Skype 4.0 For Linux Officially Released

Skype 4.0 has been officially released for Linux today after being under "development" for far too long. This first major update in years for the Skype Linux client is coming one year after Microsoft acquired Skype.

Skype 4.0 for Linux is codenamed "Four Rooms for Improvement" and aims to address some of the missing features from the Linux client that the Windows and Mac OS X versions have had for a while. Plus there's some user-interface refinements and other improvements too.

From the Skype Linux Blog, the major Skype 4.0 changes are:

1. We have a new Conversations View where users can easily track all of their chats in a unified window. Those users who prefer the old view can disable this in the Chat options;
2. We have a brand new Call View;
3. Call quality has never been better thanks to several investments we made in improving audio quality; and
4. We've worked on improving video call quality and have also extended support for more cameras.

Other Skype 4.0 Linux changes include:

- Improved chat synchronization
- New presence and emoticon icons
- The ability to store and view phone numbers in a Skype contact's profile
- Much lower chance Skype for Linux will crash or freeze
- Chat history loading is now much faster
- Support for two new languages: Czech (flag:cz) and Norwegian (flag:no)

The closed-source Skype Linux client can be downloaded at Skype.com.

Meanwhile, there's still no concerted effort towards the Free Software Foundation's Skype replacement project. The work out of the open-source Skype reverse-engineering camp has been limited as well.