Adium Themes in Pidgin [Ubuntu Karmic Koala How-to]

We've managed to use Adium themes in Pidgin on Ubuntu Jaunty and in Empathy (Ubuntu Karmic). But how about Pidgin and Ubuntu Karmic? That's pretty easy actually; here is what you need to do:


1. Installing required packages

a) You need to add the Webkit PPA (paste the following command in a terminal):

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:webkit-team/ppa

b) Now let's install all the required packages with one command:

sudo apt-get install libnotify-bin pidgin-dev libpurple-dev libwebkit-dev bzr checkinstall

2. Compilling Pidgin-WebKit plugin for Ubuntu Karmic:

Just open a terminal and paste the following command to get the source for pidgin-webkit (for Karmic only!):

bzr branch lp:~spoidar/pidgin-webkit/karmic-fixes

Now let's compile it. Naviate to the karmic-fixes folder (cd karmic-fixes) and run the following commands:

make
sudo checkinstall

You can use "make install" instead of "checkinstall", but "checkinstall" will create a .deb package and install it so you can easily remove the plugin if you want to, later on.

If you used "checkinstall", you will reach a screen which looks like this:

Select "2" and enter the name for the plugin (for instance: "pidgin-adium" - without the quotes) and then "3" and enter it's version (for instance: "0.1" - without the quotes). Make sure you do this, or else the package will be called "Pidgin" and you can't install it since Pidgin is already installed.

3. For easy installing Adium themes, we are going to use the same script we used for Empathy (credits: Antono Vasiljev, credits for the modifications: h!v user @ ubuntuforums.org).

Create an empty file in your home folder and call it whatever you want. I will call it "pidgin-adium.sh". Paste this inside the file:

#!/bin/sh
# Adium theme AdiumMessageStyle installer for Empathy
# Originally © 2009 Antono Vasiljev
# Licensed under the same terms as Empathy
# http://antono.info/en/165-install-adium-themes-to-empathy
# Changed by Vertlo Oraerk (did not work with directories containing spaces in the names)
# Changed by h!v from ubuntuforums to work with Pidgin+libwebkit and Notifications
# On Ubuntu you need to install libwebkit and libnotify-bin to get it working properly
# Further info on how to get working adium themes in Pidgin on http://www.webupd8.org/2009/05/pidgin-webkit-plugin-adium-conversation.html

if [ -z $1 ]
then
echo
echo "Usage:"
echo "`basename $0` adiumxtra://some.url.here/extra"
echo
exit 1
else
TMPDIR=`mktemp -d`
XTRAURL=`echo $1 | sed -e "s/^adiumxtra:/http:/"`
DEST="$HOME/.purple/message_styles/"


if [ ! -d $DEST ]
then
mkdir -v -p $DEST
fi

cd $TMPDIR
notify-send "Downloading" \ "Adium theme for Pidgin" --icon=pidgin
wget --no-verbose -O xtra.zip $XTRAURL
unzip -qq xtra.zip

ls -d ./*.AdiumMessageStyle/ > themes_to_copy.lst
num_bytes=`wc -c themes_to_copy.lst | sed 's# themes_to_copy.lst##'`
NAME=`cat themes_to_copy.lst | cut -f 2 --delimiter='.' | cut -f 2 --delimiter='/'`

if [ $num_bytes = 0 ]
then
notify-send "Sorry Manitou" \ "No themes found in downloaded file"
else
while read line
do
echo cp -r \'$line\' "$DEST" | sh
done < themes_to_copy.lst
echo
notify-send "Succesfully installed" \ " $NAME " --icon=pidgin
fi
rm -r xtra.zip
rm -r $TMPDIR
fi
exit 0

Then use the terminal to navigate to where you created the script, and run the following command:

chmod 755 pidgin-adium.sh

Remember to change "pidgin-adium.sh" with the name of your file.

Then, in a terminal, paste this:

gconftool-2 -t string -s /desktop/gnome/url-handlers/adiumxtra/command "/path/to/pidgin-adium.sh %s"
gconftool-2 -t bool -s /desktop/gnome/url-handlers/adiumxtra/enabled true
gconftool-2 -t bool -s /desktop/gnome/url-handlers/adiumxtra/needs_terminal false

But don't forget to change "/path/to/pidgin-adium.sh" with the path to where you saved your script.

4. Setting up Pidgin

Close Pidgin and open it again, then go to Tools > Plugins and enable "Webkit Message Styles".

Then, browse some Adium themes (not all will work - a list of working themes can be found HERE) and click the "Install" button. If it doesn't work in Firefox, try Google Chrome or some other browser - but in most cases it works with Firefox too. If, however, it does not work, place your message styles unpacked to ~/.purple/message_styles, so you have something like

$(HOME)
\-.purple
\-message_styles
|-Style1.AdiumMessageStyle
\-Style2.AdiumMessageStyle

To use an Adium message style you installed, in Pidgin go to Tools > Plugins, select the "Webkit Message Styles" plugin and click on "Configure":

And select the Adium message style you want and open a Pidgin chat window.

That's it!

For older Ubuntu versions, you can try our old how-to: Pidgin-Webkit Plugin: Adium Conversation Styles for Pidgin - which seems to still work for some people.

A newer guide for Ubuntu Jaunty can be found on the Ubuntu forums