Pidgin

Desktop Smart Phone
Windows Mac Linux iPhone/iPad Android Blackberry

Notes About Pidgin

Pidgin is a multi-protocol chat client, comparable to Trillian on Windows and Adium on Mac. It supports connecting to Yahoo, MSN, GTalk, AOL, ICQ, and others, all simultaneously. It is also the only cross-platform multi-protocol client we document. For many people, it is probably the best choice.

Getting Connected

When you first start up Pidgin, it will ask if you wish to setup new accounts. Set up any of the other accounts that you wish to use, and then follow the steps for adding a new account.

When you are done adding others, You will need to add a new account for CS Chat. Make sure the add dialog box looks like this:

Once done, you will be in the main Pidgin window, with all of your CS contacts, friends, and social groups loaded up.

Joining a Group Chat

To join the main group chat room, click "Buddies"->"Join Chat". Make sure the window that appears looks like the following (replacing "Account" with your CS Chat account, and "Handle" with your CS Screen Name), then click "Join".

To make your own group chat room, follow all the above steps. When asked for the name of the group chat to join, enter a new name other than "cs".

Emotes and Nicknames

You can do emotes, which are statements that look like actions. This is done using /me does something, and will look like this in the room:

CSScreenName does something

You can also change your nickname while in the chat room. This is done using /nick NewNickName, and this will change your nickname that others see in the room. Note that people can always find your real screen name by looking at your user information, though.

Moderating Your Chat Room

If a need arises to kick someone out of your chat channel, you can do /kick nickname "reason for kicking", and that user will be kicked off the channel.

If it goes further, and you must ban someone from joining your channel again, you can do /ban nickname "reason for banning", and that user will be unable to join the channel again.

If you discover you need to unban someone, then you will need to know their full username. You can get this by doing /affiliate outcast. Find the appropriate name you wish to unban, and then do /affiliate none full_screen_name.

Adding Contacts

To add contacts and friends, visit your CS Buddy List, and add them there. From there, the data will be copied from CS to CS Chat. This process normally takes 30 to 45 minutes. Once done, you will see the person appear in your contact list the next time you log on.

Note, though, that a person on your roster for CS Chat will never be removed by this process. Delete them from your CS Buddy List, and then delete them in your roster window, if you wish to do this.