Latest Upgrades to Chat: Clear Conversations + Volume Controls

[Alex]

We hope you're liking the new chat! As we mentioned in our most recent announcement about chat, your feedback around this project has been incredibly useful. Based on your requests, we've added two more things to chat. They're relatively small changes in the grand scheme of things, but we expect those of you who want them will be pretty happy to see them. 

First, we have added the ability to clear the chat of prior conversation. We asked you how you wanted to use this type of clear chat functionality, and we got a lot of different responses. So, we've made this available in two ways, which we think will cover most of the needs we heard expressed:

• The ability to "Clear chat history" in the Main Room will let Network Creators and admins zero out the public chat. Everyone participating in the public chat will start with a clean slate. Members won't see this link.
• All members will have the ability to "Clear chat history" in private conversations. This will remove all of the messages that are in their own view, while the member they are chatting with will continue to see the messages.

It's important to note that this link will appear at the top of the chat window so you will need to scroll to the top of the conversation to clear chat.

The second thing we added is a volume control for alert notifications. The default sound levels for everyone out there on the Internet can be pretty varied, so it makes sense to add this straightforward volume control. Too loud? Turn it down.

These two updates will wrap up the major work on our chat upgrade. The old Flash-based chat will stick around for a bit longer, but we will ultimately be turning off the old Flash-based chat. If you haven't tried out the new chat yet, now's a great time to get acquainted with it!

[Eric Suesz]

Notifications when people join are something that software apps sometimes include (e.g., Adium). Interesting idea, although it's not something we have planned. 

[Phillip Seaver]

Just to make sure we're communicating :-), I meant when people first join the community, not just when they join chat.

I wasn't thinking of a notification (thought that might be cool) -- I was thinking of something next to their name in the list of people in chat to indicate that they recently joined the community.

[Shy Matsi]

Please please please turn off that old flash chat!!! 

I love the new chat, it's great, and follows my censor rules on the site, which makes moderating bad language and other things so much easier! However I am still seeing things like this: 

• Member A

  Can someone link me the old chat? :S

• MemberB

  http://furry4life.org/chat/index/popOutWindow

Which brings up that horrible old flash chat D: that is uncensored, showing all the foul language I don't want my members seeing.. 

[medicsindex]

Well Done - THANKS

[Kristin Overn]

Eric,

So... Any chance you can disable that function that automatically deletes chat history after 24 hours, as we previously discussed?  Our chat room isn't that active right now, and people are discouraged from participating when the discussion keeps disappearing every day and the room just sits there blank and empty.  Would VERY much appreciate having the option to NOT clear the discussion.

Thanks very much!! 

[Bousal]

IS IT POSSIBLE TO HAVE IT THAT WHEN A MEMBER IN CHAT IS CLICKED ON IT DO NOT OPEN IN A NEW WINDOW ?

[Rich Schumaker]

If you use the pop-out feature, your chat conversations, both main and private, all show nicely on one interface.  That is what I use if I am going to chat much.

[Bousal]

THANKS MUCH, BUT IF I AM CHATTING WITH SOMEONE AND FROM CHAT WANT TO GO TO THEIR PAGE, IT WOULD BE NICE TO CLICK ON THEIR PHOTO AND OPEN PAGE IN SAME BROWSER, MUST BE A WAY TO GET RID OF THE TARGET BLANK

[Kos]

Just a stab it the dark but have you tried changing your tab settings under Tools/Internet Options?  

I switched mine to "open in new tab" just now and it seemed to do what you're asking........ of course the drawback is when chat is popped out, it will remain in a tab rather than standing separately as a result of the same setting.  idk

[liz4cps]

We've been having a couple problems in our chat.  Some of our members say they notice that lines they type often do not show up in chat to them though most of the time other folks in the chat will see and respond to them.  Other times, lines seem to just disappear completely.  I have seen both of these behaviors myself, though not very often; others seem to see it a lot.  Once, it froze up completely and I stopped getting anything more and thought folks had stopped talking until one of them alerted me to it via yahoo messenger.

Overall, there are enough problems that chat is much quieter -- and that's not good for our site.  The member that's having the most trouble with this has an older computer; is there a system or software requirement to avoid these problems?  Is there something else going on?

Thanks!

- Liz

[Kos]

We've been encountering the same problems and it seems to be limited to Internet Explorer, not Chrome or Firefox.  If you close down chat and re-launch, it functions for a while b4 happening once again.  I've been sending screenshots to the Help Desk so I know they're aware of the problem.  Fingers crossed to come to a solution soon.

[liz4cps]

Glad to hear they're aware of it and thanks for the info.  I've let the member know that seems to be having the most trouble with this -- hopefully, that will help.

It is disconcerting; you really don't know when it just stops, why it might be happening.