Meebo has just launched a new Firefox extension so that you can instant message right from the sidebar of your browser. While this makes it convenient to have access to your favorite IM clients like AIM, MSN, Yahoo!, Google Talk, ICQ, and Jabber, there are a few things that could be improved to make this extension even better. Seeing as this is their first extension though, I think you’ll be impressed with what it offers.
Once you install the extension (download here), you’ll be able to select which chat client you’d like to sign into. Once you sign-in, a new Meebo tab will automatically open in your browser. This is where all of your chat windows will be. When I mentioned that Meebo could certainly improve on a few things, this is one of them. It would be nice if you could keep the chat window open in the sidebar, or maybe even have your conversations tabbed right along with your other opened tabs in the browser instead of having all your conversations opened in the one Meebo tab. The current setup is almost like just going to their site to chat, but you have the convenience of being able to view all of your contacts in the sidebar which is always open.
While there are some improvements that need to be made, it does have some great features, so lets take a look. Using the Meebo extension, you can chat with a group of people, send a file, view chat logs, and view a user’s profile. There’s also an automatic sign-on feature that will sign you in when you open the browser. Meebo alerts will let you know when you have a new message if you’re viewing another tab. If you’re on a different tab and you receive a message, the tab will flash, but you’ll also see a red bubble next to the persons name in the sidebar displaying how many new messages you have from them.
Overall it’s a really great extension, and a nice addition from Meebo to make chatting easy no matter where you are.
Thanks for the tip Radu!
Oh nice, this would very cool for like Internet Table of some sort of thing. Nice find.
Unfortunately it doesn’t work on Linux … a really nice extension though. I’m hoping the meebo ninjas will fix this issue.
I’m actually surprised that it doesn’t work on Linux.
I don’t like how it’s implemented. If I could close the tab and simply click the icon in the status bar to show/hide the sidebar it would be good. Having to keep that tab open all the time is a deal breaker for me though.
I was pretty excited about this extension…However, like you mentioned, it’s really not too different from going to Meebo’s website.
Once they allow conversations in the sidebar, this will be a big winner.
At least the only thing they can do from here is improve, and with feedback like what you’ve suggested, I think they’ll be able to mold it into the perfect IM Extension for Firefox.
They better fix this one fast. Iam so dissapointed.
I agree, it kind of seems like a no brainer to me, but maybe they were rushed for a release?