Chapter 1 - Introduction

Abstract

This chapter focuses on the Google Talk client. Google Talk is a huge step forward for Google as a means of tying in communications with its wide suite of applications. Google Talk is one of the few open-standard chat services around, using the widely popular Jabber protocol. It is ubiquitous and allows people to connect through a standalone client, Google Mail, or many of Google's other Web-based applications. When Google Talk was envisioned, the planners decided to take advantage of the Jabber protocol—an open-standard protocol based upon Extensible Markup Language (XML), which is used in a large variety of networks. Its design makes it easy for third-party developers to create modifications and extensions to Google Talk or create their own clients that can converse with Google Talk users. This is vastly different from all the other prominent instant messaging (IM) services, which use their own closed-source protocols and spend countless hours blocking access from outside clients. Google Talk operates with its standalone client and is also tied into a number of Google services such as Google Mail. It has already been implemented into other Google apps, such as their Google Desktop, with the potential for it to be included in numerous other applications such as Google's Documents and Spreadsheets applications. For chatters on the move, Google Talk is also fully supported on numerous mobile devices such as the RIM BlackBerry and the Nokia 770 tablet. Google Talk might be the newest IM service to emerge, but with a strong brand name and loyal following, it could become one of the most popular clients in upcoming years.