ChatPro Help

ChatPro is a cgi script written in Perl by Mike Wheeler to allow real-time "chatting" with people anywhere else in the world so long as they are in the same chat-room as you. Careful design was implemented to insure ChatPro would be compatible with every forms capable browser. It is best if your browser also supports tables, but this isn't a necessity.

The Initial Page

When you first go to the chat page you will encounter a page where you must enter your name and a password. Part of the page will look something like the image above. The password insures that two different people can't enter with the same name, this would cause confusion and problems with the "one on one" messages. If you accidentally leave the chat (if you get disconnected or your computer crashes) use the same password or else you won't be able to use the same name for a specified amount of time. If you enter your e-mail address other people will be able to send you e-mail.

There may be a link to a schedule of meeting times on this page. And there should be a link to this help-file, or another help-file set up by the person who put the script up on the site.

Once you enter your name and password press the button that says "Enter Chat" (or something similar) and you will be taken to the room designated as the entry room by the person who set the script up on this site.

The Control Panel

This is where you control what you want the script to do.

There may be a link to this help-file here. The next link is called "Change Rooms:", this takes you to the part of the page that allows you to change rooms, I'll get into that in a minute. There is also a link called "Messages:" this links you to the part of the page where all the messages are. With most browsers you will be able to see the top of the messages from this point anyway, but people using Lynx won't be able to see them without selecting this link or scrolling down a couple screens.

Next is a big text entry field. This is where you type your message. The text will automatically wrap from one line to the next. If you want a line break when your message is displayed to everyone else press return, otherwise just let the text wrap by itself. HTML tags are not allowed because it would be too easy to mess the page up if they were. If someone started a table but posted before completing it the whole page would be messed up. If someone had an img tag to a large image everyone would have to wait for the image to load.

Next are a series of five buttons:

1 on 1

Post: press this button to send the message in the text area above. Your message will be added to the conversation and the page will reload showing you the latest conversation. If you press this button with an empty text area above the page will reload to show you the latest conversation, but it won't post anything.

Reload: press this button to see the conversation since the last time the page was loaded. New conversation will not be displayed automatically, so you need to press this to follow what is going on. If you press this button with text in the message field the page will reload and the text will remain in the unsent message area and will not be posted.

Clear: Press this button if you want to erase all the text in the message area without posting it. The page will not reload when you clear the text.

Leave: Press this button when you are done chatting and want to get back to the outside world. When you press leave a message will be displayed to everyone saying that you left, your name will be removed from the visitors list, and you will be taken to a page determined by the person who set the script up on this site.

Below these five buttons are a series of radio buttons where you decide how many messages you want displayed. The default is 20 messages, but you can change this to 10, 30, or 40. The number of messages you request will show up next time you reload the page and the script will remember how many messages you want displayed. Sometimes the script may not be able to display as many messages as you request. This may be the case if the script hasn't been used a lot recently because the script automatically deletes messages that have been around for a certain amount of time (determied by the person who set the script up).

The Visitors List

Next to the control panel box (or below it if your browser doesn't support tables) is a list of people who are in the same room. The top line in this box is the name of the room you are currently in. The next line just clarifies what is below. You will see a person's name in bold with a time displayed next to it. The time displayed is when that person last reloaded, by this you can have an idea of whether or nat that person has seen your message yet. Some names may appear as links, these are the people who included their e-mail address when they entered the chat. If you click on their name you can send that person e-mail.

A person's name is added to the visitors list when they enter the room, and a message is displayed in the message area saying that person entered. Their name is removed when they click "Leave" on the control panel and a message is displayed saying they left. If a person does not reload for a given amount of time (determined by the person who set the script up) their name will be removed from the visitors list (but no message will be displayed saying they left).

The Messages

Below the control panel and the visitors list are all the messages. If your browser supports table they will look like the image above. On the left is a small column which displays your five most recent "one on one" messages. On the right the public messages for the room you are currently in are displayed. The name of the person sending the message will be in bold followed by the time (local time for the server) they sent the message, and on the next line is their message.

Change Rooms

At the bottom of the chat page is an area where you can change to a different room. The name of your current room will be displayed. Then there will be a menu of the public rooms associated with this copy of the script. You can select any room and then click the button that says "Go There" (or something similar). And the script will display a message to the current room saying you left that room and your name will be removed from the current rooms visitors list and you will be taken to the new room.

The person setting up the script has the choice of whether or not to allow private rooms, so this paragraph may not apply to you. Below the public rooms changing area is a similar area for private rooms. Here instead of a menu listing the names is a text entry field. You must enter the name of the private room you want to enter and then click the button that says "Go There" (or something similar).

If there is any text in the private rooms field the script assumes you want to go to a private room, if the private room field is empty it assumes you want to go to the selected public room.

If the room you requested does not already exist it will be created automatically. When other people request a private room with that name they will be taken to the same room. So if you tell someone to meet you in a private room called "Wheeler" you will both end up in the same room when you enter "Wheeler" in the private room text area. The names of the private rooms will not be displayed anywhere, so people must know the name of a room to be able to enter it. (Room names ARE case sensitive, so you must capitalize identically)

One on One Messages

If you click on the "1 on 1" button on the control panel you are taken to a screen that looks something like this. This is for sending message to one specific person who is in any room. Every person currently in any room will have a button with their name in it. Type your message for that person in the text field and then click the button with their name to send it to them. You will be returned to the main chat screen for the room you are in. If you don't want to send a message click the "Return_to_Chat" button below all the names. Below all the buttons are all of the "one on one" messages that have been sent to you since you joined the chat this time.

The Credits

ChatPro and help page was written by Mike Wheeler (mwheeler@gladstone.uoregon.edu)

The script is available free of charge from http://gladstone.uoregon.edu/~mwheeler/cgi

Questions or a problem with Chat? Please email our webmaster.