Microsoft has released the newest version of the immensely popular instant messenger, Skype. In the 6.6 version a couple of important bugs have been fixed, along with improvements in the mechanism of sending video messages.
Microsoft wanted, first and foremost, to take into consideration all the comments and responses submitted in the last couple of months by the users. The interface has been modified to make sending video messages easier, since this form of communication is an increasingly popular alternative to video chats.
Until now there were two options that were not available at the same time, namely Video chat and Video message. You could call somebody and invite them to join a video chat if they were online, or send a video message when your receiver was offline. Since now these two options will be available interchangibly, all of the time.
This way it will be easier to send a video message even if your receiver is online at the moment. Whether you don't want to have a chit-chat at the moment, or maybe you (or the receiver) has no time for talking for longer than a couple of seconds you can just send them a single video message. In offline mode the Video call icon will be visible but grayed out.
In Mac OS X Skype 6.6 asks the user if they want to send a video message if the person the user calls doesn't pick up for more than 10 seconds. Mac's fans can also make background updates even if they have no administrator's rights.
Skype 6.6 for Windows brings seven bug fixes that deal with previously detected issues, such as problems with video display in Windows XP, crashes of the program after hibernation and not informing the receiver about abortion of sending a file.
In Mac's case the phone black list has been restored and the text field for writing messages has been greatly improved in its design. However, the problem with sending messages to Facebook users - which tend to duplicate and be displayed multiple times - has not yet been resolved.
