pidgin/nest

Parents 90f6d2f67075
Children fe0f481832f6
This file isn't actually used. No reason for it to be here.
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    community.md
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    -# Community
    -
    -## Finding Us
    -
    -Being a communication project we can be found all over the place. Below you can
    -find the specifics.
    -
    -### Where can I find Pidgin-related chat online?
    -
    -There are two primary Pidgin-related chat resources:
    -
    - * `#pidgin` on `irc.freenode.net` **IRC**
    - * `devel@conference.pidgin.im` **XMPP Multi-User Chat**
    -
    -Developers, contributors, and users alike are welcome to join us in either of
    -these fora.
    -
    -### Is there a user mailing list?
    -
    -Yes! For general questions about using Pidgin, problems connecting, etc.
    -please use the [support mailing
    -list](http://pidgin.im/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/support).
    -
    -If you're a developer and want to ask about the internals of libpurple, Pidgin,
    -Finch, or GNT, please use the [devel mailing
    -list](http://pidgin.im/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/devel).
    -
    -We offer a few other mailing lists, too. See the full list
    -[here](http://pidgin.im/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo).
    -
    -All mailing lists are run by volunteers. Please be kind.
    -
    -## Community Topics
    -
    -### Can I help?
    -Yes! We especially need small patches for small bugs, and lots of bug triaging.
    -There are a slew of a bug reports in Pidgin's ticket system - you could pick
    -one and try to tackle it and submit a patch. We love patches!
    -
    -Bug triaging is when you look at a bug report and determine whether it is a
    -duplicate of an earlier report, or whether it is user error, or maybe you need
    -to request additional information to be able to reproduce the bug. We don't
    -allow people to modify ticket attributes, but if you leave a *helpful* comment
    -on the ticket with your findings, we will take appropriate action. This is a
    -*significant* help to us, because it allows fewer people to have to focus
    -primarily on maintenance of the ticket system, while other development resources
    -are spent as well as they can be.
    -
    -For more ways to contribute check out the [Contributing Page](contributing.md).
    -
    -### Can I ask you about third-party plugins, patches, etc.?
    -
    -You are more than welcome to ask, but be prepared for the answer to be something
    -like "ask the authors". We simply don't have the time or energy to keep up with
    -all of the third-party projects out there, so we probably can't help you.
    -Common topics that fall into this category are various encryption plugins,
    -GFire, and various Purple Plugin Pack plugins.
    -
    -### Where should I report bugs, feature requests, or patches?
    -[Here](https://developer.pidgin.im/newticket).
    -
    -### Hello?
    -
    -We don't know the answer to this question. Please, stop asking it.
    -
    -## Miscellaneous Questions
    -
    -### Did you guys reverse-engineer the protocols?
    -
    -The core Pidgin, Finch, and libpurple developers did not. Here's some related
    -information:
    -
    - * XMPP (a.k.a. Jabber), SIMPLE, and IRC are published protocols, so we didn't
    - need to reverse-engineer them. (Google Talk is an implementation of XMPP.)
    - * MSN was at one time a published protocol; over time changes have creeped
    - into the protocol and other people have reverse engineered those newer
    - revisions.
    - * OSCAR and Yahoo! are not published, and were reverse engineered by other
    - people. Sametime is maintained by a developer of the meanwhile library we
    - make use of.
    - * Our SILC plugin was written by one of the protocol's developers.
    - * Novell kindly provided us with the Novell GroupWise plugin.
    - * QQ was reverse-engineered by other people and later absorbed into
    - libpurple.
    -
    -### Do Pidgin and Finch support secure instant messaging (encrypted IM)?
    -
    -#### Short Answer
    -
    - Yes; use the OTR plugin or the SILC protocol.
    -
    -#### Long Answer
    -
    - These days, almost all chat protocols are encrypted between the client and the
    - server. We'll assume that you're asking about end-to-end encryption: when only
    - the two people having the conversation have access to its unencrypted
    - contents.
    -
    - The SILC protocol is natively encrypted. For other protocols, which do not
    - natively support encryption, neither do we. Simply encrypting the data stream
    - with no verification of the parties involved in the conversation is not secure
    - in any sense of the word. Some other clients offer options like this, but we
    - feel that such measures instill a false sense of security that is more harmful
    - than helpful.
