If you haven’t noticed, the next version of Messenger (8 beta) is out. This is the most development I have seen from the Messenger team in a long time.
I have also noticed that the Messenger/chat network has been real flaky lately. It seems like every other night I can’t sign in for extended amounts of time. I guess in the long run this is good for business because Yahoo! is finally upgrading its services and not neglecting Messenger. My only wish is Yahoo! would post the outages and perhaps start a Messenger developer’s blog.
I read this morning at theunofficialyahooweblog (http://yahoo.weblogsinc.com/2006/06/19/yahoo-opens-up-messenger-to-3rd-party-plug-ins/) that Yahoo! has just released a SDK for a plugin engine that will reside in the next version of Messenger. I can’t wait to dig into this seemingly juicy morsel of Yahoo! fun. I’m not sure what all one can do with the SDK yet but I will be sure to report what I find. The SDK can be found at http://developer.yahoo.com/. A list of already published plugins can be found at http://us.gallery.yahoo.com/messenger.
Yahoo! mail is the target of a new JavaScript vulnerability. I have not been able to find out much about the actual mechanism involved but I have listed a few interesting links on the matter. All I know at this time is it involves AJAX.
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/js.yamanner@m.html
http://www.securityfocus.com/brief/229?ref=rss
http://www.yahoo.weblogsinc.com/2006/06/12/alert-yahoo-mail-vulnerable-to-new-graphics-site-email-worm/
Just added some Yahoo! registration servers in the tutorial section.
I have finished yet another “book” on Yahoo! entitled “All About Yahoo!” published by Smart Computing Magazine (http://www.smartcomputing.com). This is actually one of those special issue editions published by a major computer magazine that focuses on a particular topic. It is a general discussion about all of the Yahoo! services with brief mention of Yahoo! Messenger. There was nothing new reveled to me with the exception of a reference to http://messenger.yahoo.com/edit/?.src=pg. This shows a list of your buddy list and allows one to message or change user options. I am sure that this is a well know fact to most but I was unaware of this particular link. It was OK to read but I would not recommend it.
Looks like the chat network is experiencing problems again and rumor has it that a new update for webcam is the culprit. I have searched all of my resources but only found one mention of the update (it has only been a few hours since I noticed the problem so the news has not filtered down yet?). The guys in the Camseek forum are talking about an improved super webcam more like MSN’s. This does seem in line with the MSN and Yahoo! IM merger. It would be nice if Yahoo! posted an official release before taking certain services offline or performing upgrades. If anyone hears any more about this then please let me know by a comment.
