Real time chat

ron_jeremy

Firstly, I think Webinsane nailed it -- chat should only be for closed groups where anyone can create their own chat 'room' and invite whowever they want to join (maybe set a limit on the # of participants), but the chat window/content is not visible to anyone else. Everything else belongs on the forum else you risk chat taking over as the main way members communicate.

Secondly, you better have a solid community before you think of adding chat.

Funny story here; you might not think it's related to chat, but it really is because we are essentially talking about giving users a quick and convenient means of communication.

Anyway, on with the story...

...One of the off-road dirt bike forums I belong to uses vB5, and most members simply hate it. So, I began testing alternative forum software: Flarum, NodeBB, and Discourse.

To keep our 'new forum software' discussions private, I setup a small Slack channel and invited a handful of members. Please keep in mind that none of the participants have any background or even any interest in IT -- they just want their new form software to be easy to use on their phones (i.e., ability to easily and quickly post discussion and insert photos of their rides from their phones). None of them had used Slack before this.

After using Slack for only 2 days, NO ONE wanted to use a 'traditional' forum anymore, including Flarum, NodeBB, or Discourse. They all wanted something as easy to use as Slack! When I asked why, the answer was unanimous -- no web browser. Everyone loved the fact that they did not have to fire up a web browser and navigate to the site and login, etc., to start communicating.

If they came upon a downed tree across a trail they could make it known to the rest of the community (channel) within seconds using Slack.
If one of their riding buddies just had a spectacular crash they could snap a pic on their camera phone and it would be up on our Slack channel in seconds.

They also loved the fact that Slack had a very convenient and easy to use desktop app.

Of course, Slack can not (currently) replace a forum because it lacks the ability to have a structured 'forum-like' discussion. Secondly, Slack is not free (in any real world use-able state).

I have to be honest here; if Slack was free and included a 'Posts' feature I would not be here at all. I emailed the team at Slack about adding these features and also offering a self-hosted version and was told they were already evaluating some of those options.

So what's the moral of the story?

Be careful what you ask for! If your forum is not 'solid' (content-wise), adding chat might just derail your forum altogether.

Sorry for the long post!

Davis

ron_jeremy definitivly a worthwhile story.

Also worth noting is if you have an iPhone you can add a shortcut on the home screen, so it pretty much functions like an app. Flarum is very mobile friendly too!

JRay

ron_jeremy After using Slack for only 2 days, NO ONE wanted to use a 'traditional' forum anymore, including Flarum, NodeBB, or Discourse. They all wanted something as easy to use as Slack! When I asked why, the answer was unanimous -- no web browser. Everyone loved the fact that they did not have to fire up a web browser and navigate to the site and login, etc., to start communicating.

So the real question is... did the real-time chat style suit their needs better or was it the ease of use that appealed to them over aged technology (vB5)?

We are in an age where user-experience trumps all. Apple, Slack, etc. has raised the bar very high on usability and people are inherently lazy when it comes to learning technology (devs too). But after the excitement over the ease of use wears off, I wonder if they would have the same type of longer-term engagement on Slack vs. forums.

Franz

ron_jeremy Haha, just try making a post like that on Slack, though. ?

I just now read through this thread (so sad that I didn't have time to do so until now) and must say, very interesting discussion. The idea of different thread types is very intriguiging, to say the least. Another possible type that comes to mind: a list of comments for a blog post. (We've had this idea for a while: allow for a thread to be embedded on another site, using a widget-like thing in an iframe; very similar to Disqus, but driven by a site's Flarum instance, with their user accounts and so on...)

mojeda

Davis This is possible in Android as well, if you have Google Chrome installed. It's likely available in other web browsers, however I only use google chrome on my phone so only know for sure it has it.

It's also likely very easy to setup an app like launcher for any webpage on desktop using chrome's app shortcut feature.

