IM Mod

[Grudge]

Hey,

I'm thinking of completly reworking the IM system over the next few days and have been trying to come up with the way to do it. This is my current idea of how IM's could work:

First of all - your inbox will stop showing all the messages visually. Instead it will list your current incomming messages. When you click on a message it will then show you the message - but this is ot all!

I want to rework the concept of IM's to become more like conversations then messages. By this I mean if I sent someone an IM and they reply, instead of me just getting an IM it will add their reply onto the end of our "conversation" - much like replies in a thread.

What this will mean is when you click on a message in your inbox you will be taken to that message AND all the preceeding ones for that "conversation". This will make it 100x easier to keep track of messages and what they relate too.

For example, way it will work. I send X an IM - it gets moved to my outbox. I then receive an IM in reply to my first message - the message from my outbox gets moved to my inbox with the new reply on it - I can see his message AND the one I sent. I then send him a reply and the conversation moves to outbox (as I was last to reply) - this continues for as long as we post to and fro.

Other changes I want to make include -
Marking messages as read! Once a user has read your IM it will display as being read so you know whether they are ignoring you or not

Possibly taking out the outbox all together and showing inbox and outbox on same page - like on UBB (most of my ideas came from this)

Putting message icons onto IM's <-- easy yet important IMHO

Being able to move conversations to an archive. Each user can have an archive and move a "dead" conversation there to stop it showing how many messages they have on the index screen. This isn't a new idea but it seems valid

I was wondering what people thought of this idea of "conversations"? Personally I think it will make messages MUCH easier to follow. I have other ideas for small changes to the system but for the mean time I shall concentrate on these rather large changes.

[Cadish]

Yeah, that would be a great mod!!

[Anguz]

I like your idea of handling IMs as threads... pretty much

they're hard to follow as they are, cause many don't quote the previous msg, so you have to go to the outbox and check what you said

then IMs are saved in a thread manner and the IM center will be like the MessageIndex for a board... you'll be merging both, more or less

hmm... it'll be pretty much like a private board for each member, where threads are shared individually between the members mentioned in the FROM and TO  lines, I like it

about the storage, it's good, it could use an EXPORT feature, to save a thread in as an html file, or maybe pdf, in your hard-drive and delete the copy at the server, that'll save webhost space

[Surfy]

Grudge this would be a great Mod!

When it is possible, it would be great, if the Admin could set how much Messages could be inside inbox & outbox.

An Backup-folder would also be great!


Surfy

[Gobalopper]

I believe there already are mods that do this.

[Anguz]

as far as I remember there's Advanced IM, but it resembles an email inbox more than a private board, that's why I didn't mention it...

[Cadish]

Are you going to write it, Grudge?

[BG_Ironclad]

How about forcing the user to enter a Subject heading (that's if you actually do this mod, please, ).  I'm getting somewhat annoyed of looking in my inbox and finding (No Subject) most of  the time.

[Grudge]

Hey,

Believe it or not I have actually written most of this mod... I'm finding it hard to get the motivation to finish it though. I really want to wait for SMF but I *may* have a go at finishing it on Wednesday otherwise - the only thing left to do really is sort out any IM's the user received automatically (notifications etc)

As far as the subject goes I will ensure it's impossible to enter No subject if I remember, yes

[Anguz]

about SMF, I think that I shouldn't be too hard to upgrade your mods to that, so you shouldn't be less motivated...

I'm looking forward to this mod too, you're pretty good at this

[Cadish]

I'm not going to upgrade to SMF because my forum now is pretty good... The only thing to implement it your mod...

So... I expect is wednesday!!!

Thx Grudge!! You're the best!

[Grudge]

I'm in a bit of a worry with this at the moment. The mod itself is pretty much working as I hope but the problem is that this is not a little mod - it is a HUGE change to the IM system - one which is NOT REVERSIBLE.

I'm going to be very busy the next few weeks and there is a real danger if I let people have this that there will be big bugs I don't have time to fix. Make no mistake - this is not a little rewrite - the whole IM db table system changes and hence you could not simply uninstall it.

I have fixed it pretty much everything oither than some visual problems but I am going to have to go back on my word and not release it. The reason is SMF will be coming up relatively soon and the changes this make will make upgrading a HUGE hastle as IM's would not get upgraded.

In retrospect I think it is important that I wait until I see what the IM system in SMF will be like before releasing this - I don't want to be responsible for destroying peoples community messages.

I'm sorry for getting your hopes up but this *real* be released eventually but not until I am sure that the changes it makes are reversible. That said - if you want to see what the system is like you can check out my test board and register and post a few dummy messages etc:
http://www.p0stwh0reforums.com/test/

Note: If you do look at this site the buttons arn't quite sorted as the outbox button takes you to the archive page (there is no outbox anymore - I didn't do any graphics)

If anyone here is a mod developer and want to take what I have off my hands I am happy to do that but I am not going to run the risk of releasing any code in its current state.

Sorry,
Grudge

[Anguz]

we understand

I'd still like to say what I think about this, cause maybe it helps

from what you say, you're modifying the IM code heavily, including the db for it

I think you could probably do what you want, leaving the current code untouched... of course I may be wrong, but let me explain

you could create a new table for your IM system, leaving the other one untouched... the code for this system could be in it's own php file and linked to from the rest of the board (menu button and IM links for members)

the existing IM code could remain where it is, just not used anymore, same with the db

that would make it really safe to use your system, since it'd be possible to revert back to the original anytime

since the new system is pretty much like a board for each user, where the threads that are listed are the ones that have that user's name in it, you could just borrow the code for the board and the db table(s) could be the same as the one(s) for a board

I think that you are doing a great job and if you decide not to do it, I understand, but it'd be great if you did

thank you for all the effort you've put in releasing such great mods in the last few weeks

[Grudge]

Well - you are not too far wrong in that the current db is untouched - to an extent. However, to ensure the fastest speed these are mnarked as deleted and eventually are deleted. What I *could* do is mod all the areas on the board where messages are inserted.

If truth be told I could probably create a work around but I really don't have the time at the moment. The biggest worry isn't so much the current messages but that if someone has been using the mod for a month and then wish to remove it all the IM's sent since it was installed would be lost.

What I *may* do is change the db structure and add columns onto the existing system - but it would slow it down a little as it would need to do up to twice as many queries per page load.

To be honest - I have been offered the opportunity to become a developer for SMF and because of this just will not have the time to spend the time on the MOD that it needs. Hopefully I'll be able to get this MOD up and running in however long it takes for SMF to come out but until then I am officially putting it on ice...

[Anguz]

congratulations for being invited to become part of the developer team!!

I thought it'd happen at some point, since you're working so hard

I understand what you say, so don't worry

even though I'm still only learning, I am learning, so I'll know enough to be a good coder at some point, and I hope I can contribute to the project too

have fun! we'll be waiting for the SMF release and more of your mods after that