Welcome to Trillian! Start here to get up and running quickly. We hope you enjoy Trillian and we're always interested in hearing your feedback!

Thanks for choosing our software,

~The Cerulean Studios Team

Installing Trillian 5 for Windows

Downloading

Click the "Download Now" button on our homepage:

If your browser gives you a security warning bar, please click it and choose Download File.

You can run the installer directly after the download, or you can save it somewhere on your disk to install it later.

Your browser should complete the download.

Installing

Run the installer (double-click it, or choose "Run" after downloading) then follow the directions to install.
Please carefully read each page of the installer before advancing to the next step.

Install Trillian 5 in the same directory as your previous version of Trillian.

If you are feeling cautious about upgrading an existing installation, you can make a copy of both your C:\Program Files\Trillian folder and your user data folder. Windows Vista and 7 users can find their user data folder in C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\Trillian, while earlier operating systems place it in C:\Documents and Settings\username\AppData\Roaming\Trillian. If Windows Explorer doesn't let you see those folders it is because they are hidden. You can configure Windows Explorer to "Show hidden files, folders" by changing the setting in the "View" tab of Folder Options.

Signing Up

Do you already have a Trillian Account?

To use any version of Trillian you'll have to have your own Trillian Account (formerly "Astra Account"), which keeps your settings synchronized between Trillian on your desktop, mobile devices and in-browser Trillian for Web.

If you already have a Trillian Account you do not need to sign up for a new account. Just sign in with your existing username and password. If you forgot your username, or lost your password, you can have either mailed to you by visiting the Astra Account management page on our web site.

Trillian 4.x users: You already have an account.

Trillian 3.1 (and earlier) users: If you are just now upgrading, you don't have an account yet. You may have had a passworded profile configured on your local computer but that is not the same thing as a Trillian Account. The install process should migrate your IM accounts over to your new Trillian Account.

Signing up for your free Trillian Account during the Trillian Installation

The registration process is split into three stages. The first stage, shown below, has 5 steps:

1. Choose a username. Rules:
2. Must start with a letter
3. May contain no symbols other than a period (.) or underscore (_).
4. Must be between 6 and 64 characters in length
5. Enter your email address.
6. Did you purchase Trillian Pro 3.1 or earlier? Purchasers of Trillian Astra 4.0 and later should not check this box.
7. Check if you accept TOS.
8. Next we'll create a password.

1. Create a password. Password rules:
2. Case-sensitive. Upper and lowercase are different!
3. Any combination of letters, numbers, punctuation
4. Must be between 6 and 64 characters in length
5. Enter your password again, just to be sure you entered it correctly.
6. Click the security question drop down button for a list of choices. In our example we chose to enter our own and typed in a question only we would know.
7. Enter the answer to your security question as you would remember it later. This is important because it is the only way you can recover a lost password.
8. Your account will be created when you click Next! If there is a problem you'll be asked to solve it.
   Next you'll choose which IM accounts you wish to use with Trillian. This is covered in the next section, so keep reading.

Setup

Set Up IM Accounts

After creating your account, you'll be asked to Set Up Instant Messaging as seen below:

Input your IM account for each service, then press Next. You can add IM accounts later, so feel free to leave any (or all) blank.
Tip: Each IM account you add will get a dedicated icon at the top of your contact list for controlling the connection.

Set Up Social Networks

Sign in to each social network. When you're done, press Next. You can add social networks at any time, so feel free to skip any (or all) for now.
Tip: Each social network you add will get a dedicated icon at the top of your contact list for controlling the connection, as well as a shortcut in your Windows system icon tray (clock).

Set Up Mail

Trillian is an email client capable of connecting to your mail account via industry standard POP3 or the newer IMAP. You can add your mail account on the following screen, or at any later time:

Important Tip: Trillian automatically checks mail for Gmail, Windows Live, Yahoo! Mail, and AOL if you have added IM accounts for those respective services. Do not add those accounts here. 1. Choose IMAP or POP3. Check your mail host; most provide instructions. Try googling POP3 Comcast or IMAP Comcast, for example.
2. Input your full email address.
3. Your username is probably the part of your username before the @ sign, but sometimes it is your full email address.
4. Type the password you use to get your email.
5. Your mail server. Most ISPs use mail.something.com or pop.something.com.
Tip: Don't enter your SMTP server, that's for outgoing email.
6. Use port 110 for POP3, port 143 for IMAP.
When you are done, click Next. Your email account should now appear in the "Mail" section of your contact list!

End of the setup section

You're all set up!

Congratulations, you're now ready to start using Trillian. If you've connected to at least one IM network, you should start to see any online contacts appear in your contact list. If you've connected to social networks, you'll see their entries appear in your contact list and also in your system tray (next to your Windows taskbar clock).
We recommend you read the rest of this guide to get familiarized with Trillian.
Thanks, from the entire Cerulean Studios team ...
Have fun!

