AVChat Software Product Blog

It’s been a while since the last time we talked about the IM, but we’ve not stopped working on it. We’ve previously made a silent launch (as in: there was no mention f it on our blog) of the new management area (Update 6) and today we’re announcing and launching a host of new changes (Update 7).

The new management area (completely replaced)

We’ve completely replaced the old and dusty IM management area with a new one.

Here’s what’s new in this one:

• Completely new easy to use design
• Dashboard for each website for quick access to the most important information including IM news from this blog
• Settings area with 9 options for fine tuning your IM installation
• Statistics area with a nice line chart that shows you the number of messages sent over the last 30 days (3 more charts are under development)
• Themes area from where you can choose the theme for your IM
• Install area with easy to access plugins for 3rd party CMS systems and embed codes to add the IM to your website

You can login your new IM management area from the AVChat IM website: http://avchat.im/m/clients/ .

Here are a few screenshots to get you excited:

Dashboard

IM Settings

Themes Selection

IM Usage Charts

Changes to the  conversation tab (better and faster)

The conversations tab has suffered a rather drastic overhaul.

• We’re now keeping the clickable area at the bottom so you don;t have to move the mouse when you want to close it after opening it
• We’ve reorganized the information in it on 2 lines instead of 3 for better scanning and reading:
  

  New conversations tab has the information organized on 2 lines

• The focus is now on the last message from the user instead of the user itself
• We’ve also added a cool loading graphic, that shows up while the conversations are loaded:

The new conversations tab now shows a small loading animation

Changes to the embeddable area (separation of functions)

Until now the [send message] button had 2 functions:

1. initiate IM window
2. show status of member (online, offline, idle)

These functions have now been separated and are shown separately:

New embeddable area separates the status information from the [send mesage

In the future we will also separate the embed codes for each element (chat button, status, reply rate and quick message) so that you can put the reply rate under profile pictures and th [send message] button in search results.

Themes support (2 themes, more to come)

Yes, we’ve added themes support today. You can choose between 2 themes at this moment:

• the default grey+green one
• a new blue theme that fits very well with the default Social Engine 4 theme:
  

  Blue theme for Social Engine 4 web sites

You can choose the theme from the new IM management area.

New themes will be added in the future, we might even throw in an Easter or Christmas theme or two!

Much improved IM caching mechanism (faster than ever)

The IM uses quite a bit of java script files, icons and graphics, this means your member’s browsers need to load all of them.

We’ve taken a deep look at how these files are loaded and cached by the browser and server and we’ve made changes to improve the loading times. And they have improved considerably, the conversations tab now shows up almost instantly

All files are now cached by the browser and instead of asking the server if there were any changes the browser just loads them from it’s memory.

This is not the be all and end all of fast IM’s, we still have a few good speed-improoving ideas we want to implement in future builds.

That’s it for now. We’ll continue to improove the IM as long as you keep the feedback comming so please email us at contact@avchathq.com with your thoughts or comment below.

Update: you can discuss the changes in the dedicated forum thread: http://avchathq.com/forum/index.php?/topic/1437-avchat-im-updates-5-and-6-bring-new-management-area-faster-im-and-themes/ .

2 weeks ago we did an update that solved a lot of the issues and bugs that had shown up on IE and other browsers.

Today we’re back in “new features” mode with an update that among others ads the ability to limit the  IM features for each member or member level in particular. This will allow you webmasters out there use the IM as an incentive for free members to upgrade to a paying plan (GOLD Membership for example).

We’re introducing 2 member level limits today with more on the way:

1. Ability to block the reading and sending of text messages

When a member has this limit applied he is not able to

• open the IM window to read his incoming messages
• open the IM window to send text messages to other users.

When such a member:

• clicks the REPLY BUTTON in the Conversations tab
• clicks the SEND IM BUTTON that shows up on member profiles

a Java Script function is called. You can edit that function to add your own UPGRADE message, action or image like we did in the image below:.

Website member being asked to upgrade when clicking the REPLY button.

2. Ability to block initiating video calls

When a member has this limit applied he is not able to initiate video calls. he is able however to receive video calls.

More information about how to enforce these limits is available in your account area on http://avchat.im .

Our AVChat IM integration kits have also been updated expose in the website admin area the ability to turn on/off these features for each user/member level in your website.

The Conversations Tab now contains all messages that have never been replied to

Until now if you sent a message to a user and that user had not replied yet, the one way conversation with that user was not shown in the conversations tab. We’ve just fixed that in this build.

The image above highlights a conversation that holds only one text message sent by me to the other person. These were not shown until now.

We’ve also improved our integration kits

The Joomla!, vldPersonals, Social Engine 3 and 4 and phpFox have all been updated with:

1. New general options:
   • Upgrade URL for when users click on an upgrade link in the IM
   • a way to configure what CHAT image to use for when a user is idle, online or offline (one could have changed these images before this update, right now we’re just exposing the functionality in the admin back end)
     

     General IM Settings for the Social Engine 3 integration kit

2. Ability to allow or not access to some IM features (mentioned at the top) to each user/member level in your website
   

The screenshots above show the new options in the Social Engine 3 integration kit for AVChat IM.

