How Do I Link Contacts from External Networks?

Linking contacts is particularly useful when interacting with your buddies on multiple networks in that you can consolidate multiple presences of a buddy. For more information on linking contacts, see: Linked Contacts.

A combined presence of a linked contact looks like the following:

• Offline. When a linked contact is offline, the offline icon status displays for the contact's primary identity.
• Online. When a linked contact is online, a single presence icon is shown for this contact in the buddy list. On mouse over, the linked contact shows the details of up to three contacts in a pop-up. If there are more than three contacts, a link is shown which reads, "To see all linked identities, select Properties on the context menu." To select the buddy with whom you want to talk, right-click the linked contact (on Mac OS, Control key + click) and select the buddy from  the drop-down menu. Even though a linked contact can have more than one online contact, only one presence is counted in the number of online buddies.