Tutorials > Google Talk

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#352332 by xosemp (VIP) at 2005-08-25 09:28:45 (7 years ago) - [Report]

Google Talk is the new IM/Voice application developed by Google. In this tutorial I'll explain how to set it up, and some tips and tricks of their use, including some hidden stuff. Note that Google Talk is only a Beta and has been released very recently, so consider this tutorial as a draft that I will be improving every while, adding more information.

Installation
The first thing you will need to use Google Talk is the client itself. You can download it from here. It's a 900KB installer so it will take very little time to download. To login to it you'll also need a GMail account. If you don't have one, there are plenty of places to get one for free (avoid eBay :-P

) or you can ask a friend who has one to invite you. You'll also need a Windows NT 5+ (this is, Win2000/XP/2003). Google Talk might work on other versions although it's not recommended. There is also no version for Linux or Mac, but there will be one soon. If you want to use Google Talk on other OS, you can use another client, but you won't be able to make voice calls. I will explain this later. There is currently a English version only, but Google is alredy working on other languages.

The installer is very clean and straightfordward. It doesn't bundle any strange app and has very few impact on the operating system, installing very few files and registry keys. This is the installation list for those interested:

Registry keys (these also have subkeys and values):
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{226b64e8-dc75-4eea-a6c8-abcb496320f2}\Google Talk
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\{226b64e8-dc75-4eea-a6c8-abcb496320f2}-Google Talk
HKU\S-1-5-21-<random-numbers-separated-by-slashes>\Software\Google\Google Talk

Files:
%PROGRAMFILES%\Google\Google Talk\googletalk.exe
%PROGRAMFILES%\Google\Google Talk\uninstall.exe

And 2 shortcuts, one on the Desktop and another on the Start Menu.

If you don't like the client, you can cleanly uninstall it at any time by deleting these files and registry keys manually or by using the uninstaller provided.

General information
Once you start it it will ask you for your username and password. Your username is your GMail login (either your nickname only or your full e-mail address, including the domain), and your password the GMail password. If you set the client to remember you, the login will change to your full e-mail address.

Once you are logged in you'll find a minimalistic interface with a logo, some links at the top, the search contacts field, your name and status and your friend list. There are no poups and no advertisements of any kind on this version. The first time you start the program this list will be clean, unless someone has alredy added you. You can fill this list with your GMail contacts by left-clicking on it and selecting "Also show GMail contacts" and on the "Show all XX" link at the bottom. Then you can invite anyone by just clicking on the Invite link next to their name/e-mail.

Note that you can invite anyone, even if they don't alredy have a GMail account. If you invite a non-GMail user he will also get a GMail invite to register on the webmail service and then on Google Talk. The invite used will be taken from your current invites. You can't invite any non-GMail user if you don't have any invites left. When you invite someone, he will see a "<name> wants to add you as a friend!" message, asking the user for confirmation. When he accepts you, you can start talking.

You have 3 links at the top, like the following:

Inbox: that will open your GMail inbox on the default browser.

Settings: to change the program settings (more of this later).

Help: opens your browser on Google's Help Center.

Then you have your name and status. There is a dropdown list where you can change it. There are 2 main statuses, that you can choose: Available and Busy. If you click on the "Custom message..." item or on the status instead than on the arrow you can set your own personal message that will appear on your friend's contact list to let them know your current activity. These statuses are savesd for later use with a single click.

There is a simple colour representation of the different states of your friends on Google Talk:

Green: Available

Orange: Away

Red: Busy

Gray: Off-line/hidden

If you move your mouse over one of your friends and leave it there for a second, some information of that user will be shown, like the e-mail address and the status message. You have also a GMail icon next to your offline friends, so you can send them e-mail. On online messages the icon changes to a phone, so you can start voice conversations directly. If you left click them, a menu will pop up with 2 options: Rename and Remove. You can rename your friends in case they you don't know them by the name they currently have. If you have many friends on your list you can use the "Search all contacts" field to find them. Clicking on Remove will show a confirmation message asking if you want to block that contact or not. If you don't block it, he will still be able to chat to you but won't show on the list.

