::A Geek in Korea::

Back when I was using Ubuntu Linux Intrepid Ibex 8.10, I ran Adobe Air for Tweetdeck. Adobe Air runs simple standalone applications from the web that are easy to upgrade. It used to be a good alternative for a Twitter client, as it “just worked” and had tons of features. I even installed it at school on my computer to keep concurrent since Adobe Air stuff usually runs in different environments pretty well. Sure, you had to install the stupid proprietary Adobe Air platform everywhere you used Tweetdeck, but it worked so well for tweets.

Except that from time to time Adobe Air would break itself. Like all things inscruitable and closed source, when something went wrong, it was out of your hands to fix it. I don’t know what would cause an upgrade to break the installation of my Adobe Air applications, but eventually it became too much for me to bear. I dropped it and looked for different alternatives.

At first I looked for native Linux only solutions. The Twitter applications in the software repository are bare bones. They are primitive and don’t have even the most basic features an Adobe Air client in active development has. Also, the Ubuntu “Growl like” notification system in Jaunty Jackalope 9.04 sucks. I used a twitter client running in the background to have it pop up messages when someone updated, but the updates lasted for five seconds or shorter on my second monitor, and by the time it caught my attention it was already gone. Forget about clicking on a link if you have such a short time to react. The ability to set how long notifications stick around was in the release candidate and then REMOVED from the final version of Jaunty. I didn’t find out how to re-enable this feature, so I needed to move to an actual Twitter client alternative again.

First, the GreaseMonkey extention “Endless Tweets” is pretty damn awesome. It basically upgrades the Twitter page into an uber-client in Firefox. Inline Youtube videos? Threaded conversations? Groups? Loading the next set of tweets before you hit the bottom of the page to make a truly “endless” page? It makes the Twitter homepage a lot better to post from. I actually used this for a few months, and if I get annoyed with any client I can always go back to this. The grouping and “channel” features in this enhanced twitter page is still a primitive alternative. Also, I had to install a plugin and visit multiple settings screens to mimic the robust features in Tweetdeck that made the expanded nature of the client so indispensible. I needed more options without all the installing so I could use everywhere easily!

The best web only Tweetdeck alternative I’ve discovered so far is PeopleBrowsr. Yes, people are still doing the no “E” Web 2.0 thing. I almost skipped it for this reason, but I’m glad I tried it. This client has a “lite” “advanced” and a “business” mode that separates features depending on needs. I find the Lite mode is  actually a pretty good alternative to Tweetdeck, while the Advanced mode overwhelms me. This thing can do more than just Twitter too. Flickr (damn no “e”), Facebook, and other social services can all be accessed in the client. Considering the amount of crap I’ll tolerate before being overwhelmed, PeopleBrowsr’s got a LOT of stuff going on. It’s feature complete and very well developed. You can’t pop out the Youtube links, and it doesn’t auto-expand shortened URLS like a good Twitter client should, but other than that it’s pretty damn nice. Since it’s web based, I don’t even need to install anything if I want to use it on multiple computers. Suck on that Adobe Air.

Word of warning for Firefox users in Ubuntu: There is a rendering bug when you click on someone’s picture profile window. You’ll get a popup window with their details, but no way to close it. Using Opera, I discovered the popup window does have a close button in the top right hand corner of the window where you’d expect it to be. Other than that, it operates as it should everywhere I’ve tried it.

I recommend Peoplebrowsr as a good Tweetdeck alternative if you are running Linux. Fire up a session in Firefox, or better yet set up a Prism stand alone browser session for a dedicated client feel.