Customizing the Chat View

Features and Commands:
    Help command
    Avatars
    Graphical smilies
    Text Formatting
    Using colored text in chat
    Invite a user to join your current chat room
    Changing from one chat room to another
    Modifying your own profile inside the chat
    Recalling the last message or command you have submitted
    Responding to a specific user
    Private Messages
    Actions
    Ignoring other Users
    Getting Public Information about other Users
    Save messages

Special commands for moderators and/or the administrator:
    Send an announcement
    Kicking a user
    Banish a user
    Promote/Demote a user to/from moderator:

Choosing a language:

You may choose a language among those in which phpMyChat - Plus have been translated by clicking on one of the flags at the start page. In the example bellow, a user selects the French language:

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Login:

If you have already registered, simply log in by entering your username and password. Then select which chat room you would like to enter and press the ’chat’ button.

Else you can register first or simply enter a room but your nick won’t be reserved (an other user may use the same nick once you have logged out).

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To Register:

If you have not yet registered and would like to, please choose the registration option. A small pop-up window will appear.

• First, create a username and a password for yourself by typing it into the appropriate boxes. The username you choose is the name that will be automatically displayed in the chat room. It cannot contain spaces, commas or backslashes (\).
• Second, please enter your first name, last name, and your email address. In order to register to chat, all of this information must be provided. The gender information is optional.
• If you have a homepage, you may enter the URL into the box.
• The language field may help other users in future discussions. They will know which language(s) you understand.
• Lastly, if you wish to allow your email address to be viewed by other participants, please check the box next to "show e-mail in public information". If you do not want your e-mail address to be viewable, leave the box unchecked.
• Then, press the Register button and your account will be created. If you wish to stop at any time without registering, press the Close button.

Of course, registered users would be able to modify/delete their own profile by clicking on the appropriate links.

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To create a room:

Registered users can create rooms. Private ones can only be accessed by users who know their name and will never been displayed except for users that are in.

Room’s name cannot contain comma or backslash (\).

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Sending messages:

To post a message to the chat room, type your text into the text box in the lower left corner and then press the Enter/Return key to send it. Messages from all users scroll in the chat box.

You may change the color of the text of your messages by choosing a new color from the list of choices to the right of the text box.

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Understanding the users list (not for users popup window):

Two basic rules have been defined for the users list:

1. a little icon that shows gender is displayed before the nick of a registered user (clicking on it will launch the whois popup for this user), while unregistered users have nothing but blank spaces displayed before their nick;
   
2. the nick of the administrator or of a moderator is italicized.

For example, from the snapshot bellow you can conclude that:

Nicolas is the admin or one of the moderators of the phpMyChat room; alien (whose gender is unknown), Jezek2 and Caridad are registered users with no extra "power" for the phpMyChat room; lolo is a simple unregistered user.

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Leaving the chat room:

To exit the chat, simply click once on "Exit". Alternatively, you may also enter the one of the following commands into your text box:
/exit
/bye
/quit
These commands may be completed with a message to be sent before you leave the chat room. For example : /quit See you soon!

will send the message "CU soon!" in the main frame then log you out.

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Knowing who is chatting without being logged in:

You may click on the link that shows the number of connected users at the start page, or, if you are chatting, click on the image at the top-right of the screen to open a independent window that will display the list of connected users, and the rooms they are in, in near real time.
The title of this window contains the usernames, if they are less than three, the numbers of users and opened rooms else.

Clicking on the icon at the top of this popup will enable/disable beeping sounds at user entrance.

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Customizing the Chat View:

There are many different ways to customize the look of the Chat. To change settings, simply type the appropriate command into your text box and press the Enter/Return key.

• The Order command allows you to toggle between having new messages appear at the top of the screen or at the bottom.
  Type "/order" without quotes.

• The Notify command allows you to toggle on or off the option of seeing the notices when other users enter or exit the chat room. By default this option is on and the notices will be seen.
  Type "/notify" without quotes.

• The Timestamp command allows you to toggle on or off the option of seeing the time the message was posted before each message and the server time in the status bar. By default this option is on.
  Type "/timestamp" without quotes.

• The Refresh command allows you to adjust the rate at which the posted message are refreshed on your screen. The default rate is currently 20 seconds. To change the rate type "/refresh n" without quotes where n is the time in seconds of the new refresh rate.

  For example: /refresh 5

  will change the rate to 5 seconds. *Beware, if n is set to less than 3, the refresh is reset not to refresh at all (usefull when you want to read lots of old messages without being disturbed)!*

• The Show command allows you to adjust the number of messages viewable on your screen. To change the default number, type "/show n" without quotes where n is the number of viewable messages.

