trying to understand xmpp

Question

xmpp is federated. does that mean that as long as i connected to one xmpp server .example gtalk server. from there, i can communicate with any external jabber server in the world when sending "iq stanze" ?

Answer 1

Yes.

It works just like smtp. The jabber id contains the name of the Jabber Domain.

jabber_nickname@domain so your home jabber server can find the jabber ip of the domain and transfert your messages and requests

Answer 2

See, you can communicate with any jabber server and jabber client out there, unless some other rule, like a privacy rule, prohibits that. That is not restricted to IQ stanzas only, but all type of stanzas (presence, message, iq).

So, if you send a message to your friend on jabber.org, it travels from your client to your server, to her server, to her client, assuming that all connections are up and alive.