Yahoo! Messenger Blog » Mac version

Updated Mac version now available

Administrator — Thu, 28 May 2009 22:44:08 +0000

As promised, we’ve released a new build of Yahoo! Messenger for Mac 3.0 Beta (178870). This latest build fixes the issues with auto log-in and chat room crashes that were occurring for users who had upgraded to Mac OSX 10.5.7.

Download Yahoo! Messenger for Mac Beta 3.0

Thanks for your patience while we worked out the bugs.

Sarah Bacon
Product Manager

Mac update (with some exciting iPhone news)

Administrator — Fri, 22 May 2009 22:02:29 +0000

For those of you having issues with the latest Mac OS X update (10.5.7) and Yahoo! Messenger for Mac, help is on the way.

We’ve identified the problems causing the chat room crash and the sign-in problem* (see potential workaround below), and will be releasing those fixes in a new build soon. So stay tuned to the blog; we’ll let you know as soon it’s available. Thanks for your patience.

On an Apple-related note, we’re smiling this week because we hit the 1 million download mark for our Yahoo! Messenger for the iPhone app. Thanks to all of our users for giving it a try and providing their feedback. We really appreciate it.

Sarah Bacon
Product Manager

* Here’s a workaround if you are having trouble signing in since you updated to 10.5.7 (and are using a “behind the firewall” connection setting): Try disabling auto-login. To do that, click on the Yahoo! Messenger menu, select “Preferences”, then click on the “General” tab. Uncheck the box that says “Automatically start Yahoo! Messenger”. Quit Yahoo! Messenger completely and relaunch it again. If this fixes the issue, please hold off on turning auto-login back on until we release the new build.

Tips for Yahoo! Messenger for the Mac

Administrator — Tue, 12 May 2009 18:52:33 +0000

I don’t post about Yahoo! Messenger for the Mac very often, so I thought I’d share a few of my favorite features/preferences.

Webcam display image: Use your webcam to take a display image picture. Pose for your shot, hit the “Take Snapshot” button and wait for the counter to get to 1 – then smile! To use this feature, go to the Yahoo! Messenger menu, select “Preferences” and then click the Display Image icon in the toolbar. Click on the “Image” option in the center, then click “Webcam” to take your pic.

Hide display images in your contact list: On some days, it can seem like none of my friends have a display image. There’s only so often I can look at an anonymous grey head. So if you like to keep things simple, or just don’t like your friend’s display images, you can hide them on your contact list.

Go to the Yahoo! Messenger menu, select “Preferences” and then click the Display Image icon in the toolbar. Then uncheck the “Show display images in my Messenger list” box.

Apple + n keyboard shortcut: This handy trick brings up a contact search box with auto-filtering, making it easy to find a friend in your list and start a new IM.

Let the music play (or not): Under Preferences > Voice & Calls, you’ll find a checkbox that says “Pause iTunes during calls”. This is checked by default so if you’re grooving when a call comes in, your music will automatically pause. But if you like background tunes while you chat, uncheck it.

What’s your favorite tip or trick in Yahoo! Messenger for Mac?

Sarah Bacon
Product Manager

Winner in the About.com IM Awards

Administrator — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 20:23:02 +0000

We did it! With the help of your votes, we retained our title and won several more categories in the 2009 About.com IM Awards.

After 160,339 votes were cast, we won the following awards:

Best IM Client of the Year
Best Mac IM
Most Improved IM
Best Chat Rooms
Best Designed IM (GUI)

Thanks to everyone who voted for us – we really appreciate it!

Sarah Bacon
Product Manager

Voting closes soon!

Administrator — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 17:19:34 +0000

Voting for the 2009 About.com IM Awards ends this Sunday at midnight EST. Please take a moment to vote for Yahoo! Messenger using the links below. Even if you’ve already voted, feel free to do it again!

Click a category below and once on the page, click the Yahoo! Messenger listing to vote (you’ll also see current results after you vote).

1) Best Overall IM Experience

2) Best Mac IM – Yahoo! Messenger for Mac

3) Most Improved IM Client

4) Best IM Feature – Pingbox

5) Best IM (GUI) Design

Thanks!

Sarah Bacon
Product Manager

Start calls from your Mac Address Book

Administrator — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 19:23:56 +0000

If you’re a Mac user that lives and dies by your Address Book, you’ll love this tool. One of our developers wrote a plug-in for the Mac Address Book application that lets you start a call on Yahoo! Messenger right from your friend’s contact card. Once the script is installed, you can right click on any contact’s phone number and you’ll see an option for “Call with Yahoo! Messenger”.

