Gaim now in Bahasa Indonesia !

I'm sure that many of you who have are into Open Source and or GNU/Linux had the opportunity to use Gaim Instant Messenger. An Open Source multi protocol and multi platform instant messenger. Gaim is not the only multi protocol instant messenger out there, there is for example Trillian for Windows users or Kopete for Linux users and perhaps many others.

What is multi protocol anyway ? Multi protocol means that Gaim supports a wide range of popular protocols like ICQ, AIM, Yahoo, MSN, Google Talk and many others. You can use all this protocols at the same time instead of having to run each individual application which makes your desktop a very crammed place. Imagine running let's say three different protocols and at the same time talking to three people on each protocol, that would be like nine chat windows blinking at the same time. Worse case scenario, you type a wrong message in the wrong window ... brrr.

On the other hand Gaim uses tabbed chat window, so instead of having nine chat windows open in Gaim you just have one chat window with nine tabs. It's kind of similar to tabbed browsing in FireFox, in Gaim it's tabbed chatting. This way it's much more practical and organized than multiple chat windows.

Another Gaim plus is that is supports multi platforms, meaning it runs not only in GNU/Linux but also on other Open Source platforms like the BSD family and of course on MS Windows platform. So for those who have to frequently switch between platforms, work wise or else Gaim is just great because you can use it regardless of the platform instead of switching from one instant messenger to another. Of course Gaim has much more features to offer, however that is more users specific. I've been a happy Gaim user for years now.

Now being a long time user I though it would be great if Gaim was available in Bahasa Indonesia. Why ? Well Indonesia has over 220 million people so we are a big country and not everyone speaks English. In last couple years Internet is becoming more accessible to many. With the current government commitment in developing the infrastructure to provide more affordable Internet and preventing software piracy by spreading usage of Free and Open Source Software than it only makes sense that Gaim will be even more popular in Indonesia.

Adding the fact that you can use it in your native language should further spread the use of Gaim. So after a week of translating several thousand of lines and another week of waiting for translation to be officially accepted to the Gaim project, it's finally done. Gaim is now available in Bahasa Indonesia. :)
Actually Gaim is not the only instant messenger that's available in Bahasa Indonesia, for those who only use single protocol like MSN Messenger there is an Open Source clone named aMSN that is also multi platform capable.

I just hope that there will be more Indonesian people who will get involved in Open Source projects either as coder, developer or simple as translator. Everybody is welcome, so let's do a little something to help spread the knowledge and educate our nation, Indonesia.