December 2007

Just before the end of business year a product called RingJam was certified. This is actually not a new product, first time it was certified just a year ago as RingJacker, now it was just re-certified under new name. RingJam provides a set of ringtones, some of them also with video, and enables user to record one’s own ringtone. Listening to all tones is free, however, some tones must be paid before using them for calling. User can select contact and a tone and start a call. If the other party has RingJam installed, she or he will hear the tone or see the video that callee has selected, instead of Skype ringtone; otherwise an invitation will be sent to callee to install RingJam.

To handle video tones, RingJam needs Adobe Flash Player 9 installed. It will be installed with RingJam itself if needed. For more information, see http://www.ringjam.com

Because of the changes in the team we couldn’t do the promised last update for Extras this year. We apologize.

This is now new on my to-do list. Because I’m not quite up to speed, we felt it was a better idea to delay the update, rather than risk making any classic newbie mistakes that wouldn’t be fixed until 2008.

We promise the next Extras update will be at the beginning of January.

Thanks for your patience, and see you in the New Year!

How does your service work?
A lot of Christmas Spirit and dash of Skype.

How many clients do you have?
Well we are a new company but the bearded man helps out with the client base - His long annual holiday is a bit of a concern and customer loyalty is also a problem, we tend to loose clients as they get older - currently is around the age of 11 or 12.

How many calls do you have in one day?
Well we are limited as we can only call from the good list , so there goes a big chunk of our market!

Which country are living the most talkative children?
They seem to have a lot to talk about on Christmas island.

Is it true that you need Logitech webcam to get a High Quality Video of Santa and multicore processor?
Yes thats true, as it happens we’re using these from a box load that fell off the back of a sleigh we found parked out back.

Does the elf that coded the falling snow animation on your website that cause uncommonly high processor load get any presents this year?
Everyone gets presents around here we are all good!

Do you play an angry Santa as well?
Only when we get a bad Skype connection.

Does Santa have proper pilot training?
He attends top gun every summer, you cant miss him.

We know that fighter pilots, especially those that are expected to land on aircraft carriers which is comparable to difficult landing conditions around most homes, take years to train.
Santa has centuries of piloting experience, landing is not the issue its squeezing down chimneys that can get tricky after a large helping of mince pie.

Continue reading "Santa Sighted Via High Quality Video" »

I am a developer for Skype and one of my free Extras for Skype is called the “Speak and Translate Chats” which can be found in the Skype Extras of the Windows client by clicking on:

Tools -> Options -> Do More -> Get Extras

Then click on featured, which is located on the left, and click on the green arrow for “Speak and Translate Chats”, which is located on the right. This will install this Skype Extra which is free. Ah yes, I am sure you are saying, “Wait….first….what does it do?”

Well this Extra will speak your Skype chats, kind of like a chat answering machine, no need to be sitting right in front of your computer, maybe you are near your computer but watching TV or even if you are sitting right at your computer, maybe you are very busy, no need to read your Skype chat messages when they can be spoken. To you and in 10 different languages of your choice. Also, this Extra will translate your Skype chats using 38 different language pairs, from one language to another so that you can chat using Skype with others all around the world, and not even know the other Skype users language, neat huh?

Well, all during the design, as many people know (“This Extra was one of the very first Extras created for Skype”) my goal was to make the “Speak and Translate Chats” Extra Accessible, but I could not locate anyone to tell me if all my work was in vain. I published “Speak and Translate Chats” and crossed my fingers that I did a good Job.

Two weeks ago, I get a Skype chat message from someone, all I know about them is that their name is Justin and that he really really wants to try to install the “Speak and Translate Chats” Extra. My first thought is, wow, I thought my instructions for how to do this were clear. Little did I know after all this time, Justin is my first contact about Accessibility and this Extra, Justin is 16 and blind.

Justin, has family in Denmark, and he badly wanted to communicate with them, but he only knows English, and his family members there only know Dutch, so this is how this all started. This is where the interest of using some kind of language translator for Skype came in.

Well, much to my surprise, there is much more in general for a blind person to use any application. This includes Skype as well as my Extra..

It should be noted that there are many tools to make Skype more Accessible, but in this case I would like to focus on a some JAWS Scripts for Skype located here:

http://www.dlee.org/skype/

There are several tutorials on how to install these scripts as well located here:

http://marrie.org/SkypeTutorials/3/Skype3Tutorials.html

I would hope that even sighted people can click on some of the .mp3 tutorials above just to see what effort goes into making any application accessible. I can assure you, it is much more than I ever imagined.

If you know someone who has a need to make Skype accessible please pass this information as well, it might really help others gain access to Skype that might not know how to make Skype accessible.

Continue reading "The Blind Leading The Sighted" »

While going through big changes inside the team, Jira, our bug tracking system for developers, appears to be a rock in stormy times. Life in Jira is like always - new bugs and problems coming in and solutions going out. I have combined a list of known problems and recently fixed issues which should give a nice overview of what is going on in that area. This information is of course also available for everybody who cares to make some searches in Jira, but I would guess most people find it easier to get the updates from my blog posts.

So, here we go, please click the link below if you want to keep on reading!

Continue reading "API and Extras related bugs report from Jira" »

Guest post by Paul Amery:

Whoever said that should really get royalties!

A few changes are happening in SDP, and we wanted to let you know about them.

As part of Skype’s focus on platformization, it makes sense for the Developer Program to build tighter relationships with the Core Tech and Engineering teams driving this work in Tallinn. With that in mind, myself, Lester Madden and Caitlin Wright will be leaving Skype before the end of 2007.

Continue reading "Change is constant" »

For the end of the year a new version of certification test specifications, 8.01, will be published at https://developer.skype.com/Certification/Software/TestSpecs. As of January 2, 2008, all new software certification requests must be made against version 8.01.

The main changes in the version 8.01 are the following:

• Remote Access (RAS) category is dropped, this category’s products will be no longer certified;
• Product must support English;
• Category must be selected adequately, i.e. desktop sharing application in Sharing, call recorder in Productivity etc;
• Advertisements are allowed for free products;
• Clarified that product must be installable under limited account if operating system allows it;
• On uninstallation paid products can leave entries to save commission information;
• Quantitatively measurable requirements for voice quality;
• Product must support Unicode (previously it applied to Contacts list only in some categories);
• Product should support MSAA and keyboard navigating;
• Clarified error- and resource-usage requirements;
• In Generic category added requirements for managing video calls;
• In Generic category added requirement that it must be possible to set call forwarding to multiple numbers;
• In Sharing category added requirement that only authorized contacts can be invited;
• Productivity applications should have Getting Started Wizard and “Tip to know” on launch;
• Games should have “High scores” table.

As you can see, this time there are not many changes because the specs are quite mature already. Mostly there are clarifications for requirements that have been often misunderstood and some P3 suggestions. Remote Access category was dropped because we don’t have always a satisfactory level of visibility and control to ensure that all partners stick to our certification guidelines. Current release candidates with rationale of all changes are available at https://developer.skype.com/Certification/Software/TestSpecs/TestSpecs801

The festive season has once again crept up on us all too fast. Suddenly the days are getting shorter (or longer for our southern hemisphere friends) and our minds are filled with planning parties, last minute shopping and getting out of the office for that all important holiday break.

Continue reading "Last chance for an Extras update in 2007" »