Over the past few days I've been researching XMPP/jabber servers with a plan of integrating live chat into our CRM. I've decided to go with ejabberd because of it's scalability and robustness. There are allot of options out there, but I won't go into that right now. I just want to give a brief overview of the steps it took to get ejabberd working, along with the bandersnatch component that enables logging of chat messages to mysql.

Firstly a couple of links to the home pages of the two projects:
http://www.process-one.net/en/ejabberd/
http://www.funkypenguin.info/project/bandersnatch/

Installing ejabberd was very simple. It doesn't include setting up a system daemon, but include a daemon script that can be setup manually.

1. download ejabberd binary
2. extract and chmod +x
3. run the binary: $ sudo ./ejabberd-2.1.1-linux-x86-installer.bin
4. follow the prompts
5. start ejabberd $ /opt/ejabberd-2.1.1/bin/ejabberdctl start
6. Browse the admin page: http://127.0.0.1:5280/admin
7. Read the docs: http://127.0.0.1:5280/admin/doc/guide.html

I managed to get bandersnatch working eventually, but it was a bit of a mission. The application archive on the home page was corrupted, but I managed to find it on a mirror site.  It's poorly documented and hasn't had much activity since 2008, but it does work. It logs private and group chat to mysql. Attached is a screenshot of the logs it has recorded in few brief tests i ran.

1. download the archive (attached)
2. extract to /opt/bandersnatch

3. modify /opt/ejabberdETC/conf/ejabberd.cfg

add this in the modules section:
{mod_service_log, [{loggers, ["bandersnatch.jabber.myserver.com"]}]}

add this in the listeners section:
{5526, ejabberd_service, [{ip, {127, 0, 0, 1}}, {access, all},
                          {hosts, ["bandersnatch.jabber.myserver.com"],
                          [{password, "secret"}]}]},

4. create the bandersnatch db in mysql and run the db install script
mysql -u root -p bandersnatch < bandersnatch.sql

5. modify /opt/bandersnatch/config.xml setting the secret and component name

<server>
    <connectiontype>tcpip</connectiontype>
    <hostname>localhost</hostname>
    <port>5526</port>
    <secret>secret</secret>
</server>
<component>
    <name>bandersnatch.jabber.myserver.com</name>
</component>

6. install the perl dependencies:
$ apt-get install libnet-jabber-perl

7. Run bandersnatch from /opt/bandersnatch
$ perl bandersnatch config.xml

Below are a few links I used to put this all together.
http://www.ejabberd.im/install-bandersnatch
http://gonzo.kiev.ua/projects/jabber/bandersnatch-en.html
file:///opt/bandersnatch/doc/bandersnatch.html

Setting it up as a daemon
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=67918

Also it's worth pointing out that this is just a test and not a production setup. The environment I ran it on is Ubuntu Hardy 8.04 LTS Desktop.

Files: 

bandersnatchOutput.png

bandersnatch-0.4.RC1_.tar_.gz