The decision to replace Pidgin with Empathy in Ubuntu 9.10 has not been without controversy, or second thoughts on the part of Ubuntu developers. Much of the discontent centers around concerns that Empathy does not yet offer the features to compete with Pidgin. With this in mind, I took a look at how Pidgin and Empathy line up when it comes to delivering the functionality that most people look for in an instant-messaging client. Here are the results.
For my tests, I booted to Ubuntu 9.10 alpha 5 and installed Pidgin (version 2.6.2) from the Ubuntu repositories. Empathy, of course, was installed by default, with version 2.27.91.1 as the current build.
Although it’s still possible that there will be minor changes to the two applications before Karmic’s final release, the feature sets available in the alpha build likely represent everything users can expect in October.
Protocols
First, a look at the protocols supported by the two chat clients:
|
Protocol |
Pidgin |
Empathy |
| AIM | X | X |
| Bonjour | X | |
| Gadu-Gadu | X | X |
| Google Talk | X | |
| GroupWise | X | X |
| ICQ | X | X |
| IRC | X | X |
| MSN | X | X |
| MySpaceIM | X | X |
| X | X | |
| SILC | X | X |
| SIMPLE | X | X |
| Sametime | X | X |
| Jabber/XMPP | X | X |
| Yahoo | X | X |
| Yahoo JAPAN | X | |
| Zephyr | X | X |
| Skype (via plugin) | X |
Empathy lacks support for a few protocols, but the most widely used ones are well supported by both applications–which is no surprise, since they each rely on libpurple as their backend.
Features
Here’s how Pidgin and Empathy compare on features:
|
Feature |
Pidgin |
Empathy |
| Tabbed IMs | X | X |
| Video chat | theoretically | X |
| Audio chat | X | X |
| Desktop sharing | X | |
| File transfer | X | X |
| Network proxy | X | |
| Conversation logging | X | X |
| Off-the-record IM | X |
Overall, the list suggests that Pidgin and Empathy are not that different when it comes to delivering core functionality. Admittedly, I included only features that I deemed important in the table above; Pidgin’s extensive plugins offer a wealth of bells and whistles, like “Contact Availability Prediction,” that might be fun but not essential for most people, and which are currently unavailable in Empathy.
Pidgin lacks working video-chat support (in principle it can be enabled, but I’ve yet to hear of anyone besides the developers who’s managed to use it), but it offers a couple of other important features that Empathy still lacks. Ideally, all of these features would be implemented in both clients, but until then, this sounds like an equitable trade off.
To reiterate an assertion I made a couple of weeks ago when first writing about the Empathy/Pidgin controversy in Ubuntu 9.10, the overwhelming similarity between the two clients proves that this should be a non-issue. At this point, the Ubuntu developers might as well stick with Empathy, since it’s already made it through the alpha releases, and focus their energies on more pressing concerns.
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Since Empathy supports Jabber/XMPP, why wouldn’t it support Google Talk?
Hey Chris – FYI: The “Google Talk” setup in Pidgin is just a dummies way of configuring XMPP (aka Jabber) to work with Google Talk. Google uses specific ports and such, and the setup in Pidgin just simplifies the process for the user, thus making it more user friendly than having to look up the details separately.
Empathy will still work with Google Talk, but you have to know a few settings to configure it properly.
Both will do voice and video once you have them connected.
@Dave
have you got pidgin video working then?
@Troy
+1
If Pidgin doesn’t fix the video chat thing I think Cannonical will go for Empathy – time they bought it in one of the things people use – video chat. Didn’t they say they’ll reconsider their decision of chucking Pidgin? What happened?
How about Facebook chat? And getting the status message from Twitter? I want these features before switching to Empathy.
A basic feature that Empathy lacks as a multi protocol IM is contact merging. I don’t know if this has been fixed but it is a must have to really abstract protocols
You should also add in Facebook Chat via plugin. I use it on Pidgin.
Troy, Dave, LVS: thanks for the clarification–I didn’t realize that Google Talk could work on Empathy, although it’s not as out-of-the-box as in Pidgin.
Daniel: apparently you can get Facebook chat working in Empathy (as well as Pidgin); see http://philliptweedie.wordpress.com/2009/05/18/facebook-chat-with-empathy-in-ubuntu/ But again, it’s not out-of-the-box.
