End of Skype support coming soon?
 

Microsoft has indicated that Skype support for legacy platforms and OSes will be greatly reduced soon. Though they were not so kind as to give a date, they mention October 2016 as a deadline. Skype integration even without video is something I enjoy on my N9. I don't know if it will survive the latest purge.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

what is skype?

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

It is possible to build alternative Skype client with integration similar to Extraplugins accounts UI or Nine2D. The problem is as usual the lack of interest & money. Skype integration was one of the top notch features I was so happy about. What's next? abandoning 2G? changing radio frequencies? Life is so brutal for nostalgic nerds like me :)

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

In the USA AT&T has already depricated 2G and is pushing hard for LTE but at least there is 3G available for my N9.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

No alternatives will exist, unfortunate that this is happening. But it was inevitable. I'm sure somebody will talk about a replacement in the next year or so but after this long, nothing has appeared.

I do find it odd that even Windows Phone has been dropped.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

It seems to me that Microsoft has more or less dropped WP off their plans, nothing new comping up there, not even of their own protocols/applications.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

It is called "admitting the defeat".

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

Skype & Windows Phone have quite a love story. Back during the Lumia 800 times the "official" Skype client didn't support backgrounding (i.e. cannot receive skype calls in other programs).

It never got upgraded.


I wish I could ditch Skype. If only so many academics weren't using it...

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

Yikes. Funny how I had a Lumia 900 but never used Skype on it. Used it on my N9 instead.

Weird... most academics I encounter are now using Hangouts first, Slack (text only) and then Skype as a distant third.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

Ahhh it must suck to have such slick newer devices ...
yet not be able to use progs like real xmms
(which by the way has the ability for literally 1000"s of tunes in a playlist ..unlike so many players for our devices...and the virtualizations are not too bad either)
or even skype...
works great ...
still ....
on my n800's and n810's ..


Want skype and decent applications..?
get a proper device..
:D

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

If I ever win a fortune in a lottery, I will bribe former Nokia employees to get me the sources and I will pay for development (with whatever money I'm left with) :D

Meego was perfect enough to survive 4 years without any updates. If you pull a 4-year old android smartphone out of the drawer today, it's begging for internet access and loads a ton of updates.

Nokia N9 would serve as a "smartphone" for another couple of years if:
- the sources were given and APIs updated for Facebook, Skype, Google, Dropbox, Picasa, Flickr, etc.
- the messaging options were extended to include official WhatsApp client, Telegram, Source, QQ, Vibe etc. to choose from.
- Maps and Drive apps were updated to be able to use Here map tiles
- several bugs were finally fixed (sudden battery drop among most annoying)

Rest is just a matter of using proper tweaking tools to adjust the phone to our tastes.
As long as I can make a call, text somebody, take a picture and listen to music, N9 is my weapon of choice. Amen.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

I actually don't need so much "updates" for N9 -- updated processor, a bit more ram, solved battery drops and I am good to go :)

On the apps side -- updated MeeRun (still gratefull that such app exist, after all) and AGTL (does not work anymore on my N9, using Jolla instead).

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

They don´t release source code because they plan to re-release the N9 :D

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

Seems Windows Phone turned out to be the real burning platform.
But then they have been burning down platforms since WinCE.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

Did you mean you need something in MeeRun for updated, or that you found a recent update? I like that program, too. If there's a later version somewhere that adds something interesting, I'd love to know.

Only two quirks as far as I'm concerned. And neither one really causes me any actual problem, just an amusing anecdote . . .

1) Only supports SI and Imperial units and not US. This is a purely academic issue for non-survey distance measurement, so is a non-issure for me. Still amusing, though. (Is the Imperial system in widespread use anywhere in 2016 outside of Belize? E.g., all the highway signs I've seen in Canada have long since switched to km. We switched all ours back to miles only under Ronald Reagan, of course.)

2) And this is the weirder but one: If you do select Imperial units and turn on the voice announcements, you hear your distance traveled every kilometer -- in miles! ("Point sixty-two miles. Three minutes, sixteen." On my bike, I'm certainly not running that fast! ;) )

And it occurs to me that I've never tried eCoach on the N900. Mosly since I've never been sufficiently motivated and patient to sit down, read through the forums thoroughly and fix the N900 AGPS problem. Anyone here using it?

