The fifth experimental release of the Pidgin 3.0 (2.94) instant messaging client has been introduced. This release is marked as having a quality level of a preliminary alpha version, not intended for everyday use. The builds are prepared in Flatpak format and are available in the beta repository on Flathub.
The Pidgin 3 branch has been in development since 2011, and prior to that, it was discussed for three more years at the conceptual and idea level. Pidgin 3 has transitioned to a GObject type system, GTK4 libraries, and Adwaita, the Meson build system, GPlugin for plugin handling, SQLite for chat history storage, and GSettings for settings management. The API has been completely redesigned. GTK Builder XML has been used to define interface elements, and a custom widget library called Talkatu has been created for chat history display.
In the Pidgin 3 interface, the contact list and chat are combined into a single window. The delivery of the console client Finch has been discontinued (it may be returned in the future). Currently, implementations of the IRCv3, XMPP, SIP, Demo, and Bonjour protocols are being developed. The Pidgin 3 branch is incompatible with Pidgin 2 and previously created plugins but can be installed alongside existing Pidgin 2 builds.
Among the changes in the presented test release:
- An interface for managing statuses has been added.
- The algorithm for highlighting user nicknames with different colors has been changed to use the HSLuv color space and the method described in the XEP-0392 specification.
- The KWallet plugin has been discontinued in favor of direct interaction with the libsecret library.
- Several dozen internal changes and bug fixes have been made to the Pidgin application and the libpurple library.
Source: opennet.ru