    -
    - Note that there are a number of third-party plugin developers working on
    - secure IM frameworks. Take a look at the
    - [ThirdPartyPlugins](third-party-plugins.md) page for links to those we know
    - of.
    -
    - There is currently no support for encrypted file transports.
    -
    -### When will the next version be released?
    -
    -~~The schedule for releases is every third Thursday~~. However, a new version
    -will only be released if it meets a certain standard of quality (i.e., it will
    -not be released if it still has a large number of serious bugs). Therefore,
    -some releases will take longer than others. Major rewrites means lots of new
    -bugs to work out. The new version will be released as soon as it is possible to
    -do so. The [Roadmap](https://developer.pidgin.im/roadmap) gives best-guess
    -estimates, but take them with a grain of salt--if we aren't ready to release on
    -a Milestone's due date, we won't release, and that milestone will fall into
    -"past due."
    -
    -### What will the next version be numbered?
    -
    -We follow the [http://semver.org/ Semantic Versioning] scheme.
    -
    -Starting with version 1.0.0, Pidgin version numbers have 3 parts to them. The
    -format is major.minor.micro. If we change something internally in Pidgin such
    -that some plugins won't work with the newer version, we will increment the major
    -version number. If we don't increment the major version number, and we've added
    -things to the Pidgin API that won't break any older stuff, we will increment the
    -minor version number. In any other cases, we will increment the micro version
    -number. Even and odd numbers have nothing to do with stability, and you should
    -always be running the latest release of Pidgin to get new features and bug
    -fixes.
    -
    -### How do you capitalize Pidgin?
    -
    -Pidgin, with a capital P, or pidgin, with a little p. In all cases, the
    -remainder of the letters are lowercase. It's not PIDGIN, nor PidGin, nor
    -PiDgIn, nor anything similar. Stop doing that.
    -
    -### What's with the name Pidgin, anyway?
    -
    -[Pidgin](http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/pidgin) is not, in fact, named
    -*after* so-called "rats with wings," but rather it refers to a special type of
    -"broken" language used by speakers of different languages to communicate. We
    -thought this name fit well with the purpose of Pidgin.
    -
    -Of course, Pidgin is a [homonym](http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/homonym)
    -for pigeon, so we couldn't resist taking advantage of the pun to create a
    -cartoon mascot.
    -
    -Many have subsequently pointed out that the use of carrier pigeons for
    -transmission of messages fits nicely with Pidgin's functionality as well.
    -
    -### What's with the name libpurple, anyway?
    -
    -The use of the term purple is another
    -[homonym](http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/homonym) of sorts. Long ago,
    -we started referring to PRotocol PLugins by an abbreviated name "PrPl" which we
    -would pronounce in the same manner as the color. Since libpurple provides
    -primarily an interface for using protocol plugins to access a variety of IM
    -networks, it seemed reasonable that we name the library after the pronunciation.
    -
    -### What's with the name Finch, anyway?
    -
    -In keeping with bird theming for IM clients based upon libpurple, including
    -[Adium](https://adium.im) (the Duck client), and [Pidgin](https://pidgin.im)
    -(the Pigeon client), Finch was chosen as the name for our text-based client.
    -
    -### Why Won’t You Remove My Mailing List Posts?
    -
    -Occasionally we, the Pidgin team, receive requests to remove information from
    -our mailing list archives. We don’t honor those requests. Quite frankly, by
    -the time we get the request it’s already too late for removal to be useful.
    -
    -Every post to our mailing lists is archived. Our archives are public. A number
    -of other mailing list archival services have been subscribed to our lists,
    -making duplicated archives that we have no control over.
    -
    -Google and other search engines index our archives, which we also have no
    -control over. (Yes, robots.txt exists, but search engines are not obligated to
    -obey it, and we actually want our archives indexed so our users can find
    -information more easily.)
    -
    -By the time we receive a request to remove any data from our archives, it
    -already exists in so many places that one more copy of the data can’t possibly
    -cause any additional harm. We also do include a disclaimer on the list info
    -page for each of our mailing lists and in the Help->About box in Pidgin itself
    -that our mailing lists are publicly archived, thus adequate warning exists to
    -inform people that their data will be publicly disclosed.
    -
    -We cannot be held accountable for someone else's failure to read the disclaimer.
    - So, as a policy, we do not remove anything from our mailing list archives.
    -
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