Skype Scrambles to Fix Login Glitch

Skype issued an update for Skype for Windows to fix a login glitch that locked out some users yesterday, and it promised a new Mac version for today.

Blog post that a small number of users

Skype's Peter Parkes reported yesterday in a blog post that a "small number" of users, more often than not people using Skype for Windows, were experiencing trouble logging into Skype. To all appearances, the problem was caused by a specific xml file, "shared.xml." To fix the problem manually, Parkes provided instructions for users on Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux machines, which consisted of quitting the app and deleting the file.

In a later post, Parkes said that the company understands that the manual instructions were "fairly technical" and was working to create updates to fix the problems automatically. Subsequently, a new version of Skype for Windows is now available for download, and Parkes promised an update for Mac today, during Linux users should all in all follow the manual instructions.

Small percentage of users

While this glitch only affected a "small percentage of users," it brings to mind the system-wide failure Skype experienced last December that paralyzed service for the voice- and video-chatting service worldwide. Skype was able to identify and fix the problem on time to get the service online for the Christmas holiday, however the outage raised questions about the VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) service's reliability.