The same options are available for the Social Engine 4, Joomla! and vldPersonals integration kits.

2 weeks ago (Monday 21 November) we did a silent update (update 4) to AVChat IM, here’s what we added at the time:

• You are now notified in the IM window when the other person leaves or enters the room (you can only video chat with someone if he is in the room with you):
  
• New “Don’t tell your password…” message in the IM window:
  
• A camera icon shows up in the CHAT NOW button, in the Conversations Tab and in the IM window besides people who have a web cam:
  
• First branched build, your website members will now get the latest IM right away without the need for their browser cache to expire
• Many user interface bugs fixed, especially on Internet Explorer

If it’s one thing we heard again again from webmasters using AVChat IM is that they need video chat, and last week we finally delivered that feature the third AVChat IM update which went live last week.

All about the new video chat feature

We’ve tried to make the video chat as seamless and as simple as possible:

• There’s a new Video Call button which enables itself only when both persons are in the room.  Clicking it brings up the video windows interface and reduces the text chat area.
• We’ve positioned the video windows in perspective as to give the impression that the 2 persons having a call are opposite of each other.
• The video chat is peer to peer so that the latency is as low as possible.
• We made sure the video chat works as expected when someone refreshes the IM window

What’s next

As you can see a lot of thought has gone into this feature and we’re not stopping here, we already have a huge list of improvements for the video chat feature that we will implement in the next builds. Things like full screen video chat, being notified about when a user comes in the room, improved echo cancellation and more.

How to update your AVChat IM

Existing webmasters running AVChat IM on their websites don’t have to do anything. The video chat feature should already have shown in their IM windows.

Webmasters who are new to AVChat IM and want to install it on their websites need to follow these the steps:

1. Sign up for an account on http://avchat.im/m/c…ts/registratio
2. Verify your email address
3. Sign in http://avchat.im/m/clients/login with your email/password.
4. Add the website you want to use the IM on to your account on http://avchat.im
5. Download and install the provided Modules/Components or use the custom embed codes.

It’s been a week since our last IM update and today we’re bringing a new one. This week is all about increasing the number of messages sent trough the IM. Most of what we’ve done is some way or another relates to increasing that number.

So here’s what’s new:

1. Send quick message area

This area shows below the CHAT NOW buttons and allows a user to send another user a message without opening the IM window. We hope that by making it really easy for users to send each other messages the # of messages sent on a website will increase.

2. More pronounced Conversation tab

The Conversation tab has suffered a few canges:

• • We changed the colors a little bit to add more contrast
  • The number of new messages now show up on top of it with a red background breaking the square grey area
  • We’ve moved the REPLY button all the way to the right to be more visible
  • We’ve moved the status dot to the right of the username to be more consistent with the way it is shown in the text chat window
  • We added a green online spot
  • We’ve added a different color for when the mouse hovers over it
  • A new DELETE COVERSATION button

All these changes will bring more eyeballs to the Conversations tab and hopefully more messages will be sent trough it.

3. We added a way to delete entire conversations.

Conversations can now be deleted from the Conversations tab. Knowing that every discussion can be erased with a sponge will hopefully make it easier for some members to start those naughty conversations they always wanted to do.

4. Other changes include various icons and formatting changes for consistency and a 50%  smaller Reply Rate bar that will now fit into all sort of places.

How to update:

We’ve just pushed the update to our live/production servers and you should see it right away on your website automatically. You don’t have to update your integration code or reinstall or anything.

What’s next:

We’re preparing a  new build focused on adding audio and video chat capabilities.

This is it, please send us feedback!

For any questions or feedback please email us at contact@avchat.im or post in the forum .

It’s been a month since we’ve launched AVChat IM 2.0 as a closed beta and over 2 weeks since we’ve opened it to anyone

Today we’re proud to release the first update to AVChat IM which brings a few rather critical improvements.

Here’s what’s new:

• Improved functionality across firewalls and proxy servers. We had a few cases in the last few weeks where users could not receive and/or send text messages. These issues have now been solved.
• Different look for the conversations tab when you have no conversations (we’ve also added a shadow around it)
  
• The conversations tab now shows up even if you are not logged in
  
• Works properly on Safari on Mac.
• Improved speed with which the CHAT button shows up on people’s profiles
• Turkish language now available
• The conversations tab remains open  between pages and visits, we’re using a cookie to save its state.
• Improved text chat area with new HIDE TEXT CHAT HISTORY button,  LAST MESSAGE RECEIVED display and no more avatar images taking up all the space.
• You will be notified in the text chat when someone goes online, offline or idle.

How to update:

We’ve just pushed the update to our live/production servers and you should see it right away on your website automatically. You don’t have to update your integration code or reinstall or anything.

What’s next:

We’re preparing 2 new builds:

• one will be focused on increasing the discussions/messages between users,
• the other one will be focused on adding audio and video chat capabilities.

This is it, we’d love to get your feedback,

For any questions or feedback please email us at contact@avchat.im or post in the forum .

