Skype 1.4 (for linux)
There’s a deb file for Feisty on the main site, which is great to see. Also nice to see some furthered linux support from Skype.
So, here’s a quick rundown of my experience so far.
Good
Install. Duh, it’s a deb file. Double clickety and install.
Seems smoother overall than the previous version I was running, and I haven’t had to restart it to fix the sound yet (unlike the previous version, which had insane clipping issues after being on for a few hours).
Picked up my old Skype profile, no problem.
Option to make a test call in the audio device settings.
Call quality seems nicer overall.
Bad
The previous version had a way more sensible audio device selection menu. It showed me the available devices as seen by OSS (ugh) and ALSA. This… well.. doesn’t make it clear offhand which is which, and a tangle of multiple listings makes it messy.
Make a test sound, while a nice idea, plays the sound out of my desktop audio device, regardless of the settings in Skype.
Stupid call status window. Previously you could close every Skype window and the call would still be on, since Skype was still running and you hadn’t ended it yet. Now, there’s this little status window which offers practically nothing and must remain open, leaving me with a pointless window. I’d have much preferred a call control context menu from the systray icon, or just the old method.
Call quality, while nicer overall, would get grainy periodically. Before the sound was like a POTS call over an old line, it was very steady.
Overall
I’m sure some of this will just take some fiddling, and was way worth it. The call window is my biggest gripe, since it’s just, in my opinion, a bad UI decision.