These names are taken from their GMail accounts. You can change your own name from here. There is currently no way of changing your own nickname on the client itself. Note that when you are chatting with your friends, only the first name is shown, not the last name, but on the conversation window you'll see both. If you want to set a nickname instead than your real name, write it on the First name field and leave the last name one blank.

When you double-click on any of your friends a new window appears. This is the conversation window where you can chat/talk to your friends. The conversation is a the top and the field for writing at the bottom. When your friend is writing, a keyboard icon appears at the bottom right corner to inform you. The conversation window is very simple and currently has no images or other distractions. It's just plain text conversation. It has only two buttons at the top: one for sending email to your friend and other to start a voice conversation.

After you send a first message, a conversation window will pop up on your firend's computer for you to talk. If you write several messages in a row, your name won't show several times, but your message will be addd to the previous one in a new line. There are no avatars or graphical emoticons on this Beta version, but if you write a emoticon it will be shown with blue, bold text. You can also write with some basic styling. For example in *bold* or _italic_ by using these signs at the beggining and end.

Voice conversations are very easy to use. Just click on the Start Call button and it will connect. There are simple controls at the top to control the volume of both the microphone and the speakers. When you finish your call you can just click on End call or close the window.

Program settings
By clicking on the Settings link you can change the client's options. A new window will popup with two panes. On the left there is a list with all the option panes and on the right the options themselves. I'm going though every setting explaining them (default options go inside the parenthesis):

General tab:
General client and friend list's options:

Start automatically when starting Windows (ON): Self-explanatory. It will start the Google Talk client every time you sign-in in Windows.

Open Gmail when I click on email links (ON): It will launch Gmail's Compose view on the default browser whenever you click a mailto: link on your browser. Note that it will show the Compose pane only, not the Gmail menus or other options.

Sort Friends by name (OFF): sorts the friends list by name.

Hide offline friends (OFF): It will hide any contact who is offline or hidden.

Hide Gmail contacts on my Friends List (ON): Hides all the Gmail contact list from being seen on the friends list. This is on by default so you can invite your current Gmail contacts to Google Talk.

Note that all the three Friend List options are also available by left-clicking anywhere on the Friend List itself.

Blocked tab:
This tab shows the contacts you have marked as blocked, and allows you to un-block them. Just select the contact in the list and click on the "Unblock" button.

Privacy tab:

Add people I communicate with often to my friends list (ON): It will add those contacts that you have a lot of email conversations with automatically.

Save recent chat history (ON): saves a log of all the chat communications. The log file is stored on "C:\Documents and Settings\<windows username>\Local Settings\Application data\Google\Google Talk\chatlogs", but it's not very easy to read. (note that "Local Settings" and "Application data" will differ from each WinXP locale version)

Notifications tab:
Sets options for all the notifications, both sound and text.

Incoming call (Both ON): Shows/plays notifications when someone starts a voice conversation.

Incoming chat (Both ON): Shows/plays notifications when someone starts a text conversation.

New email (ON): Shows notifications when you receive a email on your Gmail Inbox.

Disable all notifications (OFF): Disables all notifications at once. This option is also available on the Tray menu.

Connection tab:
Settings on how to connect to the net.

Detect proxy automatically (ON): uses Windows' proxy settings to connect to Internet.

Use the following proxy (OFF: Lets you select your own proxy.

Start monitor (button): Opensa a debugging network monitor to troubleshoot connection errors.

Audio tab:
All the sound options go here.

Input (Default Device): lets you select the input hardware, in case that you have several sound cards/microphones.

Input - Automatically adjust microphone sensivity (ON): If you speak too loud the mic volume will automatically go down, and videversa.

Output - Notifications (All devices): On which sound card(s) do you want to hear the sound notifications.

