[JDEV] jabber client

[Jens Alfke]

>> I'd like to learn to develop a jabber client. DO you
>> know which texts should I read as reference?
>
> Have a look at Jens Alfke's Client Developer's Cheat Sheet aT:
>
> http://homepage.mac.com/jens/Jabber/JabberClientCheatSheet.html

One note: my cheat sheet describes writing a Jabber client from scratch 
(or nearly from scratch -- you'd be nuts not to at least use an 
available XML parsing library like expat.) But you should first consider 
using a Jabber library for your platform, if one's available for your 
favorite language & platform and if you can agree with the (usually GPL) 
licensing terms. See <http://jabber.org/?oid=71>. This will save you a 
lot of coding.

You should also consider whether it wouldn't be more productive to 
contribute to one of the existing open-source clients instead of writing 
yet another one. If you're doing this because there's a feature you need 
that isn't available, it'll probably be easier to add it to an existing 
client, and there'll be an existing user base that will thank you for 
it. There's a somewhat-complete list of clients at 
<http://jabber.org/?oid=70>, most of which are open source.

That said, let me toot my horn and say that the cheat sheet is probably 
worth reading even if you're not working from scratch, since it 
describes the overall architecture of what happens inside a Jabber 
client in a style that's much more tutorial than the official specs.

--Jens