Microsoft delivers on promise to fix Skype chat syncing

Shawn Knight

Posts: 15,291   +192
Staff member

It’s been nearly three months in the making but Microsoft is finally delivering on a promise to fix an annoying issue that has plagued Skype users for several months.

Frequent Skypers are no doubt familiar with the product’s synching issues. Using the service to chat with friends and family on your desktop doesn’t present much of an issue but when you move to a smartphone or tablet, messages often fail to sync properly. As a result, it’s not uncommon to be bombarded with outdated message notifications.

Microsoft transitioned from peer-to-peer networks to cloud-powered servers to power the service but unfortunately, Skype’s infrastructure wasn’t adapted quickly enough to handle the influx of mobile users with multiple devices which is what caused the issues to begin with.

But now, the sync issues have all been rectified in the latest versions of the app for Android, iOS, Windows and Windows Phone. Additionally, Microsoft has improved the push notification experience within Skype and also baked in some performance enhancements.

As outlined in a recent blog post on the matter, Microsoft also improved load times for the app and for recent conversations. Furthermore, it is now faster to return to the app as it runs in the background and battery life is also said to be improved.

Looking ahead, the Skype team is planning to enhance the experience even more by limiting notifications to the device you’re actively using.

Permalink to story.

 
I use the desktop version of Skype on Windows. Sometimes I'll sign in and immediately hear either the message sound or the file-transfer sound from a conversation that took place the day before. It's kind of annoying. Also I'll notice that my messages don't get delivered right away (the spinning circle shows up next to them), and my friends would say the same thing (that they said something like 20 minutes ago and I just now got it) I've never had these kinds of problems using any other messenger. I've been thinking about switching to another video-call client, but I guess I'll wait this one out and see if it gets any better.

Since we're talking about Microsoft and messengers, I wish they never discontinued MSN Messenger :(
I used to love playing the games on there with a friend. Solitaire Showdown, do a puzzle together, Minesweeper Flags, and so many others. Skype used to have a game option in the tools menu, but that's long gone. I don't remember it ever working anyway...
 
Back