Here’s how to install the script which will work in conjunction with Yahoo! Messenger for Mac 3.0 Beta 4:

1) Download the zip file and unzip the contents (1 file entitled “Yahoo! Messenger.scpt”)

2) Double click the hard drive icon on your desktop, go to the Library folder, and find the folder entitled “Address Book Plug-ins” (~/Library/Address Book Plug-Ins/)

3) Drag and drop the Yahoo! Messenger.scpt file you downloaded into the Address Book Plug-ins folder. (You may be asked to authenticate the installation)

4) After restarting the Address Book, you will be able to right-click on anyone’s phone number and call them through Yahoo! Messenger.

For more information on making low-costs calls from your Mac to your friend’s mobile or landline phones, please visit our website.

Sarah Bacon
Product Manager

Vote for Y! Messenger: About.com IM Awards

Administrator — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 20:09:32 +0000

For the second year in a row, About.com readers nominated Yahoo! Messenger as a finalist in several of the categories for the Best IM Awards of 2009. We hope you’ll take a moment to vote for us and help us hold onto our title from last year.

Click a category below and once on the page, click the Yahoo! Messenger listing to vote for us (you’ll also see current results after you vote).

1) Best Overall IM Experience

2) Best Mac IM – Yahoo! Messenger for Mac

3) Most Improved IM Client

4) Best IM Feature – Pingbox | (What’s Pingbox?)

5) Best IM (GUI) Design

Thanks to the About.com readers for nominating us in these categories and special thanks to those of you that cast a vote. Voting ends Sunday, March 15, 2009 at midnight EST.

Sarah Bacon
Product Manager

Mac 3.0 Beta 4 now available

Administrator — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 22:11:08 +0000

Yes, we’re still in Beta but the team has been hard at work fixing bugs and adding a few new features. Here’s a rundown of what’s in this latest release, Yahoo! Messenger for Mac 3.0 Beta 4 (build 156957):

- Over three dozen bug fixes addressing a variety of features including file transfer, display images, voice, chat rooms, stealth settings and webcam.

- Added clearer messaging when receiving anonymous messages from your Pingbox (screenshot)

- Added a preference to separately enable/disable archiving for chat room conversations. Go to Preferences > Messaging and check the “Enable Yahoo! Chat Room Archiving” box (screenshot)

- When you report an IM as spam, it also adds the sender to your ignore list (screenshot)

- To cancel automatic sign in when you’re launching Yahoo! Messenger for Mac, hold down the SHIFT key

- Various performance and memory bug fixes

- Added a new message style called “Kobi lite”. To try it out, go to Preferences > Messaging, then change the Conversation style.

Download Yahoo! Messenger for Mac 3.0 Beta 4

We hope you enjoy this latest version. We value your input so please stop by our Mac feedback form after you’ve tried it out and let us know your thoughts.

Sarah Bacon
Product Manager

Leopard crash bug fixed in Mac Beta

Administrator — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 21:35:40 +0000

We released a new update for Yahoo! Messenger for Mac 3.0 Beta today. A bug was fixed that was causing crashes for users on OS X Leopard.

We recommend that all Yahoo! Messenger for Mac users upgrade to this latest version. If you’re on an older version of 3.0 Beta, you will also see a prompt to upgrade when you sign in.

Download Yahoo! Messenger for Mac 3.0 Beta
(build 126432)

Have some suggestions or issues you want to share with us about the Mac version? Please stop by our Yahoo! Messenger for Mac feedback page to let us know.

Sarah Bacon
Product Manager

Update to Mac version

Administrator — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 22:23:45 +0000

Today we released an update to Yahoo! Messenger for Mac 3.0 Beta. This latest release (version 120437) includes several bug fixes that addressed some nagging issues with stealth settings, file transfer, mobile settings, and interoperability with Windows Live Messenger.

With this release, we fixed the privacy feature so that you can assign individual stealth settings for your friends. So if you want to appear online to everyone but not to your boss Joe, you can set yourself to appear offline to him but online to your friends.

In addition, Mac users will now be able to add Windows Live Messenger contacts to their Yahoo! Messenger list without any issues. We also fixed a problem that was affecting some file transfer requests.

In prior releases, we also encountered bugs with the “Sign in to mobile device” feature which allows you to sign out but still appear online to friends with an “I’m mobile” status message. IMs sent to you are then forwarded to your mobile phone as SMS (text) messages. This latest release fixed this bug so it should work correctly now.

While these are all longstanding features of Yahoo! Messenger, they were buggy or not working properly in previous versions of the Mac version. If you have encountered problems with any of these features in the past, be sure to upgrade to this latest version of Yahoo! Messenger for Mac 3.0 Beta.

As always, we greatly appreciate your feedback. After upgrading to this latest version and using it for awhile, please stop by our feedback form and let us know what you like and don’t like about it.

Download Yahoo! Messenger for Mac 3.0 Beta

Sarah Bacon
Product Manager