realistic

Many people nowadays prefer to stay offline while using Yahoo! Messenger - mostly done to avoid someone. There are many ways of finding people who are online but yet invisible.

First Method: Doodle Method

1. Double Click on the user whose status you want to check.

2. A message window will open.

3. Click IMVironment button, select See all IMVironments, select Yahoo! Tools or Interactive Fun, and click on Doodle.

4. The last step and the most important step. After loading the Doodle IMVironment, there will be two possibilities.

a) If the user is offline, the Doodle area will show waiting for your friend to load Doodle continuously.
b) If the user is online (in invisible mode), after few seconds (it can take up to one minute, depending on connection speed), you will get a blank page. So the user is online!

Second Method: Voice Chat Method

1. Double Click on the user whose status you want to check.

2. Click on Voice icon on the toolbar, or select Contact menu and select Enable Voice Chat .

3. The deciding part; there are 2 possible results:

a) If the user is offline, you will get this message: Internal server error. Cannot obtain voice token to start voice chat.

b) If the user is invisible (actually online), you will see the Voice Toolbar.

Third Method: Conference Invitation

1. Right Click on the user whose status you want to check.

2. When the menu appears, select invite to Conference.

3. A window will appear. See at the right pane, the username you selected will be there. Now, click Invite.

4. The deciding part ¦ there are 2 possible results:

a) If the user is offline, you will get this message: None of the users in the invite list are available to join the conference. Please try at a later time.

b) If the user is invisible, you will get a window similar saying: You are now logged into voice conference

Source- Methods to find a invisible user on Yahoo! Messenger