source: skype/README @ 9f829c4

Last change on this file since 9f829c4 was 9f829c4, checked in by Miklos Vajna <vmiklos@…>, at 2008-07-24T12:56:09Z

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1= Skype plugin for BitlBee
2Miklos Vajna <vmiklos-at-vmiklos-dot-hu>
3
4== Status
5
6[quote, Wilmer van der Gaast (author of BitlBee)]
7____
8Okay, this exists now, with lots of thanks to vmiklos for his *excellent*
9work!!
10
11It's not in the main BitlBee and it'll never be for various reasons, but
12because it's a plugin that shouldn't be a problem.
13____
14
15One day I browsed the BitlBee bugtracker and found
16http://bugs.bitlbee.org/bitlbee/ticket/82[this] ticket. Then after a while I
17returned and saw that it was still open. So I wrote it.
18
19It's pretty stable, I use it for my daily work. Being a plug-in, no patching
20is required, you can just install it after installing BitlBee itself.
21
22NOTE: You will see that this implementation of the Skype plug-in still requires
23a Skype instance to be running. This is because I'm not motivated to reverse
24engineer Skype's
25http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skype_Protocol#Obfuscation_Layer[obfuscation
26layer]. (Not mentioning that you should ask your lawyer about if it is legal or
27not..)
28
29== Requirements
30
31* Skype >= 1.4.0.99. The latest version I've tested is 2.0.0.68.
32* BitlBee >= 1.2.1. Use old versions (<=0.5.1) if you have 1.2 or
33  1.1.1dev installed.
34* Skype4Py >= 0.9.28.7. Previous versions won't work due to API changes.
35
36NOTE: I had not had time to add support for 1.x yet.
37
38* Python >= 2.5. Skype4Py does not work with 2.4.
39* PyGObject >= 2.8.0. Older versions are part of PyGTK. (And you don't want to
40  install GTK for nothing, right?)
41* pyopenssl or python-gnutls.
42
43`bitlbee-skype` has been tested under Linux and Mac OS X. Skype and Skype4py is
44available under Windows, too, so it probably works, but this has not been tested.
45
46== How to set it up
47
48Before you start. The setup is the following: BitlBee can't connect directly to
49Skype servers (the company's ones). It needs a running Skype client to do so.
50In fact BitlBee will connect to `skyped` (a tcp server, provided in this
51package) and `skyped` will connect to to your Skype client.
52
53The benefit of this architecture is that you can run Skype and `skyped`
54on a machine different to the one where you run BitlBee (it can be even
55a public server) and/or your IRC client.
56
57NOTE: The order is important. First `skyped` starts Skype. Then `skyped`
58connects to Skype, finally BitlBee can connect to `skyped`.
59
60=== Installing under Frugalware
61
62- Install the necessary packages:
63
64----
65# pacman-g2 -S bitlbee-skype
66----
67
68and you don't have to compile anything manually.
69
70=== Installing under Debian
71
72- Install the necessary development package:
73
74----
75# apt-get install bitlbee-dev
76----
77
78and you have to install `bitlbee-skype` and `skype4py` from source.
79
80=== Installing from source
81
82- You need the latest stable BitlBee release:
83
84----
85$ wget http://get.bitlbee.org/src/bitlbee-1.2.tar.gz
86$ tar xf bitlbee-1.2.tar.gz
87$ cd bitlbee-1.2
88----
89
90NOTE: You no longer need additional patches, as of version 1.1.1dev.
91
92- Now compile and install it:
93
94----
95$ ./configure
96$ make
97# make install install-dev
98----
99
100- Get the plugin code (in an empty dir, or whereever you want, it does
101  not matter):
102
103----
104$ wget http://vmiklos.hu/project/bitlbee-skype/bitlbee-skype-@VERSION@.tar.gz
105$ tar xf bitlbee-skype-@VERSION@.tar.gz
106$ cd bitlbee-skype-@VERSION@
107----
108
109- Compile and install it:
110
111----
112$ ./configure
113$ make
114# make install
115----
116
117This will install the plugin to where BitlBee expects them, which is
118`/usr/local/lib/bitlbee` if you installed BitlBee from source.
119
120- To install http://skype4py.sourceforge.net/[Skype4Py] from source:
121
122----
123$ tar -zxvf Skype4Py-x.x.x.x.tar.gz
124$ cd Skype4Py-x.x.x.x
125# python setup.py install
126----
127
128=== Configuring
129
130- Edit `/usr/local/etc/skyped/skyped.conf`: adjust `username` and `password`. The
131  `username` should be your Skype login and the `password` can be whatever you
132  want, but you will have to specify that one when adding the Skype account to
133  BitlBee (see later).
134
135NOTE: Here, and later - `/usr/local/etc` can be different on your installation
136if you used the `--sysconfdir` switch when running bitlbee-skype's `configure`.
137
138- Generate the SSL pem files:
139
140----
141# cd /usr/local/etc/skyped
142# openssl req -new -x509 -days 365 -nodes -config skyped.cnf -out skyped.cert.pem \
143        -keyout skyped.key.pem
144----
145
146NOTE: Maybe you want to adjust the permissions in the `/usr/local/etc/skyped`
147dir. For example make it readable by just your user.
148
149- If both pyopenssl and python-gnutls are available, then python-gnutls
150  will be used. This behaviour can be overwritten by:
151
152----
153$ export SKYPED_NO_GNUTLS=1
154----
155
156- Start `skyped` (the tcp server):
157
158----
159$ skyped
160----
161
162- Start your `IRC` client, connect to BitlBee and add your account:
163
164----
165account add skype <user> <pass>
166account set skype/server localhost
167----
168
169<user> should be your Skype account name, <pass> should be the one you declared
170in `skyped.conf`. If you want to run skyped on a remote machine, replace
171`localhost` with the name of the machine.
