Brosix - collaboration (chat, video, screensharing)

Submit portable freeware that you find here. It helps if you include information like description, extraction instruction, Unicode support, whether it writes to the registry, and so on.
Message
Author
NationHahn
Posts: 1
Joined: Thu Feb 19, 2009 7:20 am

Brosix - collaboration (chat, video, screensharing)

#1 Post by NationHahn »

Brosix Public is a free highly secure instant messaging tool, which provides unique features especially designed for enterprise and business purposes as well as for personal use.

It requires minimum system resources and needs no extra setting in order to start using it immediately.

Unlike other conventional tools, Brosix provides a highly secure communication, as a very strong encryption is applied to all data transfers, which makes it a preferred communication option. Furthermore, by using Brosix instant messenger there is no risk of virus infections.

Brosix operates on a global servers infrastructure, which means that users connect to the closest Brosix optimized server - this way our customers get the best performance.

A link for the download: http://www.brosix.org/compare.shtml

User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: Brosix Portable IM

#2 Post by webfork »

There's a portable version...
http://www.brosix.com/download/windows-portable/

I'd be much more interested if the client didn't require using their servers. I mean, if you really want to give something away for free, why require people use your bandwidth?

Additionally, I wish the authors had created a file sharing system, not just a file *sending* system. In other words, someone has to initiate transfer, you can't just share a directory on your drive and let other users grab what they want.

User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: Brosix Portable IM

#3 Post by webfork »

Old program update: the program has continued to develop and they've added a free and enterprise version, with some pretty nice features including voice/video/whiteboard and co-browse. Cross-platform.

Feature comparsion
http://www.brosix.com/versions/

User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: Brosix Portable IM

#4 Post by webfork »

FWG just highlighted this program: http://www.freewaregenius.com/chat-and- ... im-client/ I couldn't find a version number on the review or the home page, but Softpedia is listing v.3.1.3 Build 110719 released in October, 2011.
I'd be much more interested if the client didn't require using their servers. I mean, if you really want to give something away for free, why require people use your bandwidth?
Found an answer here: Softpedia's description lists this as "peer to peer," even though offline msgs are supported. Certainly other programs here on the site are probably more secure, but the real advantage of this program is feature-set (whiteboard, desktop sharing, co-browse, offline messaging, voice/video chat) and being able to communicate security on almost any platform (including mobile).

Most of the point of giving all this away for free is probably to get its "foot in the door" and compete in an increasingly crowded collaboration services industry alongside Microsoft Skype, Apple's Facetime, Cisco WebEx, and many more.

User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: Brosix Portable IM

#5 Post by webfork »

Tested this out a bunch recently as a replacement for another unified communications program for communicating with friends (whiteboard, supports voice and video, screenshots, co-browsing, and screensharing). So far it works well.
  • Features vs other similar tools (there's a comparison up on the site)

    Missing: Notably, it's not as simple and doesn't have the awesome VPN capability that TeamViewer has, but is clearly for a different audience have some features. Also runs a whole lot cheaper if you want a commercial license (1.75/month vs. $750)

    Portability: From my basic tests, it looks portable, saves settings to config.ini and users folder.

    Stealth: No: writes Trolltech registry entries to HKCU\Software\Trolltech\OrganizationDefaults

    Languages - site supports world languages aside from Chinese and Japanese, and

    Disk space: 35 megs with basic NTFS compression, 55 without. Could delete unneeded skins from the Themes folder to save 5 more megs, though I recommend the "Silver" skin over the default.
Note: in my testing, video sharing worked fine, but audio didn't sound very good

User avatar
joby_toss
Posts: 2970
Joined: Sat Feb 09, 2008 9:57 am
Location: Romania
Contact:

Re: Brosix Portable IM

#6 Post by joby_toss »


User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: Brosix Portable IM

#7 Post by webfork »

joby_toss wrote:Added
Great, thanks for doing that. Voted.

Also, here's the changelog for today's update for people already using this program:

* New features added: Profile image, Portable (runs from USB drive), Users activity log, Customizing features, screenshot, online, away and busy states; Encryption, Voice Conference, Voice Mail, Screen Sharing, File Transfer, Chat History (Care of softpedia: http://www.softpedia.com/get/Internet/C ... osix.shtml)

I was happy to see the program supporting multiple networks and using OpenSSL library libeay32.dll, presumably used for its secure communications.

