[JDEV] Privacy mode

[Jens Alfke]

wil at home <wil at dready.org> wrote:

> From my interpretation of the docs it seems that the server / protocol does
> not provide such facility.  Am I right?

No, I believe it's supported. I can't remember now whether I've tried it out
while experimenting with presence support in my client. I'll give it a try
Monday.

> The only way to do it that I know of, is to send a
> "<presence type=unavailable to='X'/>" (for X in each (@roster)).

Not necessary; you should _never_ manually send such presence packets
directly to other users. Simply use type=unavailable when sending the
_server_ your presence, just as you would normally use the default type
(available) or "dnd" or whatever.


Max Horn wrote:

> first of, using <presence type=unavailable'/> will make you completly
> invisible. OTOH, it will make you "blind", too.

Hmm, do you have evidence that you'll go blind, or is this just something
you heard on the street? ;-) If so, that's kind of a glitch in the protocol.
I guess the problem would be that other Jabber servers would get the
presence info and would think you were offline, so they wouldn't send you
presence updates for your buddies on those servers. Oog.

> Actually, if I for
> the moment take the role of an IM user, that is good for me! If
> people don't want me to see them, I don't see any reason I should
> allow them to see me! Invisible mode in most IM clients is really a
> spy mode...

I think there are valid reasons for wanting to view others' presence without
currently revealing your own. Several of the people I work with were
reluctant to use IM at all until I assured them that the client [AIM at the
time] supported such a mode.

I think the "spying", to people, feels like it's the other way: some people
seem to find the idea of broadcasting their presence potentially disturbing,
and want to know that there's a way to turn it off at least temporarily,
while still being able to send IMs to their friends.

--Jens