172
173If you are running skyped on a custom port:
174
175----
176account set skype/port <port>
177----
178
179If you want to set your full name (optional):
180
181----
182account set skype/display_name "John Smith"
183----
184
185If you want to see your skypeout contacts online as well (they are
186offline by default):
187
188----
189account set skype/skypeout_offline false
190----
191
192== Setting up Skype in a VNC server (optional)
193
194Optionally, if you want to run Skype on a server, you might want to setup up
195a `VNC` server as well. I used `tightvnc` but probably other `VNC` servers will
196work, too.
197
198First run
199
200----
201$ vncpasswd ~/.vnc/passwd
202----
203
204and create a password. You will need it at least once.
205
206Now create `~/.vnc/xstartup` with the following contents:
207
208----
209#!/bin/sh
210
211twm
212----
213
214Adjust the permissions:
215
216----
217$ chmod +x ~/.vnc/xstartup
218----
219
220Then start the server:
221
222----
223$ vncserver
224----
225
226Then connect to it, start an `xterm`, set up Skype (username, password,
227enable X11 API and allow the `Skype4Py` client), quit from Skype, and
228start `skyped`. If you want to watch its traffic, enable debug messages
229and foreground mode:
230
231----
232$ skyped -n -d
233----
234
235== Features
236
237- Download nicks and away statuses from Skype
238
239- Noticing joins / parts while we're connected
240
241- Sending messages
242
243- Receiving messages
244
245- Receiving away status changes
246
247- `skyped` (the tcp daemon that is a gateway between Skype and tcp)
248
249- Error handling when `skyped` is not running and when it exits
250
251- Marking received messages as seen so that Skype won't say there are unread messages
252
253- Adding / removing contacts
254
255- Set away state when you do a `/away`.
256
257- When you `account off`, Skype will set status to `Offline`
258
259- When you `account on`, Skype will set status to `Online`
260
261- Detect when somebody wants to add you and ask for confirmation
262
263- Detect when somebody wants to transfer a file
264
265- Group chat support:
266
267  * Detect if we're invited
268
269  * Send / receive group chat messages
270
271  * Invite others (using `/invite <nick>`)
272
273  * Part from group chats
274
275  * Starting a group chat (using `/j #nick`)
276
277- Topic changes in group chats:
278
279  * Show the current topic (if any) on join
280
281  * Notice when someone changes the topic
282
283  * Support changing the topic using `/topic`
284
285- Viewing the profile using the `info` command.
286
287- Handling skype actions (when the `CHATMESSAGE` has `EMOTED` type)
288
289- Setting your display name using the `nick` command.
290
291- Running Skype on a machine different to BitlBee is possible, the
292  communication is encrypted.
293
294- Managing outgoing calls (with call duration at the end, including
295  SkypeOut calls if you use a phone number instead of a nick):
296
297  * `account set skype/call nick`
298  * `account set -del skype/call`
299
300- Managing incoming calls via questions, just like when you add / remove
301  contacts.
302
303- Querying the current SkypeOut balance:
304
305  * `account set skype/balance query`
306
307== What needs to be done (aka. TODO)
308
309- Notice if foo invites bar. Currently you can see only that bar joined.
310
311- Public chats. See
312  link:https://developer.skype.com/jira/browse/SCL-381[this feature
313  request], this is because it is still not possible (under Linux) to
314  `join_chat` to a public chat..
315
316- Add `--disable-skyped` and `--disable-plugin` switches in case one wants to
317  build `bitlbee-skype` only for a public server or only for use with a public
318  server.
319
320== I would like to have support for ...
321
322If something does not work and it's not in the TODO section, then please
323contact me! Please also try the link:HACKING[git version] before reporting a bug, your
324problem may be already fixed there.
325
326In fact, of course, I wrote this documentation after figured out how to do this
327setup, so maybe I left out some steps. If you needed 'any' additional tricks,
328then it would be nice to include them here.
329
330== Known bugs
331
332- None at this time.
333
334== Screenshots
335
336You can reach some screenshots link:shot[here].
337
338== Additional resources
339
340You can reach the Changelog link:Changelog[here], and a gitweb interface
341http://vmiklos.hu/gitweb/?p=bitlbee-skype.git[here].
342
343The Skype API documentation is
344https://developer.skype.com/Docs/ApiDoc[here] if you're interested.
345
346
347== Testimonials
348
349----
35000:56 < scathe> vmiklos: I like your skype plugin :)
351----
352
353----
354It's really working great so far.
355
356Good Job and thank you!
357Sebastian
358----
359
360----
361Big respect for your work, i really appreciate it.
362
363Martin
364----
365
366----
367Thanks for bitlbee-skype. As a blind Linux user, I cannot use the
368skype GUI client because qt apps ar not accessible yet with the
369available screen readers. bitlbee-skype allows me to make use of skype
370without having to interact much with the GUI client, which helps me a
371lot.
372
373Lukas
374----
375
376----
37702:12 < newton> i must say, i love this little bee ;)
37802:15 < newton> tried it out today with the skype plugin, good work!
379----
380
381== Thanks
382
383for the following people:
384
385* Wilmer van der Gaast, for answering questions about the BitlBee plugin interface
386
387* Arkadiusz Wahlig, author of skype4py, for making suggestions to skyped
388
389* Gabor Adam Toth (tg), for noticing extra code is needed to handle multiline
390  messages
391
392* Cristobal Palmer (tarheelcoxn), for helping to testing the plugin in a
393  timezone different to mine
394
395* Risko Gergely, for his SkypeOut ideas
396
397* people on `#bitlbee` for feedback
398
399Back to my link:/projects[projects page].
400
401// vim: ft=asciidoc
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