Empathy supports Bonjour too. It’s not called that way thought, it used to be called “Salut” in the old version, with 2.28 it will be “People Nearby”.
And it should work fine even with Google Talk, without needing special info to set it up.
Ciao.
One thing I use Pidgin for is yahoo mail notification, and that doesn’t seem to be part of Empathy’s functionality.
then it seems that these two are almost identical (save for the plugins and addons)
Google talk does work out of the box with telepathy-gabble.
Yahoo Japan IS supported.
I believe that Bonjour is the same as the salut protocol.
Google talk and bonjour ARE supported in empathy, I use both of them on a daily basis since a long time and I never had any problem with these
With Empathy dependencies I will never make the switch from Pidgin although Pidgin really sucks and breaks every version now and then ..
Next time I’ll use Bitlbee.
Another useless article with false information. Empathy supports Google Talk and Bonjour just fine. How about some basic research before spouting nonsense?
Just installing Karmic Koala Alpha 5 and the install screen (which is MUCH nicer btw) expressly mentions Pidgin being the messenger for Ubuntu. Maybe it just needs updating…but why both writing copy and all that if it’s known that Empathy is going to be the default…really odd. Also, there’s a few points where apps assume Pidgin is available (the big one is turning on Pidgin integration in Evolution to sync contacts). Need to replace those with equivalents in Empathy before release of 9.10. The other big one (in my opinion) is inclusion of a Gnome-do plugin for Empathy. Do isn’t installed by default but it’s very popular and the pidgin plugin for it is probably one of the most frequently used.
Hm, great, thanks for the assurance. Hopefully the move won’t be as bad.
One question, why is that Ubuntu decided to replace Pidgin as the default IM software?
Pidgin is just fine and getting better all the time… What’s so good about Empathy? better empathy with its developers than with the Pidgin ones?
I do not understand to me it looks change for the sake of change.
One “feature” that I like about Pidgin is that it is cross-platform. This helps Windows users ease the transition to Linux and makes it easy for those of us that live in both worlds to use a single interface.
Will Empathy have a Windows (and/ or Mac) port?
The information provided here is skewed; how can you not support Google Talk if you do have Jabber/XMPP support!??!?? they probably meant Jingle support, but this is also provided.
People who still want to compare Telepathy/Empathy to Pidgin should just install Pidgin. What is so difficult about it.
The Telepathy-framework’s aim is to provide a totally integrated solution for voice, text and video integration for colloboration… from sending messages to transferring of data. It has been used by Maemo since the Nokia 770 and still to this day with a N810 I have never complained about not having certain support… I can make SIP calls, send messages over XMPP, initiate IRC chats.
To me, Empathy suffices… and probably to most desktop users also. It’s interface is clean and simple… is that not the aim of Ubuntu; ‘Linux for everyone?’ (everyone = human beings).
Instead of bashing, help to integrate Pidgin to work with Telepathy… or help Empathy to become better.
To most Ubuntu users: ask yourself the question; “Are you a desktop-user or power-user?” if so, perhaps it is time to change distro…
Note: for SIP-calls I use Ekiga.
My biggest grips with empathy is its lack of support for Network proxy. even within gnome not all protocols are supported. for me this is a huge let down and it goes again the Ubuntu policy of making things just work.
The biggest let down for pidgin for me (and am surprised this wasn’t mentioned is the lack of a secured way to save passwds which are saved in plain-text.
in fact comparing like this is wrong.
empathy support a lot of protocol through pidign(libpurple) and file tranfer in empathy works _only_ for xmpp. it would be fair to specify that.
It doesn’t matter at all as we can still have both of them on Karmic. ^^
It seems to me that all Empathy needs is facebook chat and OTR plugins. Shouldn’t be too hard to implement. I love pidgin, but I have stability issues with it. I think the biggest boom will be video chat. Something that has been missing in Pidgin for far too long.
The fact Empathy has Desktop sharing would suggest it’s more suitable for business use. Which is where Canonical are going to have a lot of hard decisions to make in the future.
It will be interesting to see how Canonical manages to serve the needs of it’s core community of non-business users and still produce an OS that is appealing to businesses. Will they spin-off a special version for special groups of people? Will they rely on partners like IBM to customise the package selections?
God damn, ubuntu users are dumb asses, IT IS NOT CANONICAL MAKING THIS CHOICE! It is the GNOME Foundation
http://library.gnome.org/misc/release-notes/2.26/#rnusers.empathy
Canonical can change what ever it wants. It doesn’t have to go with the Gnome Foundations choices.
