Pidgin, the universal instant messaging (IM) client that provides support for a wide variety of IM networks has recently been updated to version 2.5.3, which is such good news that we are willing to forget about the two day delay. Software application that provides similar functionality, Trillian 3.1.12.0, has recently been updated and consequently some security holes have been plugged.

As a little reminder, the IM networks that Pidgin supports are as follows: AIM, Bonjour, Gadu-Gadu, Google Talk, Groupwise, ICQ, IRC, MSN, MySpaceIM, QQ, SILC, SIMPLE, Sametime, XMPP, Yahoo!, Zephyr.

So what exactly is new in Pidgin 2.5.3? Here is a quick list of things that caught my eye:
- ICQ typing notifications for 3rd party clients that did not work in the past will work now (possibly).
- IM images have been implanted to Gadu-Gadu alongside other patches.
- Autoreply in Zephyr is now possible.
- rsi.hotmail.com login and offline retrieval issues have been addressed (no more certificate errors).
- Buddy menus in Finch received “Show When Offline”
- The issue of maximum message length in Yahoo has been dealt with.
- Several crash problems have been solved.

The list of modifications and bug fixes is quite long, so long in fact that we couldn’t possibly post it here. If you are curious and want to go over them all, you could check out the Pidgin 2.5.3 change log.

In related news, if you are a Linux fan that has plenty of ideas on how to promote this operating system, then perhaps you should enter the “I am a Linux” competition. The goal is to come up with a properly good 60 seconds long commercial that will determine people to start using Linux, and as a reward you will get to go to Tokyo.

If you would like to download Pidgin 2.5.3, a download location is available here.