Account Status Management

There are several ways to set the status of your account. Status includes available vs. away, available messages on and away messages on compatible protocols, and specific available and away states on compatible protocols.

Changing your status for all accounts

To set status for all connected accounts, choose a built-in status, a previously saved status, or the Custom... option from the top half of the Status menu, the Adium status menu item, the Dock menu, or the top of the contact list (Normal contact list window mode only). To set status for a specific account, without changing other accounts, select the status or Custom... from the submenu off the account in the bottom half of the Status menu or the Adium status menu item.

Connecting with a specific status

To connect with a specific status, simply set it on the account's submenu while the account is offline. The account will be connected and put in the status of your choice immediately.

Available messages

AIM, Jabber, Sametime, and Yahoo allow you to set a status message without being away which we call an Available message. AIM and Yahoo available messages are "Plain Text" which means they can not support formatting such as bold or italic, nor can they support links. If you set such attributes, it will be stripped before the available message is set.

AIM available messages are limited to approximately 60 characters by the AIM server. Messages longer than this will be truncated automatically.

Away messages

AIM, ICQ, Jabber, Sametime, and Yahoo allow you to set a status message while away.

Autoreply messages

Any status can have an "autoreply" which is sent in response to the first incoming message you receive from a contact. By default, Custom Away messages have an autoreply and other statuses do not. This can be controlled in the Custom Status dialogue box by toggling the Autoreply checkbox. Unless you specify otherwise, the autoreply is the same as your Status Message. Note that AIM, ICQ, and Jabber contacts will be informed that the message is an autoreply; for contacts on other services, your status message will be sent as a normal message (due to limitations of the services).

Specific away states

Other protocols, such as MSN, do not offer a status message; instead, other choices such as "Not available" and "Out to lunch" may be found in the State menu in the Custom... status window.

Invisibility

AIM, Jabber, MSN, and Yahoo support invisibility. Simply choose "Invisible" from the State menu in the Custom... status window. If you use Invisible often, we suggest checking "Save Custom Status" so the Invisible state will be in your Status menus.

In versions prior to 1.0, there is no Invisible status in Adium by default. You have to create such a status by choosing either of the two “Custom…” menu items in the Status menu, and changing the custom status's state to Invisible. Remember to choose “Save Custom Status” if you want to keep the Invisible status around.