Output - Calls (Default Device): Select the output for the voice conversations.

Output - Unmute speaker for ringing (ON): Changes the mute value on the Volume Control when someone wants to starta voice conversation.

Unmute speaker and microphone when on a call (ON): Unmutes the hardware if it was muted on Windows' Volume Control settings.

Debug tab:
This is a hidden tab, and I couldn't manage to get it to show yet.

Disable ??? Port, where ??? is UDP, TCP, STUN and Relay (all OFF): disables each of those ports and forces Google Talk to use the others to set the connection.

Simulated firewall settings (No Firewall): smulates different firewall options, with different ports restrictions.

Enable Shaker (OFF): enables a feature similar to MSN's Nudges, that shakes the conversation window to attract the user's attention.

Command line options
Google Talk comes with several hidden command line switches. You can use them to add functionality or change the behaviour of the client. Note htat you can use several of them at the same time. Here there are:

/autostart --> This switch is used on the autorun settings of Windows. When run with it enable, it will check the registry settings to see if it needs to be started or not. If the "Start automatically with Windows" option is unchecked, it won't start.

/forcestart --> Same as /autostart, but forces it to start no matter what option was set.

/mailto somebody@smewhere.com --> Used when "Open Gmail when I click on email links" option is set. It will open the Gmail compose window on the default browser logging in to your account.

/gaiaserver servername.com --> uses a different GAIA server to connect to Google Talk. Used for debug purposes only, there are no other known GAIA servers.

/nomutex --> Allows multiple instances of the client to be run at the same time. This way you can login with different accounts at the same time (but not with the same one twice)

/factoryreset --> Resets all the registry options. Just like uninstalling and reinstalling, but faster.

/plaintextauth --> Uses PLAIN authentication mechanism instead then Google's GAIA mechanism. Used for testing the PLAIN method on Google's servers.

/nogaiaauth --> Disables GAIA authentication method. The same as above.

/checkupdate --> Checks for client software updates. Retrieves information from here and downloads and updates if needed.

/register --> Registers Google Talk in the registry, includig the GMail Compose method.

Registry settings
Note: This section is still only a draft, with only a few tricks that are available but hidden and that can be useful. I'll write a full guide of all the registry settings soon, after I finish with the other sections.

Google Talk has a lot of registry values to store its options. Changing the default values or adding new keys can provide very useful options for the client. All the changes to the registry must be done with the client CLOSED, because all the keys are rewriten after it shuts down.

The "Google/Google Talk" key has several sub-keys that hold different option values:

Accounts: This one has subkeys with each different account logged in on the client. This keys have different values that store the username, password and connection options.

Autoupdate: Stores the current version information. When the client checks for updates it compares Google's response with this values. If an update is needed, it will download and update the new version.

Options: This is the most interesting part, where most of the current hacks should be used (keep reading)

Process: Stores the process ID. Probably used by Google Talk to detect if it's alredy running or not.

Registry hacks
Unless noted, all this hacks must be set under the "Options" registry key.

show_pin (DWORD: 1/0 :0) --> If 1, shows a "pin" next to the minimize button that keeps the windows on top of all the other open windows when clicked.

view_show_taskbutton (DWORD: 1/0 :1) --> If 0, hides the taskbar button, and leaves the tray icon only, when the window is shown (not working on this version)

away_inactive (DWORD: 1/0 :1) --> If 1, status will be set as Away after the specified number of minutes.

away_screensaver (DWORD: 1/0 :1) --> If 1, status will be set as Away while the screensaver is running.

inactive_minutes (DWORD: integer :5) --> Number of inactive minutes to become away if auto-away is on.

Easter Eggs

If you look carefully on the about box, you can see "play 23 21 13 16 21 19 . 7 1 13 5" with a gray colour at the bottom. If you translate it to alphanumeric characters (1=a, 2=b, 3=c, ...) you get "play wumpus.game". Add "wumpus.game" to your Friends list and you can play wumpus with a Google bot.

