Exporting gchat logs, take 2.

June 13, 2009 1:33 PM

There must be SOME way to export my gchat/google talk logs out of gmail, right?

I know this has been asked before, but those solutions don't work. I'm hoping there is some new advice to be had, because I need to go through a whole lot of logs and doing it in the Gmail web interface would take months. The chat logs don't show up when you download email with an external client, even if you label them or mark them as unread messages. Is there any kind of script/extension/hack that would let me export them, or am I completely out of luck?

posted by EnormousTalkingOnion to computers & internet (2 comments total)

Settings in upper right. Filters, Create a new filter (at bottom).
Boxes come up at the top, put "Chat with" in the subject line (you can include the ") Do a test search and you'll see the list of all your chats (you can further filter by person by adding the name to the subject search).
Go to the next step. Check "forward it to" and enter an external e-mail or [e-mail] if you're using a mail client to download gmail (the + makes it so you can filter it with your client easier when you download them).
Ensure you click "Also apply filter to __ conversations below" and Create Filter.

Since a chat log is updated as you chat, you may receive a lot of e-mails every time you chat with someone as the log is updated. You may want do delete the filter after you run it this one time. I haven't fully tested it, so you may want to test just a couple logs by filtering more.
posted by ijoyner at 5:30 AM on June 14

I think this used to be the method a while back, but Gmail has since changed its forwarding filters so that you can't apply it to old messages. You can check the box, but it does nothing, and there is a note that says "Old messages will not be forwarded."
posted by EnormousTalkingOnion at 12:32 PM on June 14