msn messenger private server

[stonerhash]

Hi I'm not sure if this is the correct category for this post so, if not please moderate it.

I was wondering (and I couldn't find a better place other than the open source msn community),
I'm interested in creating a private MSN messenger server (don't ask why it's just for the fun of it).
Lets say that I follow the protocol can I create an MSN server that aMSN would connect to it?

Or do you think that its possible to create an application to send IMs into AMSN by connecting
to this private server?
 
Thank you

[alexandernst]

Technically, you could create a "private server" with all specifications of official msn servers, BUT client software (aka msn, amsn, kmess, mercury, etc etc etc) will keep connecting to msn servers.
So, basically, if you'd like to create your own server and make people talk in it (aka client-software use it), you'd have to modify the client software, and make it connect to your own server, instead of the official msn servers.
Also, you'll have to know all user's password's, and maybe some other things. aMSN will send a request to your server asking if the user xxxxxxx@hotmail.com and the password 'yyyyy' match in the DB. If yes, you'd have to get the contact list for that person! So basically, you'd have to get msn database! That's insame :s. You'll never get access to all that information. I mean, ok, if you get to modify amsn to work with your server instead with the official MSN servers, when somebody logs into your server he won't have the same contact list from those when connecting with msn servers. Also, he won't be able to speak with people that aren't on your server.
Do you get the point? It's really useless.

Anyways, this is ___REALLY___ hard and long work for only one person. Why the f*** would you want to do that?
Woudn't be easier just to create a basic server and client IM-software?

[kakaroto]

Hi,
welcome to the forums,
technically, it *was* possible, but I don't think it is now anymore.. look at amsn's advanced prefs, there's a "initial notification server" option in there, you could change that.. before, older protocols, everything went through the notification servers, but now, with all the SOAP requests being done, there are many other servers being used (one for authenticating, one for getting your contact list, one for getting who's blocked and who's not, one for getting your nickname and psm, one for listing your offline messages, one for actually getting the content of the offline messages... etc..
so it would be annoying... also, there are many clients but as far as I know, noone ever wrote a server implementation, simply because there are no actual examples of a server, we don't really know how it all works behind the scenes...  although it could be guessed from the client side of the protocol..
The annoying thing is that you'd need to have your own list of users, your own database for storing the contactlist of each user, and people connecting to your server will only be able to chat with other people connected to the same server.. so it is kind of pointless.. especially considering the huge amount of work needed for that.

My opinion: forget about that.. if you're interested in the fun of doing stuff like that, why not join the aMSN project (amsn2 mainly)? We could always use a pair of hands (and a keyboard)!
Hope that answers your question!
Good luck if you still decide to do it!!