There may be times when you need to turn your attention away from a conversation to answer a question, or take another call. There may also be times when the other caller is typing a very lengthy reply or a long block of information is transmitting very slowly onto your screen or when they have asked you to hold. In these cases, you may want to set up special alerts to let you know when it is time to again pay attention to the conversation window.

In this screen, you can choose to be alerted when typing has started or when it has stopped. The default alert is that your screen will flash. Other options available (specifying a sound to play or specifying that the conversation window should be brought to the foreground when the alert is triggered) are configured in the Preferences area).

If the Alert Stop Typing option is turned on, you will see a red stop sign in the bottom of your conversation window. When the conversation window has stopped receiving text (about a 3 second pause), your screen will flash (and/or be brought to the foreground window, and/or a sound will play).

If the Alert Start Typing option is turned on, you will see a green start sign in the bottom of your conversation window. Whenever the window starts receiving text after a pause, your screen will flash (and/or be brought to the foreground window, and/or a sound will play). If the caller asks you to please hold, you can enable this alert and it will notify you as soon as they start typing again.

In the screen shot above, I have enabled both the start and stop alert options.

The Text menu item is next.