Getting Started

This page provides a quick overview of Digsby that will help you get started. If you have any trouble, check the Common Issues page or the Support Forum.

Download for Windows

• Click the orange “Download Now” button anywhere on the website and then click the Windows icon in the center to download Digsby Setup. You can save the installer anywhere on your computer. When the download is complete, run the installer.

Download for Mac/Linux

• Digsby for Mac and Linux will be launched soon. If you would like to be notified when we go live, click here.

Installing Digsby

• When you double click the installer, you will be greeted with a welcome screen. Click “Next”.

• Read the License Agreement terms. If you agree to the terms of the agreement, click “I agree” to go to the next step of setup. If you do not accept, you cannot continue with the setup wizard and Digsby will not be installed.

• Choose the directory where you want to install Digsby. If you do not have administrator privileges and can't install programs to the “Program Files” folder, try changing it to the “My Documents” folder instead. When you are done, click “Next”.

• The final step of the installation process is to create a Digsby account. You will be asked to enter your Digsby username and password every time you start Digsby.
• All your preferences are synchronized with Digsby servers for a seamless experience between sessions and locations. For example, if you log in to Digsby from another computer, preferences like what skin you chose and whether or not the formatting bar should show in the IM window will be exactly as you set them at the other location.
• We are 100% transparent about the security procedures we employ to protect your data and you can read about them in detail on the Security Practices page.
• Once you fill out all the fields, click “Install”.

• When the installation is complete, click “Finish”

• When you launch Digsby, you will be greeted with a login screen. Enter the Digsby username and password you created during the installation process and click “Sign In”.
• If you do not have a Digsby account, you can create one for free.
• If you have a Digsby account but forgot your username or password, click here so we can send you an email with your username and instructions on how to reset your password. Make sure to enter the email address you used to register the account.
• If you experience any problems signing in, email us at bugs@digsby.com

• Once you log in to Digsby, you will see a blank buddy list. Click the “Add Accounts” link to add your IM, email, and social network accounts into Digsby.

• This will bring up the “Accounts” portion of the “Digsby Preferences” window
• There are buttons to “Add IM Account”, “Add Email Account” and “Add Social Network”.
• Each of these will bring down a menu of the supported protocols:
  • IM Accounts: AIM, Windows Live Messenger (MSN), Yahoo Messenger, Google Talk, Facebook Chat, ICQ, and Jabber
  • Email Accounts: Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo Mail, AOL/AIM Mail, IMAP, and POP
  • Social Networks: Facebook, MySpace, Twitter

• Clicking on one of the account types in the menu will bring up a dialog box so you can enter your account credentials.
• Notice in the screenshot below that after adding an email or social network account, they will activate automatically while IM accounts start as offline.

Signing in and out of IM Accounts

• There are three ways to sign in and out of your IM accounts.
• Check or uncheck the checkboxes in the preferences

• Using the “Tools” menu on the buddy list

• Using the links in the “Accounts List” on your buddy list. You can hide and show this “Accounts List” by clicking the button with the double arrows.

Setting Your Status

• Status is one of the most powerful features of instant messaging and we tried to make it as easy as possible to set and change your status. It should never take more than one click!
• There are two distinct aspects of status: the state (ie: Available or Away) and the status message (ie: at class)
• In order to change the status message without changing the state just click in the input area and type a new message. The existing message will automatically be highlighted so anything you type will replace it.

• In order to change the state (ie: Available > Away) simply click orb on the left. You can type a new status message as well. Clicking the orb will automatically highlight the message and if you don't edit it within 5 seconds, Digsby will use the current one.
• For protocols with more options than just Available and Away (ie: ICQ, MSN, Jabber), you can right click on the orb to see other options.

• You can also set your status to the song you are currently listening to in Winamp or iTunes using the dropdown button on the right.
• After setting the “Listening To…” status you can click the orb to choose Available or Away with the song title as your status message.

• Choosing “Custom…” will allow you to set a different status for each IM account and also to save status messages for later use. This also allows you to set a state other than Away or Available for protocols that support this (ie: Do Not Disturb). Once saved, they will appear in the same dropdown menu.
• You can edit, delete, or reorder saved status messages in Digsby Preferences under the “Status” tab.

• When you sign in to an account, it will come online with whatever status you currently have set. So, if the status is set to “Invisible”, you will sign in as invisible.

