The most famous and widely used instant messenger platform is the WhatsApp Messenger and it is a cross platform, freeware mobile application. The app has end to end encryption technology that protects the messages sent by the user. The instant messenger app uses the internet connectivity to send text messages, GIF, documents, videos, PDF files, voice notes, user location, phone contacts and audio messages; make one to one video calls and voice calls.
The instant mobile application was founded in February 24th, 2009 by Jan Koum and Brain Acton in Mountain View, California. The instant messenger got stuck and was often crashed, but the hard work of the developers the app was designed with new updates according to recent trends. And the first unique feature of the app was, when the user updates their status- all the contacts linked to the user receives notification regarding the status update.
Because of the popularity of the app, the founders decide to switch the freeware application to a paid service and in 2009 the app allowed the users to send photos to other iPhone users.
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Facebook Acquisition
With a larger user base accessing the instant messaging app, the social network media – Facebook acquired the app in February 20144 for about $19.3 US billion and the overall user base raised to 1 billion in 2016.
The acquisition of the instant messenger by the social media network led many users to try or move to other instant messaging services, but the CEO of the social media said that the reason for acquiring the messenger app was to develop the basic data connectivity service so that the users can access the service for free.
The voice call feature in the in the messenger app was introduced only after the acquisition of the company and By August 2014, the app was the leading messenger across the globe with about six hundred million users, and later at the beginning of the next year, the count increased to one billion and the overall number users accessing the instant messaging app reached to seven hundred million dollars. Some of the users accessing the service faced difficulty with the paid service because of credit card payment issues, so in January 18th, 2016 the app founder announced that the service will once again be available as a free service.
The app also announced that the third party advertisements will not be a part of the app; instead the app will be enhanced with new advanced features like the ability to connect with companies and business organizations. With the help of the voice call service in more than one hundred million calls made each day. To an enable efficient security service, the app was updated to use a 2 step verification feature in the beta phase for the Android users.
Cross platform support
In 2009, after the beta stage the instant messenger mobile application was launched in the App store for the iPhone users and in the next year the BlackBerry platform was included, and Symbian operating system and Android operating system were also added in August 2010. The beta application for the non smartphone users like Nokia- the Series 40 was added and within a few months the app for the windows phone was included and by March 2013 the support for BlackBerry 10 was added.
The messenger app released an update that their application will further support the Android Wear watches and the same year they released an open source plug-in called the WhatsApp purple, for Pidgin and implemented the XMPP. It makes it possible for the users to access the WhatsApp messaging service on the Linux or Windows personal computer. And the app responds to automatically block the contact number that is connected to WhatsApp in the plug-in.
The cross platform messenger app launched a web client in January 21st, 2015 called WhatsApp Web that is used via a browser and syncing the mobile connection. The support for the Samsung Tizen operating system was added in April 2015 and an unofficial port for Nokia N9, a MeeGo based was released and it was called Wazapp and for Nokia N900, a Maemo based was released called the Yappari. Even the Symbian based oldest Nokia N95 mobile device also was capable of running the application.
By February 26th, 2016 the mobile messenger platform announced that they will stop supporting Symbian and BlackBerry 10 and Series 40, and also the older versions of iOS, Windows phone and Android by the year end. But after certain consideration, they have extended the time limit to June 30th, 2017.
Impressive features to strengthen the app
The most common instant messenger mobile apps like the Facebook messenger, BBM and Hike have lost its popularity after the millions and billions of users are accessing the WhatsApp service and the company acquired by Facebook has led people to access the WhatsApp service for almost all the purposes from texting, voice call, to sending video and audio messages. About sixty to seventy percent of the time spent by the user is on WhatsApp and they use the service for ordinary things as well as for big things and it has become an indispensable thing in life.
Increased media sharing limit
The users have certain limit while sharing the media files to the other users via the messenger application, but a new update made by the company has increased the limitations. First the beta version of the new feature was tested and is recently launched for the users to experience the feature. The limit to send the media files were ten, but the new update allows the user to add thirty files. The feature is already implemented in the iPhone devices; however it is still in the beta version for the Android devices.
The iOs users can download the new version with the file size being 91.2MB, and the app requires the users to have strong Wi-Fi signal and a good battery backup. The higher and iOs 7 users can avail the new updated features.
More space management
The app is enhanced with fascinating features that will make it easier for the users to access the app. The messenger app seems to occupy large storage space in the device and it includes the texts, images, and video and gif messages. And each time when the space is full, the user has to go through a tedious process of flushing out the memory space. But with the new updated feature, the users can empty the storage space directly from the Storage Usage.
To directly delete the contents from the Storage Usage, the user must go to the Settings option in which they have to select the Data and Storage Usage option. From this option they have to choose the Storage Usage option from the iOs device and delete the files, like the audio files, GIF files and video files.
Delete or Edit the text messages
The users might have made typographical errors while sending message, or might have sent it to the wrong person and even before realizing that they have made the mistake, the recipient would have seen the messages. But this mistake will never happen in the future because of the new update.
Te new update allows the users to modify or delete the sent messages directly from the rooted smartphone by default, and to enable this service, the users have to turn on the feature manually. So, the users can long press on the text messages they wish to delete. But the feature works only when the user deletes the message before the recipient sees the text.
Queue the messages if you have iPhone
The users can queue the messages in their device when they internet connectivity is poor or nil and the recipient will receive the message once when the data connectivity becomes strong. This new feature will allow more users to access the messenger app.
