Aol messenger setups and backgrounds

AIM will automatically search your Yahoo! AIM will then give you the option of adding these screen names to your Buddy List. Your Buddy List is the organized list of IM contacts stored in your account. When you open AIM, you'll see a main window featuring your Buddy List broken down into different groups. You can add new groups of your own by going to the Edit menu and choosing "Add Group.

When you want to add a new contact to one of these groups, go to the Edit menu and select "Add Buddy. You can also enter more information about the person, including his e-mail address and mobile phone number.

Your Buddy List tells you which of your contacts are online and which are offline. The contacts that are online are listed under their group headings. Those that are offline are listed at the bottom in a group titled "Offline. The easiest way to send an IM is to send a message to someone on your Buddy List. There are two basic ways to do that:. Once you've opened an IM window, it's easy to send a message. Simply type your message into the white text box near the bottom of the IM window.

When you're finished typing, either hit the enter key on your keyboard or click the "send" button in the bottom right corner of the IM window. The text that you entered will appear in the top half of the IM window. When your buddy replies, you'll see his or her response under your message like a conversation. AIM will notify you with an alert tone when you receive a new IM.

Do you want to read it? If you want to IM several people at the same time, you can invite all the participants to join a temporary chat room.

Here's how you set up a chat:. A chat room works the same as normal IM. To send a message to the group, type it into the text box and press the enter key or click send. A classic feature of AIM is the smiley or emoticon. AIM comes with 16 different smileys to graphically express your mood, from silly to grumpy to flirty. To add a smiley to your message, click on the yellow smiley face icon and make your selection. To do this, you'll need to know the cell phone number of the person you wish to send it to.

Here's how you send a text message in AIM 6. There's even a new feature called IM forwarding that forwards IMs to your cell phone when you're away from your computer.

You can activate IM forwarding by going into the main Edit menu and clicking on Settings. In the Settings window, choose Mobile and register your cell phone for IM forwarding. You can even reply to forwarded IMs with text messages from your cell phone. To make Internet phone calls through AIM, you'll need a headset with a built-in microphone or a computer with speakers and a microphone. Here's how to make a free voice call in AIM 6. The same is true for free video calls. Simply double-click on a buddy and click the "Video" button at the bottom of the IM window.

Of course, you'll need a webcam to participate in video calls. You can call any phone number directly from AIM, but you'll be charged by the minute. File-sharing is a useful new feature of AIM. You can easily send individual files or whole file folders to any other AIM user. Here's how it works:. For sharing photos, AIM 6. This feature lets you drag and drop photos into the IM window. The photos will be resized and sent instantly to the recipient as individual pics or a slideshow.

With AIM 6. You can now create a public or private profile page on which to share photos, hobbies and links. These AIM Profile pages include links to your buddies' pages as well.

Now let's take a look at AIM Express, a new service that doesn't require downloading of software. On an increasing basis, computer users are depending on instant messaging to reach friends, even when they're not at home. AIM Express, a new service, allows users to send IMs to friends without downloading or running any software. Friends can talk to friends from any location as long as they're at a computer that has Internet access.

They can use it at home, school or work. The application loads your entire Buddy List. Any new buddies or groups you add will automatically be added to your desktop version the next time you log on. You can also access AOL Mail through two e-mail icons at the bottom of the window. Some office and school networks block users from logging onto AIM Express through their browsers.

AIM Share is another Web service that lets you send a link or broadcast a message to all of your buddies at once. Type a quick description and press "Share" to send to the link to everyone on your Buddy List. In your Web settings for AIM, you can also configure AIM to send messages to your buddies each time you post on one of many popular social networking and social media Web sites like YouTube, Digg, del.

AIM Expressions is a new site for managing your buddy icons and wallpaper. A buddy icon is the small image that accompanies all of your outgoing IMs as well as your buddy profile.

Wallpaper is the background to your buddy icon. Click the Change buttons to browse a list of dozens of buddy icons and wallpapers. You can also type "buddy icon" into Google and find hundreds of sites for downloading customized buddy icons. The holes make it possible for a hacker to take over a user's computer by infecting it with malicious code, called a worm. According to a recent article from Wired News , security holes continue to be an issue for AIM, leaving room for a potentially devastating, widespread worm attack.

While some office workers undoubtedly use IM to chat with friends, many others have tapped into the technology as a powerful professional collaboration tool. Here are some of the key features of AIM Pro:. AIM 6. AIM Bots are automated buddies for checking movie times, stock tickers, prices on digital cameras and lots of other services. You can still access public chat rooms on most versions of AIM by clicking on Chat and scrolling to Community Chat, but many of them are empty or outdated.

Plus, we streamlined the software to make sure it's fast enough to keep up with you. Install AIM and never look back. Download Specs Similar to 4. Windows macOS. Last updated:. October 5, America Online, Inc. User rating:. AIM lets you retrieve the messages you missed while you were offline. AIM makes managing your social life even easier. Now you'll never have to worry about remembering what one of your friends said to you.

The new drag-and-drop interface makes it a snap. AIM makes it easy to stay in touch with up to 1, of your closest friends. Keep on talking with your friends, even if your fingers are tired of typing. Innovative Wallpapers These wallpapers are interactive - they work with AIM and have lots of hidden surprises waiting for you to discover.