Sending/Receiving IMs

• To send an IM, simply double click on a buddy in your buddy list to open an IM window.
• The input box is one line of text in height so more of the conversation can be seen. As you type more, it will automatically grow and then shrink back down after the message is sent.
• If you receive an IM and the conversation windown is out of focus, a popup will appear to notify you. You can reply right from the input box in the popup. This helps with multitasking since you don't need to keep going back to the IM window.

Adding/Removing/Blocking Buddies

• You can add buddies using the dropdown menu on the right side of the “Actions Bar” that appears at the top of the IM window.
• From this menu you can also block buddies, view chat logs, and change notification preferences.
• You can also add a buddy using “Digsby” > “Add Contact…” menu item on the buddy list.

• Buddies can also be blocked, deleted, or renamed by right clicking on them in the buddy list and choosing the appropriate menu option.

Managing Tabs

• As you open more conversations they will appear as tabs in a single IM window. You can rearrange tabs by dragging and dropping them. You can also drag a tab out into its own IM window or drag an IM window onto the tab bar of another window to merge them back together.

Email Notifications

• When new emails arrive, you will get a popup notification in the corner of your screen. If there is more than one unread message in that inbox, the popup will have “Next” and “Previous” arrows.

• Clicking the actual popup will open the email. For webmail accounts like Gmail or Hotmail, Digsby will launch your default browser, log you in to your account, and take you directly to the message. For POP and IMAP users, Digsby will launch your default mail client or the application you specified when adding the email account.
• You can disable popups and change other notification preferences in the Digsby Preferences window under the “Notifications” tab.

Email Infobox

• Each email account also has an Infobox that shows you previews of all your unread messages. You can bring the Infobox up by either hovering over the email account entry on your buddy list or clicking the tray icon for that account. The tray icon also shows a count unread messages.

Email Actions

• When you move your mouse over an email message in the Infobox, a series of links will appear, allowing you to perform actions such as “Mark as Read” or “Report Spam” without ever going to your inbox.

Sending Emails

• You can also send emails right from Digsby. Simply open an IM window with one of your buddies and click the “Email” button in the “Actions Bar” at the top of the window.
• Enter the buddy's email address in the “To” field and it will be remembered by Digsby for future use. The email can be sent from any of the email accounts you are managing through Digsby.
• When you are done, click the “Send” button in the bottom right corner. You can also click “Edit in…”, which will open a compose window in the webmail service or default mail client. Digsby will copy the contents you already typed into the compose window.

Social Network Notifications

• When new events happen on your social networks such as a friend request, a new wall post or someone adding photos to an album, Digsby will fire off a popup notification similar to the ones you get when new emails arrive.
• You can disable popups and change other notification preferences in the Digsby Preferences window under the “Notifications” tab.

Social Network Infobox

• Each social network account also has an Infobox. The contents are different for each social network type but it generally has timeline of events and a list of alerts such as new messages or friend requests.

Skins and Themes

• The overall appearance of Digsby can be changed using skins. Similarly, the look of the conversation area can be changed using conversation themes. Both of these can be set in Digsby Preferences under the “Skins” tab.

Merging Duplicate Contacts

• If you have multiple IM accounts, chances are there are duplicate entries for the same person on your buddy list.
• For example, let's say Aaron has an ICQ account and a Yahoo account so he appears twice on your list. Drag and drop one entry onto the other and you will get a dialog asking whether you want to create a merged contact. Give the new merged contact a nickname and hit “Save”.
• Merged contact info and aliases are all synchronized between locations and sessions using your Digsby account so you will only need to set them once.

Contact Layout Options

• The way buddies appear on your buddy list can be modified extensively in Digsby Preferences under the “Buddy List” tab.
• You can choose from one of the six presets or click “Advanced” to change everything from fonts to buddy icon size.

Cleaner IM Window

• For an uncluttered look, you can hide both the “Formatting Bar” and the “Actions Bar” at the top of the IM window. Right click the conversation area and uncheck both options.
• The “Actions Bar” items are all accessible via the right click menu.

Buddy List Options and Sorting

• You can change various aspects of the buddy list layout from the “View” menu. You can choose which panels are shown and rearrange them. You can also show or hide Offline buddies and Mobile buddies.
• There are also sorting options so you can arrange buddies alphabetically, by status, by log size, etc.
• If you click “Advanced…” you'll be taken to more extensive sorting options. Here, you will be able to choose a secondary sorting method and even group buddies by sorting method. For example, if you group by status, all the “Available” buddies will be in a group called “Available”, “Away” buddies in a group called “Away”, etc.