mvcoile's dashboard

I got it - thank you! :) – ooshiny, on July 02, 2008 11:54

mdy, thank you for your suggestions! I would be interested in the ping.fm service, if you have an invite code. It doesn't seem that I can set twitter off the record in Gmail right now, probably because it's technically offline, but I can set all of my chats to be that way. I'll give that a try. If I had Firefox at work I would definitely try TwitBin or TwitterFox, though I will try them out when I get home.

Thanks again! – ooshiny, on July 01, 2008 18:15

ooshiny, are you by any chance using the Gtalk that comes with Gmail? I'm in the same situation as you (IM is verified, can receive tweets via IM, but cannot send).

Anyway, let me share with you the various things I've tried as work-arounds; perhaps one of them will work for you.

Here's what I've tried / done so far (in no particular order):

1. I set the chat with Twitter to be "off-the-record" (it's an option under Gchat in Gmail), so I don't have Gchat histories stored in my Gmail. When I log back in, I don't see the tweets that were sent while I was offline.

2. I've installed various Firefox add-ons that let me post tweets from within my browser. In particular, I've tried TwitBin and TwitterFox. They're very different, but they both work well.

Twitbin creates a sidebar on the left side of your browser window, while Twitterfox gives you a pop-up window that appears on the lower right corner of the browser.

I prefer to use TwitBin because it's more conservative in making API calls (so I'm less likely to hit the API limit). Both let me post tweets from my PC's browser (which is open practically all day), so no need to use the phone or login to the Twitter website.

3. Today, I signed up for a ping.fm account (it's in private beta, but any existing user can give you an invite code to register. Just let me know if you'd like to give it a try and I'll be happy to send you the code via dm or email.

Anyway, Ping.fm lets you post your updates into a lot of different services (including Twitter) from a single site. I added my Gchat account to ping.fm so I'm now able to post new tweets via the ping.fm Gchat bot. The ping.fm Gchat bot receives the tweet and uses the Twitter API to post the tweet into Twitter.

If none of the above sound interesting, there's also a long list of third-party Twitter Apps on the Twitter Fan Wiki. Perhaps one of them will be useful to you as a way of posting new tweets.

Hope you guys fix your scaling issues soon.

some influential people are talking about jumping ship

My Gtalk was already registered, but that's not really the problem. The problem is, Twitter will IM me with updates, but I can't update through IM. It also continues to IM while I am offline, and I get mails with all of the stored-up tweets when I check my mail again. I've started turning IM updates off when I know I will be offline, but it's a hassle to go back and forth to do that, and it's also annoying to have to go back to the Twitter site (or whip out my cell phone and send a txt) to reply to someone whose update has come to me through an IM system that I can't actually use myself.

I totally agree.

Twitter is a complete JOKE! How many weeks (months?) has IM functionality been broken, yet these clowns cannot even get it fixed!?! I've seen some pretty poor websites and enterprises that are run badly, but Twitter takes the cake on idiocy and lack of caring! I urge everyone to delete their twitter account and stop wasting time with this utter nonsense run by total imbeciles who cannot even manage to make it work properly!

really m disappointed..

This is pretty poor. Twitter is being promoted to work with other applications, and gTalk is the link. It impacts more than Gtalk. A few hours or a few days is one thing, but this has been going on a long time and they're still promoting the capability. Sheesh...

Dear Twitter-people, please please put a note that it's offline on the IM-setup page! Probably hundreds of people are frustrated by trying to set it up!

Yes. IM is still offline, so attempts to verify IM right now will not work.

You can find out the status of any Twitter service at http://status.twitter.com

GTalk will not acknowledge twitter. Any ideas?

I'm seeing the same as the OP's screenshot. I'm also using the double scroll arrows at both ends of the scrollbar (defaults write "Apple Global Domain" AppleScrollBarVariant DoubleBoth).

The Twitter IM bot is still offline as of now, so people who are trying to verify their accounts won't be able to. People with existing, verified IM accounts are able to receive tweets from Twitter, but are unable to post updates via IM.

Twitter posts updates on their efforts to restore services on the Twitter Status Blog at http://status.twitter.com

Also, you may want to consider following this other thread, where more recent updates re: IM were posted by someone from Twitter..

Yeah I'd like to know aswell

is it working now?

Yep. The status for TwitterIM is looking healthier every day.
I'm pleased that time is being taken to provide a stable, scalable solution rather than bodging the old stuff in, which would probably just cause more whining in the long run. – mr_nil, on June 13, 2008 11:01

Thanks for this update, Jason! 8-) And btw, I really like the new daily status updates on the Status Blog, which show the current status of each feature. 8-) – mdy, on June 13, 2008 10:23

I miss tracking too, especially via sms! But having IM half-way back is a big deal for me, so I'm definitely encouraged by the progress. – mdy, on June 13, 2008 10:20

@armcurl Slightly confused.... Why don't you try one of the many splendid AIR applications instead, like Thwirl? Also you don't need to keep checking the status every day... Just follow this thread!

While I miss my TwitterIM (though I am getting work done for a change) Its not going to make me change from Twitter. Frankly the other twitter-esk applications, who shall remain nameless, aren't nearly as usable as twitter.

Personally I miss the tracking functionality more.