Adding Accounts

How to add an IM, social or email account to Trillian at any time

All of the accounts you use for various services can be found in one spot. You may add, change or delete accounts at any time that Trillian is running.
Tip: Trillian isn't going to create accounts for you, so you must have existing accounts at any of the services you wish to connect to. At the top of your contact list, click the Trillian Button in the upper left then Manage Accounts.
Tip: An alternate way to manage your accounts is to click any of the connection icons, then Manage Accounts.

With Trillian Preferences open to the Accounts screen, click the Add a new account button as shown below:

You are presented with a list of services.
Tip: If a service is missing, make sure it's not disabled in the Plugins section of Trillian Preferences. Click a service, then you'll be asked to provide your existing account details for that service:

1. Type your username. Note that some of your IM usernames may be a full email address.
2. Type your password.
3. Click Connect. Trillian will immediately try to connect to the service.

Your contact list now shows Online and the [g] icon lights up, to show we're connected to that service.

Connecting, Disconnecting, Setting Status

Control of Individual Services

Each of your account can be individually managed using the blue icons at the top of your contact list:

Every service is represented by a different icon, as shown in the legend below:

Global Control

You may set all accounts (Online, Away, Offline, Invisible etc) by clicking your status at the top of your contact list:

http://www.trillian.im/guide/images/windows-status0.png

Share a status update (e.g. "Hard at work!") for all accounts by clicking "Share a messaage..." or any existing status message:

By default, Trillian is set to update your status message on All IM Networks. If you would also like to also update your social network status you can click the selection to the right of "Set Status for" and check/uncheck your selections:

Global Away Status

When setting yourself as Away, Trillian will automatically change your status message to show what time you went away. It pre-fills the status message box so that you can edit it yourself:

Simply start typing to replace it with a custom away message.

Advanced

Open Trillian Preferences to the Status page for more control of your status messages:

You may edit saved Status Messages by clicking the "Edit status messages..." button:

Saved Status Messages allow you to configure re-usable states with finer control.
Create groups to further organize your status messages.
Set each service's state (Online, Away, Invisible, etc).
Quickly change to a saved status message from the top of your contact list:

Trillian will also automatically save any status messages you've set, for your convenience.

Managing IM Contacts

Adding Contacts

Before you add a contact, make sure that you're connected to the appropriate IM account.
Click the Trillian Button at the upper-left of your contact list, then Add Contact:

Select the appropriate Account and your friend's Username on that service.
Tip: Some services require a full email address for your friend's username. Tip: If your friend is on a service that requires authorization for add requests, you won't be able to chat until your friend accepts you.

Combining Single Contacts Into Metacontacts

If one of your friends has an account on multiple services, you can combine them into one icon!
You'll be able to double-click their icon to open a chat with whichever service they're active on (you can manually configure the priority). You will also be able to single-click their icon to expand/collapse a list of accounts contained within their combined metacontact.
Here's how:

1. Hold down your mouse to drag one contact onto another. In this example, we're combining Kevin's Google Talk account with his Trillian Network account.
2. Decide the name for this combined contact, as it will appear only in your contact list.
3. Drag to re-order which account takes precedence, for when you double-click this contact to chat.
4. Combine!
5. Click the combined contact's icon to expand/collapse its entry list.
   Tip: Drag a combined contact's entries to re-order priority. Tip: You can combine more than two at a time by holding down your Ctrl key, clicking each contact, then right-clicking one of them and choosing Combine Contacts.

Using Combined Contacts

Double-click a combined contact and Trillian will automatically choose which service to use. It is based on which services are online, offline, away etc. You can change the order of precedence when the combined contact is expanded.
Drag the entries to reorder them.
Double-click an individual entry if you wish to forcefully choose a particular service.
Tip: You can set Trillian to auto-expand Metacontacts when you place your mouse over them by checking the box in Preferences > Contact List > Expand MetaContacts when the mouse cursor goes over them. Tip: You can change which service you're using while talking to a combined contact. Click your friend's name at the top fo a message window and a drop-down box will reveal your choices.

Chatting

Starting a conversation

Simply double-click a contact and a new window/tab will open with their conversation. Then you can start chatting:

Sending a screen capture

To send a screen capture, the recipient must be on a service that Trillian is capable of sending images through. At this time, Trillian supports sending images to other Trillian Network users. What a great reason to get your friends using Trillian!
From your message window click Insert > Screen Capture...

Then drag a box on your screen with your mouse:

And your screen capture will appear in your edit box! You can now continue to type or just send it plain.

Tip: Ctrl-V will paste any image from your clipboard. Tip: Copy your entire desktop to the clipboard by pressing your PrntScrn key; or, use Alt-PrntScrn to copy the active window. Paste into a chat with Ctrl-V!

Quick Reply

Reply right from message popup notifications!

Tip: If you are not getting notifications for new messages, check the box at Preferences > Notifications > (Notify me when) A new message arrives in a chat room window.

Timestamps

Press the F2 key on your keyboard to toggle timestamps in your current message window. The permanent setting is in Preferences > Chat > Chapters and Timestamps section.

Changing Message Styles

You can change the Message Style of your message windows between Simple and Bubbles from the More menu in your chat window:

Tip: You can now download more message styles to further customize your Trillian chat windows!