Cerulean Studios has finally released some significant information regarding Astra, the upgrade to their popular Trillian 3.1 IM client.
Here is a quick rundown of new features:
Performance: Load times have significantly decreased, redrawing times have improved, network connections are better optimized to increase speed, memory usage has been reduced and leaks have been plugged.
Interoperability: MySpace IM and Google Talk have been added, file transfers have been refreshed, up to five files can be zipped on the fly and sent simultaneously, AIM has been separated from ICQ to improve memory usage, support for MSN messenger “gateway” service has been added, new IM Core makes developing stable plugins easier
Contact List: The contact list is now downloaded every time you start Trillian so you can take your contact list wherever you go. In addition, contact information is automatically managed and exported to anyone who requests it – provided that you give your permission in the security settings. Drag and drop avatar changing, easy display name changing, a new “tile view”, and a “Spotlight” search that helps you find contacts more accurately are also included.
Social Widgets: Custom widgets can be created using Flash 9
Strong Encryption: Conversations are secured automatically using a new public-key system that ensures privacy.
Web Services: User status can be optionally displayed on the web, users can login with any web browser and send or receive IMs, widgets are web-enabled
Message Windows: features drag and drop image sharing, handwriting mode, RSS news can be delivered directly to your window, “buzz” feature added to quickly get your contact’s attention, saved font styles allow you to customize and store your favorite formats for ease-of-access – i.e. “Important” and “Code”
Skins: Skins can now be changed on the fly, new themes and colors are available that enable Trillian to feel more “integrated” with the user’s desktop, transparency support has been improved, “skin math” allows for flexible dynamic skins, control layering – layer frames in a skin, and backgrounds now support a tag which reduces the amount of XML needed to develop skins
There is definitely a lot to chew on here (except Mac OSX compatibility – sigh), but if you would like to take a closer look head on over to the Astra sneak preview. You can also keep up to date with what’s happening in the Astra build via the Cerulean Studios Blog.
