On Wed, Dec 19, 2012 at 3:14 PM, Grant <emailgr...@gmail.com> wrote: >> > > > > XMPP clients are a dime a dozen, take you pick: pidgin, kopete, >> > > > > telepathy and a hots of others. >> > > > > >> > > > > Servers are another story. All of them that you can lay your >> > > > > hands on seem to suck big eggs big time. ejabberd is the only one >> > > > > I found stable enough to actually stay up for sane amounts of >> > > > > time, and not DEPEND on java. >> > > > > >> > > > > But that info might be well out of date, I haven't looked at our >> > > > > jabber server for ages. There's no need to - the techies all >> > > > > gravitated by themselves over to GTalk and Skype, claiming that >> > > > > the cloud services did everything they needed and more, and it >> > > > > was there, and it worked. Our in-house jabber server - not so >> > > > > much. >> > > > > >> > > > > Can't say I blame them. It's true. >> > > > >> > > > Thanks Alan, this is just the kind of info I need. It sounds like >> > > > I would be better off with a cloud solution for collaborative chat. >> > > >> > > Just out of curiosity: why couldn't you use a Jabber client with >> > > Bonjour/Zeroconf support (all or most of them?) within the company >> > > (which is what this is for IIUC)? With Zeroconf, the Jabber clients >> > > "find each other", then you wouldn't need to bother with setting up a >> > > server. >> > > >> > > Or is Zeroconf problematic? I know Pidgin can do Zeroconf on Windows, >> > > even if you need to manually install a separate package for it to >> > > work. >> > > >> > >> > That doesn't really work when one fellow is at his desk in the office, >> > another at home on an ADSL connection and the third is a 3rd party dev >> > based in Los Angeles. That's quite common for me. >> > >> > Zeroconf has it's uses, but it does have a rather narrow scope as to >> > where it can work. >> >> I understand that, I just thought that Grant was talking about a purely >> internal chat solution (like my workplace has) - he did say "within a >> company" (though admittedly in retrospect I realize that that doesn't >> necessarily mean *physically* within the company). >> >> Regardless, it isn't clear to me that Grant is talking about something >> that has >> to be available from anywhere. While he is apparently gravitating towards >> a >> "cloud solution" for chat, my understanding is that that is because then >> he >> doesn't have to manage his own server. All of the other solutions >> mentioned >> could be for internal *and* external use. >> >> Anyway, I was just curious and thought that if this is purely for internal >> use >> than Zeroconf might be a good server-less option for chat. > > I should have specified that the people in the organization are spread out > in different locations. > > It sounds like it is difficult/dangerous to run an internet-facing IRC > server and ejabberd is unstable?
This is what VPNs are for. I haven't really heard anything seriously problematic about ejabberd outside of some folks dislike of adding another language runtime. Whatever you decide to run internally, you're going to need to become knowledgeable in its administration. This is why a fair amount of folks are outsourcing communications infrastructure. Few believe they have the time to learn to manage the thing properly. -- :wq