Coming soon: more registry tweaks, connecting with other clients, hacks and much more! Stay tuned
(I will edit this post when I've written them)

Note: I won't be able to work any more on this tutorial for the next week or so. If you want to add something new you know, PM me. I'll complete this as soon as I can find some time.

Last edited by xosemp at 2005-08-29 09:06:02

#352351 by unknown[102805] at 2005-08-25 09:56:05 (7 years ago) - [Report]

nice stuff...thier is already a site up with Gtalk hacks and tweaks...will find link l8r

#352434 by fx2050 Donor

(Power User) at 2005-08-25 11:35:04 (7 years ago) - [Report]

nice idea google but using msn for years and already does it.

i dont even use the google mail acocunt i have, wats the point when im known via the msn and has enough storage now.

thumbs up to google earth though

#352457 by Wussie (Power User) at 2005-08-25 12:04:08 (7 years ago) - [Report]

yeh, i'm very satisfied about Google Talk, really neat program, and much more solid design then MSN...
Plus check your mem usage

MSN had 40 MB here, and Google Talk only 4

#352474 by unknown[1112] at 2005-08-25 12:25:33 (7 years ago) - [Report]

nice tut, xosemp

xosemp wrote:

Your username is your full GMail address, including the domain, and your password the GMail password.

you can actually just use the identifier part of address like 'joe' if your addy is joe@gmail.com

#352497 by xosemp (VIP) at 2005-08-25 12:52:10 (7 years ago) - [Report]

Fixed all that and added the client settings. I will start working on the hacks now. New update soon.

If you find anything else that you want me to change, any typo, or you have got more information about what I've alredy written, just PM me.

Last edited by xosemp at 2005-08-25 13:05:20

#352518 by Wussie (Power User) at 2005-08-25 13:27:46 (7 years ago) - [Report]

good work! keep it up, very usefull resource

allso, you noted that an orange nick states : away, but i can't seem to find a button to set myself to away? only online/busy

edit: nevermind, probably theres only auto-away

Last edited by Wussie at 2005-08-25 13:29:26

#352551 by xosemp (VIP) at 2005-08-25 13:55:26 (7 years ago) - [Report]

Wussie wrote:

probably theres only auto-away

Yes, there's only auto-away. More about this when I finish with the registry tweaks ;-)

#352698 by Wussie (Power User) at 2005-08-25 15:44:58 (7 years ago) - [Report]

hmmm, couldn't get the wumpus.game thing to work :x i added it but nothing happend

#352702 by xosemp (VIP) at 2005-08-25 15:50:30 (7 years ago) - [Report]

Wussie wrote:

hmmm, couldn't get the wumpus.game thing to work :x i added it but nothing happend

It's currently overloaded. Wait for a while and it will connect.

#353355 by unknown[84209] at 2005-08-26 00:00:58 (7 years ago) - [Report]

xosemp wrote:

Wussie wrote:

hmmm, couldn't get the wumpus.game thing to work :x i added it but nothing happend

It's currently overloaded. Wait for a while and it will connect.

added it several hours ago, and still nothing

#353880 by MarkoStamcar Donor

(User) at 2005-08-26 14:28:31 (7 years ago) - [Report]

ImAgInAtIoN wrote:

nice stuff...thier is already a site up with Gtalk hacks and tweaks...will find link l8r

Could you please post it here?

#354465 by unknown[107055] at 2005-08-27 00:02:27 (7 years ago) - [Report]

gtalk is fucking awesome
msn die!!

#367458 by unknown[3655] at 2005-09-06 03:24:26 (7 years ago) - [Report]

It is awesome if you can login to it, I've been trying since a week and keep getting Could not authenticate to server errors, even though I can login to my gmail account with the same username and password. The google servers are overflooded with beta testers i guess.

#367462 by unknown[24962] at 2005-09-06 04:00:08 (7 years ago) - [Report]