Multiprotocol instant messaging application
A multiprotocol instant messaging application is software which allows one instant messaging client to connect to multiple IM networks, such as AOL Instant Messenger or MSN Messenger.
The most widely-used program of this genre is Trillian, which can connect to AOL Instant Messenger, ICQ, MSN Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, IRC, Novell, Rendezvous, and Jabber. Trillian also has features such as spell-check, weather updater, e-mail checker, winamp song title scroller, stock exchange monitor, and RSS feedreader, as well as a plug-in for the Jabber network.
Other multi-protocol instant messaging clients for Windows include Miranda IM (open source) and Jabber compatible clients (Which use a program called a transport on the server side). For Linux and other Unix-like operating systems they include Kopete (KDE). For Mac OS X, clients such as Adium X and Proteus are available. The Milkbone and Gaim clients work on both Windows and Unix-like operating systems. Like Trillian, both Gaim and Miranda IM support feature extensions via plug-ins. Miranda IM plugins, like Miranda IM itself, are free.