IM in the office

[dan sh]

We use skype here. It seems to be a good idea unless you get a VOIP with dedicated lines.

"The worst code you'll come across is code you wrote last year.", wizardzz[^]

[Lost User]

It is useful for us as devs because you can also send files and our email strips almost everything useful out of emails.

Every man can tell how many goats or sheep he possesses, but not how many friends.

[Marcus_2]

Bassam Abdul-Baki wrote:

MS Chat application that sent network messages to people... People just weren't aware of it.

Ah, the old Net Send[] application... ;)

[BobJanova]

We use Skype for voice and IM chat. And the old fashioned going up to someone's desk and talking to them, of course.

[Slacker007]

good one. seized the moment. ;)

Just along for the ride. "the meat from that butcher is just the dogs danglies, absolutely amazing cuts of beef." - DaveAuld (2011)
"No, that is just the earthly manifestation of the Great God Retardon." - Nagy Vilmos (2011)

[Nemanja Trifunovic]

viaducting wrote:

Do you think that's a good thing? Are you allowed to use IM where you work?

Whether it is a good or bad thing, depends on the type of business your company is doing. I can imagine i.e. defense contractors not wanting to use Google Talk for internal communication. Where I work, we use internally set up Lync[^] for voice, video, conferencing and IMs.

utf8-cpp

[Brady Kelly]

There are good alternatives, like Jabber or Yammer, where you are only exposed to others on the same company network, in the IM space, minimising distractions and idle social only chatter.

[Henry Minute]

Kid's toys are often wasted on kids.

Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.

[clientSurfer]

:|

"... having only that moment finished a vigorous game of Wiff-Waff and eaten a tartiflet." - Henry Minute  "...who gives a tinker's cuss?" - Dalek Dave  "Let's face it, after Monday and Tuesday, even the calendar says WTF!" - gavindon

[Rama Krishna Vavilala]

I suggested that we don't have any phones or IM in my office and let people communicate face to face by talking with each other - the old fashioned way.

[clientSurfer]

We use something called Spark, which I have never used before, and which I am not at all impressed with because it is highly buggy and doesn't seem to play too well with Outlook and/or the VOIP system that they use here...

"... having only that moment finished a vigorous game of Wiff-Waff and eaten a tartiflet." - Henry Minute  "...who gives a tinker's cuss?" - Dalek Dave  "Let's face it, after Monday and Tuesday, even the calendar says WTF!" - gavindon

[PIEBALDconsult]

You can't share code snippets very easily on the phone. We're required to use MS Communicator for chat here (and on my last assignment as well). It works OK, gets the job done. On a previous job I wrote a simple (SQL server-based) messaging system to share code with a colleague in another office. (It was also good for communications we didn't want to put into the e-mail system.)

[Jason Hooper]

viaducting wrote:

but it has been suggested that we remove it completely and revert to using the phone.

"Revert" is the right word for this. It's going backwards. There are times when you absolutely need synchronous, uninterrupted comms with somebody, but most of the time the polite thing to do is assume they have multiple things going on and send them a message that they can respond to according to their priorities at the moment.

Jason

[AndyInUK]

we use ichat..I think both of it should be used - ichat and phone. But few colleagues can miss use it for gossips which can be a issue..and may be the reason they want it to be stopped in your company..

[Nemanja Trifunovic]

Rama Krishna Vavilala wrote:

people communicate face to face by talking with each other

Was the suggestion popular among fellow geeks?

utf8-cpp

[Roger Wright]

I'm not familiar with Google Talk, but if it uses the Internet (not limited to your intranet) it isn't secure. It probably also doesn't preserve a log of information sent and received, which could be critical in several circumstances to protect the company and/or you. Using the phone isn't the best solution, but you can record all calls and store them (we do), and it takes a physical tap on the phone line to access the voice calls. Still, IM is incredibly useful for its speed and convenience. I'd suggest looking into chat/IM systems that can be configured behind your firewall to exchange information inside your network, and which logs conversations to a server in case legal problems require access to them. Is Sonork still around? A bunch of us here used to use it for sidebar chats late at night while harassing the noobs infesting the Lounge, and I know that they offered a private host package for that purpose. There's bound to be others by now, so check around.

Will Rogers never met me.

[Madhanlal JM]

Since it is in sync with the outlook calendar, Ms office communicator is a fantastic tool. We are using this.

[GStrad]

We use it too, very good tool

[coding4ever]

vy a duck? I though pigeons were the fowl of choice for communications....

[Chrisgo]

We use Skype.