Microsoft’s Skype app has finally found a new joint venture in China as Skype and Guangming Founder (GMF) have partnered to provide the service across a growing number of platforms that span PCs, tablets, phones, and pretty much anything with a screen. Well, almost anything.
“Skype has been at the forefront of changing the way people communicate and GMF is a strong partner with a deep and rich understanding of mobile technology,” writes Judd Harcombe. “Our shared excitement about communications and vision for the future will pave the way for us to enrich real communications in China.”
The TOM-Skype app will be replaced by a new version on Windows 8.1, Desktop, and mobile devices
Skype has officially started the beta period for the app and will be updating the old TOM-Skype app to a new version (which appears to be simply called “Skype” like the versions available elsewhere) to coincide with the partnership. This new version will be coming to Windows 8.1, Desktop Classic (Mac and Windows desktop versions), Android, iPhone and iPad, with a version “coming soon” for the Windows Phone platform.
Speaking of Skype for Mac, version 6.11 was also released for Mac devices today and its developers have put a spotlight on quality, fixing a number of “crashes and hangs” as well as bugs reported by users. These include:
- Full-text search of messages with Unicode characters was failing on 10.6.
- Infinite scrolling was sometimes broken on Mavericks.
- A disk I/O issue prevented a small number of users from logging in.
- Dragged links were blurry when dragged to a display of a different resolution.
- File transfer messages were displaying incorrectly if they were scrolled just right.
Searching has also been improved and will allow you to find relevant content with less scrolling according to the company. You can also search for more types of messages in the Search field, including file transfers. Download the new Skype for Mac to experience the new changes for yourself.