Ed. Almost forgot my Skype point after all that;

Does anyone have N900 Skype with video working with CSSU, or does it crash for you too as soon as you turn it on?

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

But then, to be honest, it´s kind of pervert to have Skype installed on a Linux device.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

No problem with video here on two N900s.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

I don't use Skype much but it is a nice back-up communication method and most people I know do use it, which makes it important. I love the system integration for Skype on my N9, still my primary phone, and it would bother me to have something visible in the beautiful system be broken. It would mar the perfection that is N9. But, I'm optimistic that it will continue to work past Oct 2016. One reason is that N9 is essentially Linux, and MS is actively developing support for Linux:
http://blogs.skype.com/2016/07/13/sk...d-chromebooks/

And the reason for Linux support is the China market. It is a critical market due to its sheer size. Looking at Warehouse downloads, the Chinese market is a huge chunk of Jolla/Harmattan users. These are also users who are very open to trying new things, obviously, and would readily switch to Skype alternatives, as opposed to Windows Phone and Blackberry users who are more likely to simply upgrade to Androids or iOS. (Or Windows 10 phone which should work -- MS now gives the same OS name for both the phone and desktop.)

The support is for a newly developed Linux client, but it may be an advantage that N9 Skype is fairly basic (no video for example) so perhaps there is nothing to break, at least unintentionally, and at least for now. So I don't think we'll be purposely killed. But Skype is "migrating to the cloud" according to the announcement and there is a fundamental difference in how new clients will operate. So I guess it depends on how Skype had been implemented on the N9, and whether any fixes will be possible.

Edit: Upon exploring the Skype web site some more, it seems the completion of migrating from a peer-to-peer use of Skype to being entirely cloud based is planned for "early 2017." (I also use a no-longer-supported MacOS, Snow Leopard, as my main Mac OS, which will still work until then even though "support" is dropped earlier. So, the client is no longer updated but peer-to-peer is not yet broken -- until "early 2017.")

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

In which case just get an affordable n8x0 to compliment your n9. Skype ain't goin' nowhere on the n8x0...
It's there for good.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

How can you be sure?

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

MS did not erase history yet by stopping Skype on the Nx00

Maybe they realize by now that such action will only cost them another 1000 or so Skype users. :D


One of the classic stories regarding the special Nokia + Skype story is still published on a Microsoft server.
They don't seem to be in a hurry to hide the historical existence of the "world's most advanced mobile computer" which development they have helped to prevent and freeze in time and by doing so fully acknowledging the threat it was building up.

In retrospect if Nokia wanted MS to get scared by a scenario of leaking Linux out of Mobiles to Desktops and into consumers minds and guide it to buy the Nokia mobile branch to kill it if not microsoftize it then announcing "this (N900) is step 4 of 5" would make sense.

If Nokia wanted it to be successful they should have kept quiet and not announce or "partner" with Intel which was also a possible honey pot for MS intervention.

So leaving this message on their updated server reminds MS and MS customers that they have actually acquired something substantial instead of the abortion which they helped turn it into, deliberately or not.

https://blogs.windows.com/devices/20...nokia-devices/

“With more than 400 million Skype users worldwide, the integration of Skype on Nokia Nseries mobile computers is a significant step in bringing converged Internet experiences from the desktop to the world’s most advanced mobile computer.”

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

I have thought and thought on this topic...
and there are only 2 possibles I can think of why skype still is allowed to work on the n8x0.

1- We dodged the Great Skypenami!!!! hahaahaha... when everyone else was being erased ... and microsoft was getting rid of skype for old platforms... they overlooked our n8x0's. But I find this thought unlikely... since one thing to bet on is that Microsoft is nothing but thorough when it comes to axing anything that could cost them.

So it is more than likely option two is more plausible.

2- Before Skype was bought by microsoft... I believe (and this I think the more likely) that just as nokia - microsoft cannot release proprietary bits to us ...due to binding contracts with other parties such as skype (at that time) and others... I believe that it is quite possible that such binding contracts at that time made Skype bound to honour such contracts likewise...
Sort of a "Skype-Nokia Death Grip" on each other... as the two fell plummeting, flaming.... into the abyss...carrying our n8x0's into a happily functioning Limbo as a result (colourful imagery eh?).

