Embedded chat

This "hack" will allow you to run a semi-integrated (free or paid) chat room "inside" your forum:

+ It's quite generic and should work with several chat providers (made a seperate template, just for the applet code)
+ The chat room will be displayed within your forum's structure,
+ The chat applet will be sized according to the user's screen resolution (could get scary at 1600x1200 )
+ People will be logged into the chat room using their forum usernames (if the chat supports auto-login)
+ Invalid characters in usernames will be replaced before logging in to the chat, plus too lengty names will be shortened
+ Easy installation

- At this time there's no feedback from the chat room to the forum. A "chat monitor" is planned though (version 2)

The install docs and template examples are mainly focussed on the chat provider we use (http://www.raidersoft.com), but it shouldn't be a problem adjusting one or two things to get this thing to work with your own chat provider.

The sizes of the chat applet haven't been tested out fully. I have no clue how bigger resolutions work out. All the rest seems to work fine.

Hope you like it...

[update 1.4]Sizes can now be set more easily, just by editing the chatredirect template, nothing else.
Added support for raidersoft's ICE, which is more flexible with usernames.

[ThoughtDiver]

I've got the chat integrated... I have a menu choice that when I click it, it opens a new window (using target=_blank) but I'd like for the new window that pops open with the embedded chat NOT to have the left column.

I've tried to incorporate the following:
http://www.phpportals.com/forums/sho...no+left+column

But I can't seem to get the left column to disappear by adding the lines into chat.php. I tried, as a test to make sure it works, editing download.php and it removed the left menu without problem. No matter what I do, though, I can't remove the left menu for when my users go to "Chat".

I'd like to pop open the new window with chat and just the site's header and footer and no menu options to confuse the user - so they can chat and surf and not be tempted to hit a menu choice on the open chat window.

-Scott

[wot-Mike]

It must be a vB Portal thing, because I honestly don't have a clue what you are talking about

And that link won't allow me...

Originally posted by ThoughtDiver
I've got the chat integrated... I have a menu choice that when I click it, it opens a new window (using target=_blank) but I'd like for the new window that pops open with the embedded chat NOT to have the left column.

I've tried to incorporate the following:
http://www.phpportals.com/forums/sho...no+left+column

But I can't seem to get the left column to disappear by adding the lines into chat.php. I tried, as a test to make sure it works, editing download.php and it removed the left menu without problem. No matter what I do, though, I can't remove the left menu for when my users go to "Chat".

I'd like to pop open the new window with chat and just the site's header and footer and no menu options to confuse the user - so they can chat and surf and not be tempted to hit a menu choice on the open chat window.

-Scott

[ThoughtDiver]

Yeah, it's a vbportal thing. Sorry for the confusion. To me, vbportal and vbulletin are integrally tied together. :ermm:

Was hoping someone else here had run into the same issue, but should have put more details in my post. :nervous:

-Scott

[wot-Mike]

I know nothing about vbportal, so I can't help you. Maybe the people there can help out with this. The chat script is pretty simple, so that shouldn't be a bother.

If you get some solution for this, then please let me know (in details )

[tkeil69575]

Hi ThoughtDiver,

im using vBportal too but I dont have your problem because I dont use the side menu in the forum.

The problem is, that your complete forum is using the themeheader from vbportal, so you'd want to create a different header (maybe manually in chat.php) or allocate a different themeheader for the chat.php

regards Tina

[ThoughtDiver]

Okay... I got what I needed to work. I'll try and spell it out in case it is useful for someone else.

I fun vbportal integrated with vbulletin. I added the javachat integration with the pro version of sigmachat from raidersoft.com.

I have a link to chat off my main page. This takes me to the integrated chat in my site and I have it pop up in a new window by using target=_blank in the link.

Since I do have the left column menu operational in my forums area and since the chat is integrated into the forums section, my goal was to get rid of the left column menu ONLY for the chat window.

Why? Because users would click on the visible menu options in the left colum and go to another page on the site, taking them away from the chat session and dropping them from chat. What I wanted was my vbportal/vbintegration site in one browser window, and the chat session in a different browser window with all the menu options not visible to the user so the chat windows was essentially a floating chat window from the moment the user chose to click on the chat link. Okay... way too long of an explanation... but didn't know how to say it otherwise.

What I did - and this may require some familiarity with vbportal. This effectively removes the left column completely from whatever script you edit in part (1).

(1)
At the top of my /forums/chat.php file, I added the following lines:
----------------------------
global $leftcolumnoff;
$leftcolumnoff=1;

(2)
Within the vbp_includes.php file in my root directory, I added an if conditional statement as follows:
----------------------------
// mod - putting below original code in an if statement
global $leftcolumnoff;
if (!$leftcolumnoff) {
// mod

// original code follows
if ($Allow_Forum_Leftcolumn==1) {
if (($bbuserinfo['userid']!=0 and $bbshowleftcolumn)or ($bbuserinfo['userid']==0 and

$Forum_Default_Leftcolumn==1)){
include($nukepath . "/language/lang-$language.php");
require($nukepath . "/includes/forumblocks.php");
forumblocks(left);
if ($action==newreply or $action==newthread or $threadid !=0){
$themeleftcolumn ="";
$closeleftcolumn ="";
}else{
eval("\$themeleftcolumn = \"".gettemplate('P_ForumLeftColumn')."\";");
$closeleftcolumn = "<br></td></tr></table>";
}
$switchdisplay="| <a

href=\"$nukeurl/user.php?s=$session[sessionhash]&action=switchdisplay\"><b>Hide

Leftcolumn</b></a>";
}else{
if ($bbuserinfo['userid']!=0){
$switchdisplay="| <a

href=\"$nukeurl/user.php?s=$session[sessionhash]&action=switchdisplay\"><b>Show

Leftcolumn</b></a>";
}else{
$switchdisplay="";
}
}
}else{
$switchdisplay="";
$showleftcolumn =0;
}
// end original code

// mod
}
// mod - putting above original code in an if statement

Happy Happy.
Now Sleep.
:tired:

[ThoughtDiver]

When the chat is working, it works GREAT... but a fair percentage of the time, when you click on the link to open the new window with the chat integrated into it, you get the "Welcome" audio clip but the only thing that loads up is a blank rectangle with the custom background color of the chat app. Closing down and reclicking the link or pressing F5 to refresh the window will normally fix it, but sometimes you have to do this multiple times.

Any ideas? I'm using raidersoft's pro sigmachat.

Thanks,
Scott :ermm:

[wot-Mike]

This is the first time I hear of this.
Does this only happen to you, or all your users?
And what kind of OS are you using? Microsoft is not good in supporting java. What you could try (if you haven't already) is get java support from the source, and maybe that will help.
http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4/index.html

[dawl]

any updates on the who's in chat portion ?? My users are driving me crazy with this !!

[ThoughtDiver]

Wot-Mike - Just launching the site so not a lot of users, but we've gotten it on several test boxes pretty consistently. I tried putting the pop up window brining up just a normal HTML page sized to what I want and THEN a link to chat from that Window. I was trying to seperate the chat from the javascript to pop open the new window to see if it made a difference. Nope. Right-clicking and choosing refresh seems to be the best way to make it work. I'm working with Chris at raidersoft to try and figure out what the deal is... they are REALLY helpful there supporting their product.