Gmail adds video chat for Linux

http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2010/08/use-linux-now-you-can-video-chat-too.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+OfficialGmailBlog+(Gmail+Blog)

by SandB0x • 16 years ago

120 20 16 years ago

gmailblog.blogspot.com

daleharvey3• 16 years ago

I cant quite tell from the posts, but with gears they got to experiment with creating new web standards through a plugin, have they tried to do that with this and html5 devices? that would be awesome news.

yanw• 16 years ago

How would you go about accessing the mic and cam with html5?

daleharvey3• 16 years ago

Its very barebones, but http://dev.w3.org/html5/html-device/ is in the works, google could / hopefully have made progress towards making that more solid.

obsaysditto• 16 years ago

Tried it out and works very well on first run. Installed the .deb package and restarted Chrome.

duck• 16 years ago

Does anyone know why this took so long?

Locke1689• 16 years ago

Cool. What codecs and streaming protocol do they use?

stanleydrew• 16 years ago

I think everything runs over XMPP just like Google talk.

mjgoins2• 16 years ago

This package installs a cron job that affects how apt functions on your system. You're basically giving google root on your machine.

macemoneta• 16 years ago

Yeah, a closed source application installed as root, with the express purpose of accessing your webcam and microphone. What could go wrong?

foenix• 16 years ago

Here's the header of the /etc/crontab.daily/google-talkplugin file. I'm not that ninja with my cron-tabbing, but doesn't this do exactly what it says?

http://pastebin.com/4etPxNWC

acdha• 16 years ago

If you run their code in any way you're already giving them control of your system. Even if you're one of the vanishingly small number of people who use a separate admin account they're getting full control of your account if they want it.

Installing a repo & apt key is a good sign that they're playing by the rules rather than trying something sneaky.

mgunes• 16 years ago

Video chat via Google credentials has already been working for some time using the Empathy messaging client, without the need for a dedicated one.

ZeroGravitas• 16 years ago

Unless I'm mistaken it's not a dedicated client. It's a dedicated web plugin that enables video chat within your browser at gmail.com.

mstevens• 16 years ago

Doesn't work for me - crashes every time I try to start a video call.

Problem reported to google, will see what happens.

Gmail adds video chat for Linux

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