User avatar
smaragdus
Posts: 2120
Joined: Sat Jun 22, 2013 3:24 am
Location: Aeaea

Re: Brosix Portable IM

#8 Post by smaragdus »

Now Brosix forces update to the latest version- 3.8, otherwise it exits. It fails to connect to AOL, ICQ and Yahoo. Brosix seems to be the only multi-protocol messenger that fails to connect to ICQ- Miranda IM, Miranda NG, Pidgin, QIP and abandoned Digsby connect to ICQ without any problem while Brosix spews an error message (Invalid username or password for External network) . With every new release Brosix change for the worse- first it was unable to connect to Yahoo, and now- to ICQ and AOL.

User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: Brosix Portable IM

#9 Post by webfork »

Good lord. That might explain why the Softpedia version hasn't been updated.

> It fails to connect to AOL, ICQ and Yahoo

I don't have an ICQ account so I can't verify that service but I'm having the same issues with AOL and Yahoo. I've sent a note to the company asking about that but I'll go ahead and add a note to the entry.

User avatar
smaragdus
Posts: 2120
Joined: Sat Jun 22, 2013 3:24 am
Location: Aeaea

Re: Brosix Portable IM

#10 Post by smaragdus »

@webfork

I also contacted the Brosix developers yesterday- they replied requiring the log files and I have just sent them. I am sure that connection to AOL and ICQ worked fine before but the Yahoo problem is not new- it seems that Yahoo tries to block external chat clients- I have had similar issues with another multi-protocol chat program (Jitsi- https://jitsi.org/ - not portable)- it also failed to connect to Yahoo and I got messages from Yahoo that that in order to protect me Yahoo blocked a unknown application to sign in to Yahoo messaging service not giving me a choice to authorize this 'unknown application'. Using Yahoo services is a pain and I am considering to dump Yahoo for good- I used my Yahoo account mainly to play chess and to communicate with other players but they closed 'Parlor Games' and now I do not need Yahoo any more and even more- Yahoo POP3 doesn't work good for me either (as far as I remember POP3 access was a paid service for a long time). Yahoo is going down all the time.

About Softpedia- I don't think that the connection problems are the reason why they haven't updated Brosix yet- in the past usually I notified them about the available Brosix updates.

User avatar
smaragdus
Posts: 2120
Joined: Sat Jun 22, 2013 3:24 am
Location: Aeaea

Re: Brosix Portable IM

#11 Post by smaragdus »

I installed Jitsi to test Yahoo and Jitsi also failed to connect to Yahoo (it logged to all other supported services)-
Jitsi - Yahoo error - 2015-12-02.png
Jitsi - Yahoo error - 2015-12-02.png (8.02 KiB) Viewed 46770 times
- this time no message from Yahoo but connecting to it simply doesn't work.

User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: Brosix Portable IM

#12 Post by webfork »

I've sent a note to the company

So I've been working with their support service to try and resolve this issue and it's clearly not a priority for them.

User avatar
smaragdus
Posts: 2120
Joined: Sat Jun 22, 2013 3:24 am
Location: Aeaea

Re: Brosix Portable IM

#13 Post by smaragdus »

Actually they responded to my message (previously they required logs which I sent):
Please delete external accounts from Brosix and then re-add them, This should solve the issue.
Actually I had tried this several times before contacting them but it didn't work. I gave up. There are other (and in my opinion better) multi-protocol messenger which work as expected.

User avatar
smaragdus
Posts: 2120
Joined: Sat Jun 22, 2013 3:24 am
Location: Aeaea

Re: Brosix 3.9 Build 160714

#14 Post by smaragdus »

Brosix at version 3.9 Build 160714 (full version number - 3.9 Build 160714.7493 nid 1), I could not find any change log. The external messaging services that no longer work (Facebook, Jabber, MSN, Yahoo), have been removed:

Image

so currently Brosix works only with AOL, Google Talk and ICQ external messaging services (only single profile per service).

User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: Brosix 3.9 Build 160714

#15 Post by webfork »

smaragdus wrote:... so currently Brosix works only with AOL, Google Talk and ICQ external messaging services (only single profile per service).
Thanks for the update.

Post Reply