Anyone with a website can now sign up to use the IM on their website. After a few weeks of testing and running it on a few hundreds websites (closed beta) we’ve decided the new IM is mature enough for everyone to use.

Steps to use the IM on your website:

1. Sign up for an account on http://avchat.im/m/clients/registration
2. Verify your email address
3. Sign in http://avchat.im/m/clients/login with your email/password.
4. Add the website you want to use the IM on
5. Download and install the provided Modules/Components or use the custom embed codes.

As of today we provide free pre-made integration kits for:

• SocialEngine 3 and 4
• Joomla! 1.5/1.6/1.7+ JomSocial or Community Builder
• vldPersonals 2.5.6/2.5.7/2.6
• phpFox 2

There is also a custom embed code that can be used on any other website.

If you have any issues or questions post in the forum or email contact@avchat.im .

We’ve been hard at work on the new version of our Instant Messenger and oh boy do we have some updates for you.

But first of all let me thank you all for the valuable feedback we’ve got from you guys during the last months. We’ve learned a lot and as you’ll see we’ve put that feedback to good use.

Today we’re launching the 2.0 version of our IM. It’s a complete overhaul. It’s also the base for a lot of features that will be added in the future.

Here’s what’s new:

• Removed invitations system
• Send messages to offline and idle users
• New conversations tab
• Multi language
• New clean look
• Works over firewalls
• Temporarily removed audio/video chat (will be back soon)
• Reply Rate and X Unread Messages

No more invitations
The probability that 2 people that are interested in each other will be online at the same time on the same site is very small. So we’ve dropped the invitations system, added offline messages and a conversations tab.

Send messages to offline and idle users
You can now send a message to anyone weather they are online or not. This enables you to chat with all the people on the website, not with just the ones online.

New conversations tab
The conversations tab holds a list with all the people you’ve ever talked to. Want to go back to a conversation from 3 days ago? Just open the conversations tab and click on the user you want to talk to.

Multi language
The entire AVChat IM User interface now supports 3 languages: English, Spanish and Romanian. The correct language is used depending on the users settings in the browser. More languages will be added in the future.

New clean look
We’ve removed everything from the interface that we did not need. No more bubble text chat, no more useless UI elements, just the basic stuff. This makes our IM super fast.

View more screenshots at http://avchat.im/screenshots

Works over firewalls
The old IM was using a p2p network to send both text chat messages and video+audio data. That meant that a small portion of users (behind strange firewalls and networks) could not talk to anyone.

We’ve changed that. We’ve moved the text chat to HTML/JS so that anyone can at least text. We’ll keep the video chat in Flash/p2p (there’s no other way to do it) but enable it only when a connection between the 2 parties is possible.

Temporarily removed the video chat
Something had to go, we’ve dropped video chat for now but we’re adding it back in the next few weeks.

Reply Rate and X Unread Messages
These are only 2 of the features that we’ve added to enhance the IM experience on a website. We will ad more soon .

The Reply Rate represents how much that user is responding to incoming messages. We calculate and display the Reply Rate for each user.

“Alex has more than 50 unread messages”
Whenever a user has more than 50 unread messages a small warning will show up in the IM window so if you want to send this user new messages your expectations about how likely this person is to respond will be more accurate.

Screenshots:

We have screenshots of the new IM system up on our website at: http://avchat.im/screenshots

Demo website running AVChat IM:

We’ve setup a quick website (using SocialEngine 4) at http://avchat.im/community .

You need to create a free account and login before you can use the IM.

Here’s my profile page (Octavian Naicu) on the website. You can see my status (available/idle/offline) and ReplyRate on the left .

How to get the new version:

Login to your IM client area and use the new embed code and integration kits. You will see a new tab labeled Embed Code (2.0, new).

What happens with the old version:

The old IM (v1.0) will still function until 19th of September when it will be shut down.

What’s next:

• Friends/Favorites tab
• p2p audio video chat
• 1 click send message directly from the profile pages
• Location based stuff
• Detailed Reporting
• iPhone/Android compatibility
• Design Options
• Gifts

Final words

I am very exited about this release, It’s the first out of a series of releases that will make AVChat IM the best IM out there.

We now have 2 guys working full time on it, from now on things will move much more quickly.

Please use it, test it and send your feedback to contact@avchat.im. As always we’re very open to feedback from you guys.

To keep in touch follow our blog and our twitter account (@avchathq).

We’ve worked a lot during the last month and today we’ve pushed live a new build of the IM.

There are few visible updates tough, most of them are under the skin:

• more secure IM sessions, variables are not sent via GET anymore to the IM they are saved in the database and identified by a unique hash
• major optimizations on the server holding presence information, we can now hold tens thousands of users on the same sever
• optimized IM client for faster load (half size)
• we’ve prepared the IM for future features: user interface updates, offline messages, multi-language
• new pre-made integration kits are available in the account area: CommunityBuilder, Social Engine 4, vldPersonals

The new build is now live on our servers, if you already have the embed code on your web site there’s nothing you need to do, you will get the update automatically!

You can discuss the new build in the forum: http://avchathq.com/forum/index.php?/topic/386-new-avchat-im-build-is-live/.

PS: here’s what we’re working on !