Trillian's Scott Werndorfer says "we're not sure how the shutdown will occur or what additional steps Microsoft has planned." Adium, a popular client for Mac, says communications have been "pretty fuzzy" and that it hasn't heard anything directly regarding an official date. We reached out to several popular third-party Messenger apps, but developers seem to be confused over Microsoft's retirement. The dates vary by third-party, but official documentation suggests that existing clients using the XMPP protocol will end in October, while MSP clients will cease functioning in March 2014.
"They do have end of life dates that we've given them privately," says Munsell.
"On products like Xbox, we'll make announcements at a later date when we have dates to actually announce to customers." The software maker has also notified third parties about its plans to retire the entire Messenger service. Munsell says Microsoft is upgrading other apps that access the Messenger service on a case-by-case basis, including mobile apps. Third-party clients remain unaffected, for now Microsoft is pre-caching the Skype installer to existing machines to allow users to simply accept the notification and switch over to Skype, while the installer removes Windows Live Messenger.
"The upgrade process itself has been going really well, we've had millions of customers move over," says Skype's Parri Munsell.Įxisting Windows Live Messenger users will be greeted with an upgrade notification from April 8th onwards that will prevent them from signing into the service. Microsoft has been testing its migration plans with a test cell, so a very small number will move over on March 15th, but 99 percent of users will start shifting across from April 8th onwards. Microsoft will be migrating users depending on their language, starting with English first and ending with Portuguese no sooner than April 30th.įorced Skype upgrade starts for English users firstĬontrary to Microsoft's confusing email to some Windows Live Messenger users, and other reports, Windows Live Messenger will not cease functioning on March 15th for everyone. In an effort to phase out its Messenger service, Windows Live Messenger clients will be restricted from signing into the service gradually starting in early April. If you have any other questions that this article didn't answer, check out the Remote Desktop client FAQ.Microsoft is planning to force existing Windows Live Messengers users to upgrade to Skype from April 8th.
The Supported URI attributes article will tell you about URIs you can use with the iOS, Mac, and Android clients. You can also use features of Remote Desktop clients across platforms by enabling a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) scheme. Remote Desktop client Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) scheme
Just as you would with a local computer, you'll need to configure your remote computer before you start accessing it with the client. There are even clients for mobile smartphones! Here's a list of the latest versions of the client apps and where you can download them: Clientīefore you start using the client of your choice, there are a few things you'll need to do first. You can also use a Remote Desktop client to access your remote PC from almost any device.