iChat: viewing away messages

Hello everyone,

I just got my Macbook a few days ago, and it's my first experience with a Mac. I am using iChat and like it so far, I was just wondering if there was any way to see your buddy's away message besides just mousing over their name. In AIM you could right click the buddy's name and select "get info" and see their message; it appears that with iChat you can't do anything like that. I did a forum search to see if this issue had been addressed but didn't find anything; if I just missed it, I apologize. Thank you, I'm still learning!

- Katherine

Hi katherine!

You should be able see the Away and Available status in your Buddy list. I think a message shows up if it is personalized but you can tell by the dot colours.



Edited to add:

You might be interested in the iChat add-on, Chax. While it might not offer the enhancement you seek, there are some pretty nifty features that come with its use.

Thanks! I see what you mean - the colored dots indicating status, etc. However, the custom messages are what I'm really after. All that shows up on my buddy list is the first line of the "custom" message, followed by "..." and you have to mouse over it to see the entire message (but then it's just in a small text box and is unformatted) - in AIM you can see the fully formatted away message if you want when you right click the buddy name and select "get info." I was just wondering if that was an option with iChat; from what I can tell the "get info" feature on iChat only allows you to see the person's profile, whereas in AIM the away message was displayed in the same window as the profile with a line in between.

Thanks for the repsonse, and I'll check into Chax to see if maybe that offers what I'm looking for.

Oh well it might be that the message is too long to be viewable in the Buddy list window. You'll have to resize it if it is too narrow.

Hope you like Chax.

There is a right click (or command-click) menu that has 'get info', or you can highlight the buddy's name then go under the "buddies" menu on the top and click 'get info.'

HTH

Cool! Thanks for your input on this, wafflewoman!

MacHeadCase said:

Cool! Thanks for your input on this, wafflewoman!

Click to expand...

You're quite welcome!

When I do this, the away message is not displayed, only the "profile" information - should it be? Maybe my settings are off.

Thanks for the help!

katherine said:

When I do this, the away message is not displayed, only the "profile" information - should it be? Maybe my settings are off.

Thanks for the help!

Click to expand...

just below 'get info' is 'more info' under the 'buddies' menu at the top of the screen. click on that and it should bring up the entire away message and the buddy icon.

Hm - I don't have a "More Info" option. Mine goes from "Get Info" to "Show in Address Book." Maybe I have an older version? But that seems unlikely since my Macbook is brand new. Hm....

Thanks for the help, I suppose I'll figure it out!