path: root/help/C/prev-conv.page

<page xmlns="http://projectmallard.org/1.0/"
  type="topic"
  id="prev-conv">

  <info>
    <link type="guide" xref="index#text-conv"/>
    <desc>
      Search your previous conversations.
    </desc>
    <revision pkgversion="2.28" version="0.1" date="2009-08-17" status="stub"/>
    <revision pkgversion="2.28" version="0.2" date="2009-08-19" status="review"/>
    <credit type="author">
      <name>Milo Casagrande</name>
      <email>milo@ubuntu.com</email>
    </credit>
    <copyright>
      <year>2009</year>
      <name>GNOME Documentation Project</name>
    </copyright>
    <include href="legal.xml" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2001/XInclude"/>
  </info>

  <title>Previous conversations</title>

  <p>
    <app>Empathy</app> automatically saves all your text conversations you have
    with your contacts, and lets you perform two different kinds of search: a
    normal text search, or a per-conversation search.
  </p>
  <p>
    The normal search is a <em>full text</em> search: it will search the exact text in
    all your previous conversations.
  </p>
  <p>
    The per-conversation search permits you to limit the text search to a particular
    contact and conversation, and permits you to look at all the previous
    conversations you had with your contacts.
  </p>

  <note>
    <p>
      You do not need to be connected to the Internet to search your previous
      conversations.
    </p>
  </note>

  <steps>
    <item>
      <p>
        To start searching your previous conversations, from the <gui>Contact List</gui>
        window, perform one of the following:
      </p>
      <list>
        <item>
          <p>
            Press <key>F3</key>.
          </p>
        </item>
        <item>
          <p>
            Choose <guiseq><gui>View</gui><gui>Previous Conversations</gui></guiseq>.
          </p>
        </item>
      </list>
    </item>
    <item>
      <p>
        Based on the kind of search you want to perform, see
        <link xref="prev-conv#normal-search"/> or <link xref="prev-conv#contact-search"/>
        for more information.
      </p>
    </item>
  </steps>

  <section id="normal-search">
  <title>Normal search</title>
  <steps>
    <item>
      <p>
        Select the <gui>Search</gui> tab.
      </p>
    </item>
    <item>
      <p>
        In the <gui>For</gui> text box, type the text you want to search, and click on
        <gui>Find</gui>.
      </p>
    </item>
    <item>
      <p>
        If there are results, they will be shown in the first pane, ordered by date.
      </p>
    </item>
    <item>
      <p>
        Click on the result to see the exact text you were searching for on the
        bottom pane.
      </p>
      <p>  
        The search results will be highlighted.
      </p>
    </item>
  </steps>
  </section>

  <section id="contact-search">
  <title>Conversation search</title>
  <steps>
    <item>
      <p>
        Select the <gui>Conversations</gui> tab.
      </p>
    </item>
    <item>
      <p>
        From the drop-down list at the top of the window, select your account.
      </p>
    </item>
    <item>
      <p>
        From the left top pane, select the contact you want to look the previous
        conversations of. The previous conversations will be shown on the right pane.
      </p>
      <p>
        By default, the last conversation you had will be shown.
      </p>
      <note>
        <p>
          Based on your account selected and the service of that account, it will
          be possible to select contacts, IRC rooms or group conversations. 
        </p>
      </note>
    </item>
    <item>
      <p>
        From the left bottom pane, you can browse your conversations by date. Based
        on the contact selected, the date in which you had a conversation will
        be highlighted in bold text.
      </p>
    </item>
    <item>
      <p>
        To perform a text search, type the text you want to search in the text box
        at the top of the window.
      </p>
      <p>
        The search results will be highlighted.
      </p>
    </item>
  </steps>
  </section>

</page>