Chat room icon?

[Palantir]

Can't we get a "Chatroom Occupied" symbol or something at the top of the WHQ Discussion Forum page or WHQ "Main Page" when someone is in it?

That way when you get on you can tell immediately if someone is there. It might encourage more timely usage.

Kerry

[Dan Neely]

I'd request the forum index page too. Hte only time I see hte front page is when I'm bored between classes at school

[Siberian HEAT]

While I would love to do that, and have wanted that myself for some time, the current software does not allow such a thing.

I realize the utility of the chat program has declined over time, but short of paying an ungodly amount for a commercial package, there is little to be done for a volunteer site like this.

My personal preference would be an IRC channel, but many folks have expressed misgivings about having to install something in order to go to chat. While it would give us a permanent presence on the net, and it would allow unlimited idling, I can't say for sure it would be used.

Perhaps if someone were to set one up we could test it out. The obvious person is our friend Mr. Neely as he is an IRC veteran :cheeky: and would know where we could find a permanent place to park our channel.

It can't hurt to try.

[Dan Neely]

I'd set one up the last time we'd had this discusion on the network I tend to spend the most time on (starlink.org), but majorC was the only person who joined when I was there. I'm not sure about the availability of good free java clients is, the only few I found didn't have a running sample to try. If there's official interest, I suppose I could try and get one running. For that matter, I might be able to write my own in annother month or two. The second assignment in my webprogramming class is an IM program. Details aren't available yet, but hopefully it should only be a matter of changing the backend.