In the account set-up, almost all Jabber clients (Gaim, Exodus, Psi, etc) have a “resource” field. I never knew what to put here, so I usually just selected ‘‘work’’ or I put our company name.
But, the burning question is: What is this field used for? What does it mean? And perhap most importantly, what am I supposed to be putting in here?
-Rick
Hey Rick,
In XMPP it is possible for a user to be connected from many clients at the same time. The only way to identify each connection is by its resource. So the resource can be anything that might be useful for you and other people that might want to contact you to identify each connection.
More technically, a bare JID is something like this johndoe@server.com and a full jid is something like this johndoe@server.com/Work. As you can see bare JIDs do not include a resource unlike full JIDs. If johndoe is connected from 2 places (e.g. Work and Home) then he may have these 2 JIDs johndoe@server.com/Work and johndoe@server.com/Home. So people that want to send a message to his home would start a conversation with johndoe@server.com/Home. But if people send a message instead to john’‘s bare JID then it’'s up to the server to decide which connection is going to get the message.
Hope that help,
– Gato
Thank you, very helpful!
Follow-up: So, this means, for example, I could theoretically be logged in from both ‘‘home’’ and ‘‘work’’, right? (currently, when I log in from home, I boot off my work presence, I guess I have set the same ‘‘resource’’ for both). If so, do I show up as two separate users in people’'s buddy list (environment being a company)? Or, if single listing, if someone jabbers me, does that message go to both (home and work) clients?
I’‘m just trying to figure out if I can leverage this feature, or if it’‘s just an esoteric setting that I shouldn’'t give much thought…
-Rick
Follow-up: So, this means, for example, I could
theoretically be logged in from both ‘‘home’’ and
‘‘work’’, right?
Yes.
(currently, when I log in from home,
I boot off my work presence, I guess I have set the
same ‘‘resource’’ for both).
You are correct. Users cannot log in again using the same resource. The server will close one of the connections. Most probably the old one.
If so, do I show up as
two separate users in people’'s buddy list
(environment being a company)?
This really depends on the client that people are using. I think that most of the clients will show only one entry and when you click on the contact then they will see that the contact is logged from many places. Usually clients let the user choose which contact connection is going to get the message.
Or, if single
listing, if someone jabbers me, does that message go
to both (home and work) clients?
Nope. The server will select (using some kind of algorithm) the connection that is going to get the message. The presence priority is usually involved in the selection logic.
Regards,
– Gato
Yes, you can be logged in as many places at the same time as you want, as long as the resources are different.
I think that if you have two resources logged on at the same time, how it’'s displayed is entirely up to the client. I would think that most would put all resources of one contact together since it is the same contact.
I also believe that all the messages currently will only go to one client at a time. If somebody does not specify a resource while messaging you, the server will decide to which client to send the message. I think servers are supposed to send messages to the client with the highest priority. What happens on a priority tie, I’'m not so sure.
Thanks all! ‘‘Correct’’ and ‘‘helpful’’ points all around!
-Rick