                 ----------------------------------
                 | ickle - A Gtk-- ICQ2000 Client |
                 ----------------------------------

http://ickle.sourceforge.net/

Version: 0.1.2
--------------

This is the first release of ickle, so please be tolerant of bugs, and
the lack of features. Given time ickle will grow bigger.

At the moment it supports:
- Message sending/receiving
- URL sending/receiving
- SMS sending/receiving, including delivery reports
- Status changes
- Fetching basic user info off server

ickle is in no way affiliated with 'ICQ' or 'Mirabilis'.


Prerequisites
-------------
You will need:
- libstdc++
- gtkmm version 1.2.0 or above (preferably 1.2.5 or above)
- the sigc library
- gtk+ library

The last two should be installed if you have gtkmm working and
installed.

Note for RPM distributions (Redhat, SuSE, etc..) - make sure you
install the 'development' RPMs for all these libraries as
well. Usually these are called library-devel.rpm or similar.

For RPM based distributions I'm trying to build up a list of the names
of the rpms that are required, so send me info about what you needed
for your distribution if it's not already here.

Redhat 7.1 - gtk+-1.2.9-4.i386.rpm, gtk+-devel-1.2.9-4.i386.rpm,
           libstdc++-2.96-81.i386.rpm, libstdc++-devel-2.96-81.i386.rpm
           There are no rpms provided for gtk-- or sigc, so you'll
           have to get the sources from http://gtkmm.sourceforge.net/
	   and compile them yourself.

Other Redhats - I'd appreciate any input from people on success/failures.

SuSE 7.0 - the rpms for gtkmm are very out of date on SuSE 7.0, you'll
	   either have to compile gtk, gtk-- and sigc++ from sources
           or try fudging it with newer rpms for 7.2 I'm afraid.

SuSE 7.1 - sigc++.rpm, gtk.rpm, gtk-devel.rpm, gtkmm.rpm,
           gtkmm-devel.rpm
	   For the libstdc++ libraries you'll need a newer rpm than
           what libgpp.rpm provides I suggest using the libgpp.rpm
           from SuSE 7.2, you'll also need the newer gppshare.rpm from
           7.2 if you do this.

SuSE 7.2 - libsigc++.rpm, libsigc++-devel.rpm, gtk.rpm, gtk-devel.rpm,
           gtkmm.rpm, gtkmm-devel.rpm, gpp.rpm, gppshare.rpm, libgpp.rpm

Debian based distributions (Debian, Progeny, etc..) - you will need
these packages installed:
libstdc++2.10 (stable is not recent enough)
libstdc++2.10-dev
libgtkmm1.2
libgtkmm-dev
libgtk1.2
libgtk1.2-dev
libsigc++0
libsigc++-dev

Sources for these libraries can be found at the following addresses:
libstdc++: http://www.gnu.org/software/gcc/libstdc++/ (should have
come with your version of gcc really)
gtk: http://www.gtk.org/
gtkmm: http://gtkmm.sourceforge.net/
libsigc++: http://libsigc.sourceforge.net/


Compiling & Installation
------------------------
Generic configure instructions can be found in INSTALL. These are the
brief instructions for ickle:

1. Type './configure'

2. Type 'make' to compile the package.

3. Type 'make install' as root to install ickle.

Easy as that.

To run ickle you should be able to type simply 'ickle', assuming
/usr/local/bin is in your path.

Icons
-----

The default icons distributed with ickle are some designed by
me. They're not amazing but they do the job. I've also included some
more familiar ones in the directory icons.icq. At the moment the icons
are compiled into ickle, so if you want to use these alternate icons
do (before compiling):
mv icons icons.old
mv icons.icq icons
Then compile.

Contacts
--------
At the moment you have to add the contact numbers by hand. ickle will
now fetch the basic user info off the server after you've added the user.

I've written a simple perl script in scripts/licq2ickle.pl that you can
run and will convert your licq contacts over to ickle. I might write
something similar for windows if I get any requests for it.

The ickle Library
-----------------
ickle is actually split into two parts, the ickle GUI and the
libicq2000 library. If you are interested in developing your own
client you can use just the libicq2000 on it's own. I have an example
use of it like this as a simple command-line autoresponder in the
examples/ directory. There's no proper documentation for the library
yet, looking through the header files and source code is your best bet
at the moment.

CVS
---

If you want to get the bleeding edge latest version of ickle it is
available on anonymous CVS, see the following url:
http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=36654

The modulename is ickle. Once you have checked out the sources, you
must run the autogen.sh file to generate configure. You need autoconf
> 2.5, automake > 1.5  and libtool 1.4.2.

Beware though - the CVS is often unstable inbetween releases. Please
subscribe to the ickle-devel mailing list on sourceforge to stay up to
date on what is going on in CVS.

Comments, bug reports, etc..
----------------------------
Please send all your comments, wanted features and bug reports to:
  <barnaby@beedesign.co.uk>

Send me a message (ICQ# 12137587 Alias bee) if you like ickle.

For bug reports ensure you include these details:
- Version of ickle
- Source (tarball, CVS)
- Distribution
- gcc version (type: gcc -v)
- libstdc++ version (type: ls /usr/lib/libstdc++*)
- gtkmm version (type: gtkmm-config --version)
- sigc version (type: sigc-config --version)
- gtk+ version (type: gtk-config --version)
- Any other quirks of your system..

Thanks.

License
-------
ickle is released under the GNU GPL license, see COPYING for copying
conditions.
