TechLifeBlogged

Many Twitter users are in search of the ultimate client to keep them up to date. Secret is, there isn’t one. Yes, there are some great clients out there but the problem is the use different technologies. There is the Twitter client itself which is basically an old school web page. There are a myriad of clients that use the twitter API. And then there is Google Talk and the many different clients that can access Google Talk XMPP.

The uninitiated choose the web page then hear about one client or other, give it a go and call themselves happy. No my friends, to REALLY get all the benefits of Twitter you need to build yourself a dashboard to monitor everything.

The thing is, GTalk has one advantage over everything: Twitter Track. Twitter Track lets you follow keywords or subjects. This is important to grok. Tell GTalk ‘track silverlight’ and any Tweet containing the word silverlight, no matter whether it is in your twitter stream of followers or not will show up in GTalk. This is huge and lets find people talking about subjects you are interested in. Really the greatest way to find people with like interests as well as the experts on topics. And, it is only available via GTalk or SMS.

The first thing you should track, if nothing else, is your own Twitter user name. This will give you all the tweets replying to you as well as any tweet containing your user name. There really is no other service to monitor tweets containing your name in real time. Remember, replies are only considered replies if the tweet starts with your user name. Track routes around that restriction.

So I should just use GTalk and all will be good? Perhaps but it doesn’t work well for me. I have many people that I follow so it makes it hard to keep up with the flow on GTalk. The Twitter web page and some of the other clients are nice because I can see avatars and get a sense of all that is being talked about as well as scroll back if I have to step away. Plus, I use GTalk on my Blackberry and that tiny screen makes it hard to follow and any replies quickly flow off the screen.

What works best for me is to cobble together a kind of Twitter dashboard. A combination of GTalk and either the Twitter web page or one of the other clients. Also it is best is to turn OFF device updates for each of the people I am following. This way I can tweet when I am mobile with my Blackberry and I will see replies from ANYONE because I use Track on my user name.

When I am at my laptop I have the advantage of Firefox which lets me open GTalk in the sidebar as well as the Twitter page in the main window. At right is a screen shot of my set up (click to enlarge).

How I set up my Twitter Dashboard

First I set up a bookmark to GTalk and have it open in a side bar. To do that:

1. Open the Bookmarks Manager. In the Bookmarks menu, select Organize Bookmarks…
2. In the File menu select New Bookmark…
3. Enter Google Talk for Name
4. Enter http://talkgadget.google.com/talkgadget/client for Location.
5. Now just open the created bookmark.

Optional: Put the sidebar on the right instead of its default left with the Sidebar on Right extension.

Next I open a tab to Twitter. The downside it that Twitter doesn’t auto-refresh. I get around this by installing the Reload Every extension that reloads web pages every so many seconds or minutes. I do all my updates via the GTalk sidebar and just use the Twitter tab to see the conversations flow.

Of course you don’t have to use the Twitter web client, any of the fine Twitter clients will do. I just like this because it uses part of Firefox which is open on my computer most of the time and I can see both clients side by side.

For bonus points you can round out your twitter dashboard and stop missing important links by implementing my Twitter Link Monitor. Additionally, TweetScan will give you RSS feeds of topics you are interested in.

UPDATE 8:15am 11APR08: Commenter Alex Bellinger pointed out that he’s having an issue with links not working when you click on them in the sidebar. I believe this has to do with popups being blocked. Unfortunately the sidebar just blocks them and doesn’t tell you. Hopefully this will fix it:

1. In Firefox go to Tools -> Options -> Content tab
2. Click the Exceptions button next to Block pop-up windows
3. In the Address of web site: field, put in talkgadget.google.com and click the Allow button
4. Click Close
5. Restart Firefox

UPDATE 3:50pm 16APR08: Trying out Hahlo.com as the web side of this equation. It is auto updating so no need for the extension. I believe it was designed for the iphone but it works fine in Firefox. Probably Safari too since that is what the iPhone/iTouch uses. Doesn’t work at all in IE.

Also, I’m techlifeweb on twitter.