Multi Instant Messaging Client

Abstract

There is an abundance of chat services and it is not uncommon to run several applications per device that all provide similar functionality. The group started the project to nd a solution to this problem and decided to evaluate the possibility of creating a multi instant messaging (multi-IM) client that can connect to all chat services. The group studied how a multi-IM client could be developed and what services and platforms were reasonable to support in a prototype. The group developed a prototype which supported two platforms and two services and evaluated the results. The technologies and methods that were used suited the purpose of the project, but the potential of the application is considered greatly hindered by the lack of open Application Programming Interfaces (API) by some of the larger services. These limitations are so large that the future of a multi-IM client is directly dependent on services having open APIs or the developers gaining access to the closed ones.