What is AOL Lifestream? How to Use it or Remove it?

What is AOL Lifestream

AOL released a brand new update to AIM Lifestream, or should I say AOL Lifestream. It’s a service where AIM/AOL users can connect their social networking accounts, such as Twitter, Myspace, and even Facebook. If you use any of these services, AOL Lifestream allows you to publish your status updates to these networks. In essence, it streamlines the process of being on 3+ websites at once.

AOL Lifestream is also an app on iPhone and Google’s Android platform. If you are poor like me and can’t afford the two, you can join in the fun on different applications.

AOL Lifestream is available  through;

• AOL Lifestream
• AIM 7.2
• Aim for Mac
• Google Android
• Apple iPhone

The Lifestream application does not allow you to communicate to other AOL and AIM members through IMs. This application’s sole purpose is to view updates through different websites and allow you to input your thoughts by liking or commenting on them.

Using AOL Lifestream

When you enter a status update in your application, everyone who has you on their buddy list will see it. They are able to “Like” or “Comment” on it as they please. You’ll see a nifty little notification at the bottom of the AOL Lifestream application which shows you what new updates you have in social networking sites, as well as new comments from AIM members.

Clicking on the globe icon will show you a list of trending topics. These are just the most popular word in everyone’s status update. As you can see, AIM is popular amongst kids who are bored out of their mind with homework.

If you notice, there is a filter section that allows you to view only one network. If you want to see only twitter updates, type the word twitter. Or if you want to look up specific friend just type the first part of their name. In fact you can type shortcuts for the various things like twit, mysp, face, digg, photo, video, etc.

Removing AOL Lifestream

If you add random people to your buddy list, their lifestream updates will show up.

The screenshot above is a great example of someone who may not understand the functions of AOL Lifestream. If you add someone on your buddy list, you will automatically follow their lifestream updates. You can alternatively view anyone’s lifestream updates without following them by viewing their buddy info or inputting their screen name through:

http://lifestream.aol.com/stream/screenname

If you don’t want to see a certain person’s lifestream updates, remember to remove them from your buddy list.

If you want to turn off AOL Lifestream, head to the Settings Page. Clicking the trashcan icon will remove your connections to these services. Alternatively you can also click the drop down box and select “No one -Private”. Don’t forget the drop down box for the “AIM” service which will stop any of your status updates and away messages from showing up in the Lifestream tab. If you scroll down further you can disable commenting by selecting “Only You (private)”.

Thoughts

Generally I love the new design AOL is taking with the AIM website. All of the ads are gone and everything is streamlined. The same design style goes on to AOL Lifestream, now if only they could apply it to the message boards. As for the Adobe AIR Application, I do like how it instantly notifies me at the bottom of the screen. I’m not sure if this application is useful per say, it’s more like a time waster. It’s practical to use this service within the AIM program, unless you are mobile and have to rely on the iphone or android app.

How to Connect and Sync Facebook with AIM

It appears there are those who don’t know how to chat with Facebook friends on AIM. Yes despite how there’s a huge banner that asks if you want to use Facebook Connect. Well maybe you closed it out or you really don’t understand the process, so here’s how you do it very quickly.

Choose your version of AIM

You need to download or use a specific version of AIM to start this process. You have only three choices:

• Aim for Windows 7.2 Beta
• Aim for Mac 2.1 Beta
• Aim Express

These are the only three versions that include the new Facebook chat feature. While you are installing AIM, you can set up your Facebook account by going to the Aim Lifestream website.

Adding Facebook to AIM Lifestream

f Connect allows third party websites like AOL to sign into Facebook

Head over to AIM Lifestream:

• Enter your AIM login details.
• Click on Settings in the top right corner.
• Click ADD near the Facebook Icon.
• Click fConnect.
• Enter your FACEBOOK login details.

Once you complete the process, your AIM screen name will be synced to your Facebook account. This synchronization will appear on all beta versions of AIM that support this feature. So you do not need to repeat these steps for each client. You can also add as many screen names as you want to the same Facebook account!

Within your buddy list check for the Facebook icon and full names of your friends on the buddy list.

Facebook Status Update Through AIM

Click that little Facebook Icon

To send a status update through AIM, you must activate the Facebook icon within the status update box. If you hover over the Facebook Icon it will say “Also update your status on Facebook (updating is OFF/ON).” If it’s turned on,  it will first show up in your AIM Lifestream, and might take a while before it shows up in your actual Facebook profile. 

If you click that little +photos icon at the top right corner you can also add post images to your Facebook Status. Pretty neat!

Facebook And AIM Problems

A sample of issues that affect AIM 7.2. Pay particular attention to the ones highlighted in purple, as your very likely to hit these problems through daily use.

• There can be a delay in seeing your Facebook friends go online, offline or idle.
• If you have a very large number of Facebook friends it can take a minute to load your AIM Buddy List, and you will not be able to IM until the Buddy List is loaded.
• Messages sent to an offline Facebook buddy will not be delivered when they come online.
• When you login to AIM as invisible, you will see a non-working “Sign In to Facebook Chat” prompt under your Facebook groups on the Buddy List, and in the Buddy List menu.
• An empty Facebook Friends group will appear on clients that are not Facebook enabled/capable
• If you are using IM forwarding to send IMs to your mobile device, you will receive, but not be able to reply, to messages from Facebook friends.
• Occasionally the association between AIM and Facebook account is lost with no visible user notification
•  IMing Facebook friends while your AIM privacy is set to ‘Allow only users on my Buddy List’ causes IMs to be bounced back.
• Your Facebook friends’ status message from Facebook will not be shown in the AIM buddy list, next to their name.

Just like Bebo Friends, the “Facebook Friends“ buddy list group will get added to your buddy list and will stay permanently until you remove yourself from Facebook Connect.