I highly suspect the 2nd possibility ...
since far greater and more widely used and popular devices have been Skypenami'd since.
I do believe some specific bargains were made, babies sacrificed, and demonic pacts done when the n8x0's were devised.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

I was reading along for the minimum requirements, this blurb was under the "Android" subheading. Though, they way that they word it, I feel as if it were talking about more than just that operating system, more like a general statement.

Since n8x0's use the ARMv6 instruction set, and the experience is more or less simlar as the said devices in the quote, wouldn't it also make sense that support should still remain intact for our nits?

Maybe endsormeans is right with the first option and we were spared/overlooked from when the Order 66 was issued onto other platforms. :D

Another theory, they treat Maemo just like every other distro, with a few exceptions. My gmail account identifies my n810 as a Linux Computer :D so I can kiiiinda see this being possible. (maybe this is why it was overlooked?)

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

I suggest that you guys stop talking about it unless you want to jinx it. Just saying...

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

Good point Gerbick.
It's like saying "Everything is just fabulous! What could possibly go wrong?"
The great entity Murphy usually steps in on that cue.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

What about putting efforts into sip, jingle, webrtc instead ?

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

That's yielded much of nothing in the last 7 years. Why continue hoping it'll make a popularly used product today by folks that already use Skype?

Simply stated, better protocols do exist, but nobody is using them but a fringe few. I can't get my mother to use anything but Skype. Same for the companies I support. Can't even convince most of you to try anything or make anything if you were deeply entrenched in your choices either.

So why even suggest something that isn't layman friendly today?

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

A shame, isn't it?

But: just because.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

Skype has got numerous several in-built flaws; including but not limited to:

• closed protocol that allows owners to spy on your messages & conversations
• closed application that allow owners to run unknown and potentially evil functionality on your devices
• policy of the owners to ban IP addresses at will, for example known TOR entry points

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

I posted about Ring earlier:
http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=97097
It seems like a possible alternative to Skype.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

That may be the case, but as far as I am concerned, it also has one built-in advantage: everyone I know uses it.

As far as they are concerned, the advantages are the ease of use and the richness of features. As far as I am aware, there is no other single tool that combines all the features of Skype in a single product.

The whole point of a communication tool is... communication. What is the point of having a super-duper communication tool and no one to communicate with?

Lastly, the very example of Yet Another Free Tool that no one ever uses, already at least the fourth only since I joined this forum in 2012, shows how short-lived those are. All my friends, relatives and work relations have been using Skype for well over 15 years. Show me a single open-source product that has been in popular use for at least 10% of that period.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

I wonder what makes others think N900 will be spared. . It sounds to me like the protocol is changing in one way or other. We're stuck with a Skype blob, and have no hope of getting it updated.Being Linux does not mean we will receive any further support. They will obviously support their new Linux client, but I don't think that means they will revive their old Linux clients (including N900 client).

Pity that SIP/XMPP couldn't get to the masses :(

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

Skype seamless integration into N-series was a great feature and served for over 4 years without any significant updates.

Funny thing, when features & accounts stop working one by one, it reminds me of Blade Runner movie. I feel like Rick Deckard in the final 'Tears in rain' monologue scene and N9 is like a Replicant with all it's power and unfortunate expiration date... I'm asking myself, is my N9 a dying Roy Batty, or maybe immortal Rachael : )

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

And there you have why some of us are allergic to 3rd party network services (and 1st party, fwiw), _specially_ when "everyone else uses them".

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

I would go for something a little bit more secure, and at least open-sourced - Telegram. Its users growth is significant and exceeded 100M
http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=94503&page=7
Having at least one working service of this kind on my N9 would be great. We already have Google Hangouts working, but that's uncertain in the long run.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

Telegram is not a replacement for Skype as it does not do calls (voice or audio).

How do you have Hangouts working on N900?

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

Here's the official statement:
"We may enable voice calls if we see significant demand in the future. The technology necessary for encrypted calls has indeed been created in our R&D dungeons."

https://openrepos.net/content/hamedr...ssenger-plugin

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

Nitpick: you're basically just delaying the problem. Telegram is also centralized and thus has an expiration date. So you'll never see me recommending it as an alternative.

Re: End of Skype support coming soon?
 

sadly it's not about the alternative, we may will be forced to use it but our relations will have no reason to add more chat service just to add 'n9/n900 users', almost all my family, friends, work relation are on whatsapp + BBM, just saying, but really i dont want to see a lonely meego/harmattan.