connecting with Pidgin from Unix/Windows

Go to Accounts->Manage Accounts.
Click on Add button.
Select XMPP as Protocol.
Fill the appropiate field with your desired Username.
Fill the Domain field with: jabber.sdf.org
Click on Save button.

After finishing this steps, Pidgin will try to connect to the jabber server and will ask for your password (the one you have set up with the maint utility), also you will be warned about the self signed certificate, it is safe to accept it.

Add buddies in Finch

Select a group in the buddy list.
Press F11 to bring out the context menu
Select "Add Buddy".

Using bitlbee

Read bitlbee's documentation for how to get the server up and running. Then, to add SDF's jabber account:

Go to the &bitlbee channel in the server and register your user
Run the following command in that channel: account add account_name user@jabber.sdf.org [passwd]
Run: account account_name on

Read the help of bitlbee's commands and add your contacts there.

Conferences

Jabber allows you to talk to several users at once in conferences. These are similar to com rooms or IRC channels. The SDF jabber server has a "helpdesk" conference already set up and you are free to create new conferences too.

To join an existing conference using Pidgin

Go to Buddies->Join a Chat....
Select your jabber.sdf.org account in the Account drop-down
Click on the Room List button
Make sure the server to query is: conference.jabber.sdf.org
Click on the Find Rooms button
The Room List window will show all existing conferences along with the number of users in each. Select the one you want (helpdesk, for example) and click on the Join button.

By default you will not be notified of activity in conference windows the same way you are when someone talks in a one-to-one chat window. You can change this by going to Tools->Plugins, selecting to configure Message Notification and checking Chat Windows in the "Notify For" section.

To create a new conference using Pidgin

Go to Buddies->Add Chat....
Select your jabber.sdf.org account and enter the desired room in the Room field.
Click the Add button
The new conference will have appeared in your buddy list. Double click on it to join it.
You will be prompted to configure your new room. Do so if you wish, or accept defaults.
Invite other users to join your conference through Conversation->Invite... or have them look in the Room List as described above.

Looking for Jabber users

The easiest way to find other SDF Jabber users is to visit the conferences as described above. If you know that somebody uses the SDF jabber server you can add them to your contact list directly by using the address: username@jabber.sdf.org where username is their SDF user name.

You can also use your SDF account to chat with people who have accounts on other Jabber servers. Note that some people might call it `XMPP' instead of `Jabber'. One of the largest Jabber servers is Google Talk: you can chat to GMail/Google Talk users this way without needing a Google account. The Jabber address of those users is the same as their email address.

Created on Apr 18th by vosi & ecelis

$Id: jabber.html,v 1.13 2019/12/02 16:13:22 thegiant Exp $