Currently there may be a bug where your Facebook Friends group shows zero Friends online even though they are supposed to be on. As this bug is currently being researched the suggestions would be to ensure “online presence” is checked on the Facebook Privacy page. Also check that your buddy list privacy settings are not set to allow only users on my buddy list.

Facebook Application Settings

Also check for the following:

• On Facebook.com, Click Account
• Click Application Settings
• Click Edit Settings Under AIM
• Ensure “Log into Facebook Chat on my behalf” is checkmarked.

As the settings on this page are straightforward, having one of them unchecked means that feature would not work within AIM. Is Publish to Streams unchecked? Well you wouldn’t be able to update your facebook status through AIM would you?

Aim 7.2 Beta With Facebook Integration; Chat with Facebook on AIM; Custom Skin Support

Aim 7.2 Beta

Today AOL released it’s newest version of AIM with version 7.2. This time it has integrated Facebook support. Wait a minute, wasn’t Facebook already integrated within Lifestream? Well the only new added feature in this version is that now you can see who is online on Facebook and chat with them.

Release Notes:

• Chat with your Facebook friends.
• Get your updates from Facebook, Twitter, and other social networks.
• Comment, ‘like’ and update your Facebook and Twitter status.

Aim 7.2 Beta with Custom Skin

When chatting with a Facebook friend, you will see the Facebook logo at the bottom of the IM Window. Facebook Friends also show up under their own category within the buddy list, optionally you can show their pictures as buddy icons.

Aim Lifestream

It looks as if your supposed to be able to click the Like button under all the Facebook status updates, however this feature wasn’t working properly at this time. It appears to only work under your own status update and not your friends. You can note that it says “Like” under the status I posted. To view your friend’s status updates, click the “Lifestream” button.

Aim 7.2 Skin Support

Congratulations! All custom AIM 7.1 skins are supported under Aim 7.2. The instructions will change based on the installation directory.

C:\program files\aim7\services\imApp\ver7_2_3_10

Aim 7 Skins: Sonar Series

Aim 7.1 Skins

Four Brand new Aim Themes for Aim 7.1 and Aim 7.2

Each theme is done in a different style.

Aim 7 Theme: Sonar Royal [Preview Settings]
Description: Your Majesty! Your AIM subjects bow in your presence.
Tags: purple skin, 790 x 1024, tiled

Aim 7 Theme: Sonar Sky [Preview IM Window]
Description: Soar to the sky and see the stars!
Tags: blue skin, 790 x 1024, tiled, default.css

Aim 7 Theme: Sonar Red [Sign On Preview]
Description: Electrifying tentacles in pink and red.
Tags: black skin, 790 x 1024, seamless,

Aim 7 Theme: Sonar Orange [Preview IM Window ]
Description: A delicious orange during the summer day.
Tags: orange skin, 790 x 790, tiled, default.css

Download Aim 7.1 Skins

read more

Aim 7.1: Changing Screen Name Colors

Back again after 4 months of translating Japanese to English.

This time we’re going to change screen name colors for Aim 7.1, and it’s going to work without signing off.

AOL loads a certain CSS file each time you re open an IM window.

So feel free to go far beyond this tutorial and customize the colors of AIM as you see fit. This page will get rid of that ugly brown color they use for your screen name.

Before we Start

This tutorial requires a certain skill level. You must be able to do the following on your own.

• Navigate folders in Windows Explorer.
• Understand the process of opening a file in notepad.
• (Vista Only) Changing File Permissions under Administrator.
• Understand the process of copying and pasting text.

If you are unable to do these tasks please do not continue this tutorial.

Unlocking Vista’s Notepad: 

• Open Notepad with Administrative privileges by clicking Start, All Programs, Accessories, and then right-click Notepad and select to open as Administrator.

Preparation

Unlike Aim 7 Beta, Aim 7.1 has made the process of editing screen name colors very easy. All it requires is pasting a few html colors within the a CSS file.

The first step is to find the default.css file that controls screen name colors.

This file is located in the folder:

C:\program files\aim7\services\imApp\ver7###\content\im\ 

Simply copying and pasting the above path will not work in Windows Explorer. You must manually navigate to the folder using My Computer if you have Windows XP or Computer in Windows Vista.

Program Files, Vista users may see Program Files (x86), if you can not locate the AIM 7 folder, try the other Program Files folder.

Ver7### represents your Aim 7 version number which you will instantly see if you navigated to the folder manually.

en-US is the language and region folder.

Screen Name Color

Open Notepad (Vista users must open as Administrator) then drag the file, default.css, into notepad. You are going to look for the line below…

.color_font-header_local, .color_font-header_local_inline
{
color: #864F04;
}

Highlighted in brown in the code above is your screen name’s default color. To change your screen name color, replace it with an html color code of your choosing.

.color_font-header_local, .color_font-header_local_inline
{
color: #b2bf16;
}

I have now changed the color to #b2bf16 to match my new AIM  7 skin. You can of course edit the screen name color of the person you are iming by changing the color on the line below it.

.color_font-header_remote_0, .color_font-header_remote_inline_0
{
color: #e49600;
}

To summarize, .color_font-header_local changes your screen name’s color. Whereas .color_font-header_remote_0 will change the person you IM.

When you are done you must save the file.  For your changes to show up, close ALL IM windows, you don’t need to shut down AIM, then re open them. Even though you have completed the tutorial, you can also edit other colors as well.

Screen Name Status Color

If you still have default.css open,  look for this line.

.color_font-screenname_status,
.color_font-state_status,
.color_font-timestamp_status
{
color:#5D6E87;
}

Editing that html color will change the color of the status message. Here I changed the color to pink to match the website.