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13 October 2006

AskYou: GoogleTalk question... →[More:]

I have two gmail accounts -- one for friends and one for work stuff. I have GoogleTalk installed for the purpose of chatting occasionally with friends. However, GTalk has invaded my work account as well, and it's entered all the Gmail-account-holding people I email for work (including my editor) as contacts.

This means that my editor can see when I'm online. I don't like that. Really, really don't like that.

Is there anyway to disable GTalk for that account, or to make it always show me as offline? As far as I know, I never specifically enabled it. And when I open GTalk itself, it's my non-work address that's logged in.

Hep me.

post by: mudpuppie at: 13:27 | 16 comments

I have no helpful answer, but I did want to say that I hate how Google tries to take over your life online. It's highly annoying.

posted by occhiblu 13 October | 13:31

What if you just used the Quick Contacts sidebar in gmail rather than opening Gtalk itself?

posted by mullacc 13 October | 13:39

Hmm. I suppose I could do that, mullacc. I don't need to use Gtalk proper, except that it notifies me when I have mail.

posted by mudpuppie 13 October | 13:45

mudpuppie, I don't believe there is any way to set your online visibility settings in Google (Talk or Chat) like there is in, say, Yahoo. I really like that Google's IM client is lightweight and unobtrusive compared the other pieces of shit out there, but that is one feature that I would welcome.

Maybe set your status to "At work" and "Away" so it looks like your home computer is just still logged on while you're working, and tell your friends to ignore it?

posted by mike9322 13 October | 13:47

Huh. Well, as always, ask a question and wait for answers and you'll inevitably find the solution yourself.

Turns out that where you set the status, you can simply "sign out from chat" (even never having signed in in the first place). Signed out from my work account, can still be logged in to my other account, editor thinks I fell in a hole. We like it this way.

Thanks for the help.

(And on preview: Mike, you know people don't take "Busy" seriously, right?)

posted by mudpuppie 13 October | 13:48

There's a separate gmail notifier that has nothing to do with GTalk (for Mac too).

posted by mullacc 13 October | 13:49

Turns out that where you set the status, you can simply "sign out from chat"

Erm, to make that clearer, this is in your Gmail inbox, under quick contacts. Use the drop-down menu under your own name. The last option is Sign Out.

posted by mudpuppie 13 October | 13:50

Mullacc, problem with that notifier is that you can only be logged in to one account at a time. I use the notifier for one account and Gtalk for the other. I also have a Firefox plug-in, but it only tells me when I have mail about 85% of the time.

posted by mudpuppie 13 October | 13:52

Hmmm, I'm not sure I quite understand what's going on. I have multiple gmail accounts, but I only ever log on to gtalk with my personal account. If you want to disable the chat sidebar in gmail itself, there's a link at the bottom of the page for "standard without chat," which is what I use for my non-gtalk accounts.

If the problem is that you have work contacts in your personal account that show up when logged into that account on gtalk, you can right-click on their name if gtalk and select 'remove.'

posted by brainwidth 13 October | 13:52

Just making a suggestion.

posted by mike9322 13 October | 13:52

Also, use the gmail manager as a notifier for multiple accounts.

posted by brainwidth 13 October | 13:53

This whole thread has confused me. I had no idea there was any way to chat other than the sidebar in gmail.

posted by gaspode 13 October | 13:56

Happy to have confused everyone!

posted by mudpuppie 13 October | 14:00

Yay, confusion!

posted by occhiblu 13 October | 14:03

Whee!

posted by Specklet 13 October | 14:05

mudpuppie: right click on the name you don't want to see your status, and choose Block.

It is very strange that it's picking up the contacts from your other account. Mine doesn't do that and I have four GMail accounts. (GTalk by itself doesn't support multiple accounts.)

Are you sure they aren't also contacts in your "personal" GMail? If so, try right-clicking on them in GMail and going to Contact Details, where you can Delete them as a contact.

Finally, I do recommend the Gmail Manager extension for Firefox.

posted by stilicho 13 October | 22:08

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