  For example: /show 50

  will cause the 50 newest messages to be viewable on your screen. If all of the messages cannot be displayed within the message box, a scroll bar will appear on the right side of the message box.

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Features and Commands

Help command:

Once inside a chat room, you can launch a help popup by clicking on the image that sits just before the message box. You can also type the "/help" or "/?" commands in the message box.

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Avatars are graphic image icons that represent chatters. Only registered users may change their avatar. Registered users may open their Profile (see /profile command) and click on the avatar image to select it from a menu of images, or to input a URL to a graphic image available anywhere on the internet (only images publicly accessible, not password protected sites). Images should be browser-viewable (.gif, .jpg, etc. ) 32 x 32 pixel graphic files for best display.

Clicking on a person’s avatar in the message frame will popup up that person’s profile (see /whois command). Clicking on your own avatar on the user’s list will invoke the /profile command, if you are registered. If you are not registered, clicking on your own (system’s default) avatar will bring up an alert to encourage you to register.

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You may have graphical smilies inside your messages. See bellow the code you have to type into a message to obtain each one of these similes.

For example, sending the text "Hi Jack :)" without quote will display the message Hi Jack in the main frame.

:)	:-)	:D	:o	:O	:(	:-(	;)	:p	:P
8)	8-)	:[	:-[	:kill:	:wave	:baby	:nono	:shuks	:blush
:sad	:drool	:nuts	:hardhat	:thum	:foot	:hug	:sneak	:handshake	:kiss
:*	:-*	:heart	:bang	:type	:read	:zzzz	:eat	:angl	:love
:flirt	:rant	:rofl	:idea	:silly	:wow	:clps	:disco	:clap	:yea
:splat	:uch	:cryn	:whoa	:nana	:drnk	:devil	:cat	:buds	:dead
:hey	:wink	:hahaha	:hy	:mad	:shock	:slap	:bop	:music	:argue
:mischief	:groin	;punch	:drunk	:back

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Text can be bolded, italicized or underlined by encasing the applicable sections of your text with either the <B> </B>, <I> </I> or <U> </U> HTML tags.

For example, <B>this text</B> will produce this text.

To create a hyperlink for an e-mail address or URL, type the address (without any HTML tags). The hyperlink will be created automatically.

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Using colored text in chat

Usage:
You can select your own default color by editing your profile (the same color as your username color). You’ll still be able to use any other color. To change back to your default color from a random used one, you have to choose once the default color (Null) - it is the first one in the select list.

Hints:
Color Range
Depending on your browser/OS capabilities, it is possible that some of the colors won’t be rendered. Only 16 color names are supported by the W3C HTML 4.0 standard:

Settings defined on this chat:
Current Settings on this server:
a) COLOR_FILTERS = Enabled;
b) COLOR_ALLOW_GUESTS = Enabled.
Default colors: Administrator = red, Moderators = blue, Other users = black.
Your status = Registered

Power levels of color usage:
1. Administrator can use any color.
The default color for the administrator is red.
2. Moderators can use any color but red and crimson.
The default color for moderators is blue.
3. The other users can use any color but red, crimson, blue and mediumblue.
The default color is black.

Technical stuff: These colors have been defined by the administrator in admin panel.
If anything goes wrong or if there is something you don’t like about the default colors, you should contact the administrator first, not the other users in your room. :-)

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Invite someone to join your current chat room:

You can use the invite command to invite a user to join the room you are chatting in.

For example: /invite Jack

will send a private message to Jack suggesting him to join you in your current chat room. This message contains the name of the target room and this name appears as a link.

Note that you can put more than one username in the invite command (eg "/invite Jack,Helen,Alf"). They must be splitted by comma (,) without spaces.

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Changing rooms:

The list to the right of the screen provides a list of chat rooms and the users who are currently in that room. To leave the room you are in and move into one of those rooms, simply click once on the name of that room. Empty rooms do not appear on this list. You may move into an empty room by typing the command "/join #roomname" without quotes.

For example: /join #RedRoom

will move you into the RedRoom.

If you’re a registered user, you may also create a new room with this same command. But then you have to specify its type: 0 stands for private, 1 for public (default value).

For example: /join 0 #MyRoom

will create a new private room (assuming a public one has not already been created with that name) called MyRoom and move you into it.

Room’s name cannot contain comma or backslash (\).

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