Despite the Mac vs. PC ads that have completely run rampant these past few months, there's still a lot going on for Vista. Yahoo Messenger plans on taking advantage of every single Vista user out there. It's now previewing a new beta version of the Messenger for Vista, which has some key functionality so far. Yahoo's looking for beta testers to hammer out the necessary kinks and details pertaining to the core functionality of Yahoo Messenger for Vista.
[img src="" caption="" credit="" alt=""]So far there's the ability to change the layout and colors of your IM contact list, a tabbed conversation window for simplifying multiple conversations, and a sidebar gadget that gives you the option of keeping important contacts separate from the conversation window. This sidebar gadget appears to be taking advantage of some of the Vista APIs that were announced in October. The overall look is very Vista-y, as you can tell by the screen shots below. In terms of sharing items with your contacts, you can send files as large as 2 GB. There's also the ability to send IMs to both your Yahoo and Windows Live Messenger contacts.
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What's missing for this preview, however, is the voice, webcam, chat rooms, SMS, IMVironments, Audibles, plug-ins, photo-sharing (unless you send the photo as a file), and conferencing. These features are in the works and most will be available for the next Vista release. While the new Yahoo Messenger looks cool and can send IMs to Windows Live contacts, it's hard to ignore the several strides that have taken place in the world of IMing lately.
From Meebo, AOL and Microsoft lending tools for developers to create more integrated experiences and the inclusion of AIM buddies directly in your Gmail chat, how much stock should Yahoo put into perfecting a Messenger tool optimized for Vista? The best integration option I've seen for Messenger so far this year is with Yahoo Mail, which could also lend support to Yahoo's concept of Inbox 2.0.
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