Finch is a powerful text user interface instant messaging client based on libpurple, and it comes included in the Pidgin source, the popular GNOME IM client. Finch supports various protocols, including AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo and IRC.

The version which ships in Debian Lenny is rather old (2.4.3), so in order to install the latest release of Finch in Debian Lenny (which, at the time of writing is 2.6.5), just follow the next steps: