NewsForge: What Are the Best Linux IRC and IM Clients?

“I’ve been experimenting a bit with IRC and IM clients, but now
I’m back to the ones I’ve been using all along: XChat and Gaim. Is
this because I’m so used to these programs that no others can
possibly satisfy me, or are there better ones out there I don’t
know about and haven’t tried?

“Once we become accustomed to one program, we tend to measure
all others against it, and many of the factors we use to judge have
nothing to do with quality or efficiency but with our habits. We
get used to typing ‘a’ and getting response ‘b’ or clicking on an
icon in a certain spot to get a desired result, and if we suddenly
need to click a different widget or even the same one in a
different place, it slows us down–and might even make us grumble
about how the new program is inferior to the one we’re used to
using…”

Complete
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