The only reason I use Windows at all anymore is to chat with family on Yahoo/MSN webcam.
I've now found a couple of linux programs which are supposedly yahoo webcam compatible - Gyach Enhanced and ATTYM.
Gyach looks just too confusing for me so I tried ATTYM, although I can chat with people, when I try to use webcam I just get a box with a grey background and no cam picture - even though it says I am viewing or am being viewed and the person on the other end just get s a blank box also.
Is there any particular way to get this working? I installed via apt-get and webcam is working fine with programs such as camorama and gnome-meeting.

You are using Debian, right? You're in luck, I just managed to get sending and receiving of Yahoo webcam using Gyach's new update working.


To install, make sure you have alien installed first. If not, then open a terminal and as root type:

apt-get install alien

Click on the .rpm link below and select a mirror, then save the file on your system. Open a terminal and navigate to it, then type as root:

alien -d Gyach-Enhanced-pYVoiceChat-1.0.7-1.i586.rpm

This will create a .deb file which you can then install using your favorite package manager, or, if you wish to install it right away in one go, then type as root:

alien -d -i Gyach-Enhanced-pYVoiceChat-1.0.7-1.i586.rpm

To start Gyach, type in the terminal (as user):

gyach

Make sure when you see the log in screen that you put a check next to "No chat room", unless you want those of course.


.rpm

Thanks for that, Gyach looks like a much better programs than AYTTM, and Yahoo Messenger in fact.
Unfortunately, I'm still having webcam trouble.
I've tried both my webcams - with the first one (STV0681 V4L1) I get the webcam window which displays the name of the cam but a small error box comes up with the message "Gyach Enhanced (Webcam Broadcaster): There was an error reading the webcam image"
With the second cam (sn9c102: V4L2 ) there is no webcam window, just an error message stating "Gyach Enhanced (Webcam Broadcaster): An error occurred at 'ioctl VIDIOCSPICT'. Could not set camera properties"

With the first cam there are these messages in the terminal -
drivers/usb/media/stv680.c: [stv_init:388] STV(i): CIF is supported
drivers/usb/media/stv680.c: [stv_init:406] STV(i): Camera has 0 pictures.
drivers/usb/media/stv680.c: [stv_init:433] STV(i): Video Mode set to CIF

Can anyone tell me what all this means?

You might need to select the other available viewer in Gyach. Go through the options in the main program, it's there somewhere (I can't point you to it now, have to go to work soon)

Other than changing that, I have no clue.

The other viewer also gives the same errors.
I've checked the Gyach website and it mentions that I am likely to have problems with a V4L2 cam which counts out my second cam but my other cam seems to fit all the requirements needed and all permissions are ok.
I had a quick try running as root and got the same errors so I just don't know what the problem is.

Hmm.. strange.. I'm stumped..

Well, on top of the webcam not working, Gyach Enhanced is constantly crashing now and I still can't get webcam to work on ayttm either. Doesn't look like I'll be completely giving up windows any time soon.

I just browsed the Gyach site.. it says only webcams are supported that run on V4L1, not V4L2 like your cam.

I'm sorry

I have two cams, one is V4L2 and one is V4L1, neither work.
I'll maybe try Gyach again in the future when it is more established and supports more cams.