Gmail has boosted its chat feature with the addition of links into AOL Instant Messenger accounts. The company has not made an announcement about the addition, but Gmail users should notice a "sign into AIM" option on the drop down menu available through the status bar.

Once that is clicked the user is prompted to enter their AIM log in details, following which AIM buddies will appear in the list of quick contacts. We tried it at IT Week and found it to work well.

AIM buddies are identified with a recognizable icon and chats are initiated by clicking their name. In order to get the most out of the service Google suggests that users have Internet Explorer 6.0 and higher, or Firefox. Support for other browsers is planned.