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About iChat

iChat Icon

iChat 5

iChat 5 comes with Snow Leopard (OS 10.6.x). At the time of writing that is 10.6 through 10.6.3 iChat was updated to verion 5.0.1 in 10.6.2 and to version 5.0.3 in 10.6.3

These pages have sat here since 2008 with no update. In that time the AIM servers have been closed down (2017) and iChat has been superseded by Message and FaceTime. That effectively makes this a sort of Historical Document of how it worked.

As with other versions here are the links to:

  1. Functions
  2. Pictures
  3. and How Tos

iChat Version 5

As noted at the top iChat 5 comes with Snow Leopard (OS 10.6.x). At the time of writing that is 10.6 through 10.6.3, iChat was updated to verion 5.0.1 in 10.6.2 and to version 5.0.3 in 10.6.3.

iChat 5.0 reduced the bandwidth required for 640×480 video chats and upgraded iChat Theater to the same resolution.

How we got here

iChat, as version one was called was just a Text Chatting app that could join the AIM service with valid Apple IDs or a Name for AIM Names were added to a Buddy List. Mac to Mac via what was called Rendezvous back then (Later Bonjour), over the same Local Network, added a separate Buddy list. It also added drivers for UVC compliant (USB Video Class) Cameras at OS X 10.4.9

iChat AV , as iChat Version 2 was called Added one to one Video or Audio Only Chats that were between iChat Users (Not AIM on PCs or other AIM capable apps). It also could do the same to your Rendezvous Buddies. An update to iChat 2.1 was supposed to allow Video chats to AIM (on PCs 5.5 users. For more details see EZ Jim's section at Page 14.

iChat 3 brough 4 way Video chats and 10 way Audio chats (AIM on PCs could not do this). It added the possiblity of chatting to Jabber Buddies. Jabber or XMPP is a non centralised series of servers public and private that run Jabber servers. Buddies have IDs that look like emails but rarely are. Google Started Google Talk which used Google IDs but the server name was talk.google.com and had to be manually changed when adding a Google ID to have a Jabber Buddy list. This could mean three Buddy Lists taking up screen space.

iChat 4 came with Leopard (OS X 10.5) and added many bells and whistles. PhotoBooth tweaks to pictures could be applied to the Video outgoing stream. iChat Theater brought in Sharing "Documents" as the Video Feed. In this case a "Document" could be almost anything you could produce on your Mac. iPhoto Slideshows, Keynote or Powerpoint, Movies, Pictures and the like, in fact anything you could look at using Quick Look. It added Effects and Backdrops (Backdrop Intel Only). And of course Screen Sharing which included an Audio Feed.

Where we are Now

iChat 5does add some items around the edges like being able to select a Buddy from a range of Logged in IDs, such as you and them having both AIM Valid and Jabber Valid IDs you could click on one BUddy list to select them and then choose to use the other to make contact (Proding they were both added to the Adrees Card for them. As has been stated above video production was smoothed out meaning Chats and iChat Theatre used the same rates.

All this and more is expanded in Functions and yet more in the How Tos and Pictures. Yes I am suggesting Functions as your next port of call.

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