JKnife: akiwolfie is exactly right any distro can include/exclude whatever software they want, and btw if you haven’t noticed most people abide by a certain amount of civility on this forum it wouldn’t hurt you to give that a try also.
The SIPE protocol (SIP for Exchange) is working great with Pidgin, but I haven’t seen it available for Empathy. SIPE is required for me, as my work is using Microsoft Communication Server.
[...] Bug Filing Changes for Ubuntu WorksWithUAtlanta Linux Fest: Top 9 Ubuntu HighlightsPidgin vs. Empathy: Feature ComparisonMore Reflections on the Cloud Unknown Feed Ubuntu UnleashedPost for Ubuntu-Unleashed.com!Howto: [...]
I’ve been using Empathy since 9.04 because it supported Google Talk… with video! Also I don’t remember having to do anything special to get Google Talk enabled, it was listed in the protocols list, is this gone in 9.10?
so what’s more important: being able to see the other person while chatting or communicating via a encrypted connection? my choice is clear…
kkanzler – Actually, the last release or two of Pidgin supports both. OTR is a popular plugin these days.
What I can’t understand is why Canonical is going from a nice feature rich and higher quality cross-platform client like Pidgin for a pet project of the GNOME developers that doesn’t even approach Pidgin in awesomeness.
Of course, they’re also trying to put Ubuntu on the cloud, for no reason other than its the tech hype du jour. Same reason they threw Pulse Audio in there was because it was TRENDY, not because it worked better than the established software.
PA was so bad it drove me and a great deal of people I know from Ubuntu, SuSE, and Fedora. They wanted their sound to WORK.
Not that it affects me much, being an Arch user and can choose what my desktop has for myself.
Ok, but Pulseaudio is working great in Karmic final release for me.
I bet the point Canonical choose Empathy instead of Pidgin is because they see greater potential in a Gnome foundation project than some offshore Pidgin who yet has to; and seem unwilling to support FAST file-transfer and audio-video to and from MSN users.
Sheesh..
Can anybody transfer file between gtalk and Empathy? My Empathy(2.28.1) is coming with ubuntu 9.10. When I try to send file to gtalk account, it always failed. I learnt that Empathy can transfer files to gtalk via XMPP, but how to make it work?
There is a check box in the “File Transfer” box for Empathy, however file transfer DOES NOT work in Empathy for Yahoo.
The one thing I need to do is transfer simple files across Yahoo. Empathy fails this so I will continue to use Pidgin.
to @20. @bigbrovar : I dropped empathy for a short in this release. I never save passwords. Empathy have no option to ask for a password at login. It ‘must’ save it. Could not figure out how to tell that not to do it.
Having tried and failed many times to get Google Talk Voice working on my computer, would it be possible for someone to post a video on Youtube showing how to set it up and it actually working (i.e. talking both ways)?
The proxy for Empathy is handled by the proxy settings on ubuntu, you configure it once and then you don’t have to worry about it. unlike pidgin you have to re-enter it to make it work.
I am surprised at how many people do reviews of Ubuntu that know nothing about it, and then in their review they say “What I deem important”. For the record what you deem important really doesn’t mean jack to the rest of us.
Maybe if people would do a review of the product from a stand point of functionality, instead of their own selfish needs then we would be better reviews
When you mention features and supported things, it’s also good to mention how things work – how stable things are. For example the so called support for Skype in Pidgin via plugin is a 100% d*ng. I know many people (not only me) who tried this out and it always ends in crashes usually with Pidgin but sometimes even with both Skype AND pidgin. By Empathy the video chat is experimental and frankly I don’t know anyone who managed to make it work. A very important thing that you missed is the ability to transfer files in Empathy. I use it (I don’t like Pidgin very much) but still this is an obvious flaw. I use ICQ, MSN and GoogleTalk. File transfer is possible only with GT, although the other 2 protocols support it too.
And as a matter of fact @Jason said what I think too at the end of his/her post.
I can go on and on but I don’t want to.
thank you,
i dint like empathy. but shifted back to it yesterday.
I found it simple and good.
bye bye pidgin
I have a problem on empathy… I don’t know what’s wrong, but i can’t contact people who are on MSN via iPhone, I receive what they send, but they don’t receive what I send…
No problem with Pidgin