Ekiga | Easy video VoIP phone and chat for Ubuntu

Sunday, December 24, 2006

One thing I really miss since converting to Ubuntu Linux, was Skype video calls with friends and colleagues. Although Ubuntu (linux) does have a skype Skype client, it is still several releases behind the Windows counterpart, and as so is quite limited in what it can and cannot do.

So what else was a VoIP video chat addict to do, but to take matters into my own hands and go searching for a somewhat comparable video chat client. One thing I have learned since I converted to Ubuntu last summer, is that there are tons of 'fairly comparable' applications to most windows counterparts, if you have the patience to look for them.

You can imagine my excitement, when I not only found an application that would suffice, but is a very capable feature-rich video VoIP and text client. The client is called Ekiga, formerly called Gnome Meeting, and is a fantastic IM chat client, as well as a video VoIP phone client, capable of communicating with both SIP and H.323 protocols, as well as PC-to-phone.

Downloading and installing Ekiga was very simple, as it has install packages for most popular linux distros available on the Ekiga Download page. I selected the Ubuntu i386 Debian package, and it installed itself in one easy step after double-clicking on the .deb installation package.

The Ekiga website is very comprehensive, and has a very thorough Documentation and FAQs pages that will walk you through the setup and configuration of your Ekiga client, and even show you how to register your very own SIP address (like an email address, this is how your friends using SIP phones will contact you).

The call quality was very good - both the audio and video - and I had no complaints what-so-ever.