Pidgin Hunter is intended to be used in a legal manner.  If you do not have the legal right to view your target's chat logs, buddy list, and user account information, please do not use Pidgin Hunter.

Pidgin Hunter 1.10 Operations

1.  Connect the target (suspect) drive to your machine.  Make sure that Windows recognizes the drive and has assigned it a drive letter.

2.  Select the appropriate drive from the dropdown box and click 'Select Drive'.

3.  If a Windows installation is found on the selected drive, you will be prompted to select a user account.  Select the appropriate user account and click 'Ok'.

4.  If Pidgin has been installed on the selected user account, you will receive a message that Pidgin has been found.  The status text will change from "Pidgin Hunter Idle" to "Pidgin Hunter Locked On" and the graphic will change from the Pidgin icon to the Pidgin icon with crosshairs.

5.  Click the 'Copy Chat Logs' button to import the user's chat logs.  These chat logs will be copied to the Pidgin Hunter directory on your desktop under the case number sub-folder.  Note that chat logs will not be imported if the user has disabled logging.

6.  Click the 'Display Buddy List' button to import the user's buddy list.  The buddy list will be copied to the case number sub-folder as a file named 'blist.xml'.

7.  Click the 'Get User Accounts' button to import the user's account list.  The account list will be copied to the case number sub-folder as a file named 'accounts.xml'.

8.  Click the 'Search Chat Logs' button to search for words or phrases in the located chat logs. Exported logs will be stored in your working case directory.

9. Click the 'Show Original Chat Logs' button to see the original location of the target chat logs.

Change Log

Version 1.10

• Function buttons are now disabled until the user locates a Pidgin installation.
• Added 'Show Original Chat Logs' button. This button will open Windows Explorer at the location target chat logs are found.

Version 1.01

• Fixed minor bug that caused the Windows user account list to be duplicated each time the 'Set Drive' button was clicked.

Version 1.00

• Release version
• Added case save/load. Previously worked-on cases will automatically load when an existing case number is given.
• Fixed a few cosmetic issues.
• All features now functional.

Version 0.95

• Final beta version
• Added chat log export
• Fixed a few minor bugs

Version 0.9

• Second beta version
• Added chat log search: Can search logs for terms and display them in a web browser
• Exporting selected logs to chat terms directory does not work yet
• Added minor error control
• Still need to add:
  • Case save/load

Version 0.8

• First beta version
• Added chat log import
• Added buddy list import
• Added user account import
• Added Pidgin installation detection for Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7 operating systems
• Added logging by case number