I know I only use Google chrome as an example, but it's not the only solution.

antonjw

jakweb If forums just stay 'forums' though, what then is the point of Flarum? To be a javascripty version of phpBB? i.e., here today, gone (or much less popular) tomorrow?

I would love for the creators of forum software to stop thinking about forum software quite so much, but instead to think about the goal. Which surely is to facilitate discussion. Which then begs the question, what types of discussion are there? (i.e. what are the discussion Use Cases).

Well, there are threads (topics). But that's just one. There are blog posts and comments. There are micro-blogs. There are individual messages. There are group messages. There are live chats. etc. We're not in a world now where we only communicate online via forums or e-mail.

As a website owner, you might want to host live interactive events. You might want to cover an event happening elsewhere, with others chatting in real time. e.g. a football match... you might want your site staff and your users posting media and commenting on the game as it happens (we run phpBB with a chat room add-on for this purpose).

So as an interested observer of the progress of Flarum, I'm really hoping it will become a really good 'discussion engine', and not just a traditional forum software updated with modern tech gizmos.

luceos

antonjw personally I'd love to hear your opinions more often. Please voice them!

antonjw

luceos Hi luceos. That is a much, much more welcoming reply than some I have received on phpBB.com!

Flarum is a very promising looking software. I check back every now and then to see how it is progressing. It seems to have a nice community which is really engaged in making this a great system. It's very refreshing to see some open-mindedness and new developments in the forum software world.

antonjw

Kulga I like it.

And because it is real-time, I'd like to see displayed next to the word 'chat' some information as to how popular the chat is currently; either number of users currently in there, and / or the number of unread posts.

For a 'live event' type of chat, the number of current users or users in the last say, 10 minutes, might be of value.

For just a regular 'shoutbox' type chat, just the number of unread items might suffice.

Also what would be cool is the ability to have a chat automatically commence (and appear in the nav) at a specified time, and end at a specified time. And optionally convert it into a forum thread for archiving when it is done (it might have been an epic chat session or just have contained something useful; or it might have been entirely transient, in which case it would just be trashed).

antonjw

luceos This is a nice idea. That would be a lovely hybrid of real time chat and 'forum thread'. I would go for that immediately on our forum as a replacement for our real-time chat plugin.

And it would please some of our users who still bemoan the addition of the chat room (we have 'match threads' for football matches, and also the real-time chat for the same purpose - your idea would perfectly unify them and is really what I've been thinking of for about 3 years, just not as crystal clearly as you have put it).

I do think the future for forums is 'types of threads' (or 'types of discussions'), in a similar way that Wordpress has 'types of posts'. So here, you have a Chat Thread. That dictates the layout and functionality of the thread, as you describe.

You would have Blog Threads; where the opening post is formatted a bit more formally, as a blog article, and the rest are comments.

You could have micro-blog threads, which are more frivolous and could be punched in by having a 'status' box at the top of each forum. No title, just punch in your thoughts. The user gets the option of displaying them in amongst the real threads, or not. To tie that in to how forums traditionally work, if one of these generates lots of replies, a member of site staff or trusted user can give it a title and 'promote' it to 'forum thread' status.

For forum threads, if a thread's opening post is wordy and well-liked, it could be optionally or automatically be granted 'blog thread' status, and if Flarum was integrated with a website, pingg, you have a new blog post (for those more casual visitors) with lots of comments, created completely organically from natural community activity. Not a bad feature for community-driven content sites?

I seriously think you have hit the nail firmly on the head, luceos.

wizgriz

Do one thing and do it well.

Flarum is forum software and forums engage a very specific type of communication. This is a good thing. I think the reason people might expect Flarum to be anything more, or radically changing some kind of paradigm, is because it simply doesn't look like a traditional forum, forming some sort of dissonance.

The reality is that forums are a niche. They serve an important, but limited, purpose. Not every website needs a forum and Flarum shouldn't strive to change that. It should focus on being the best forum out there to fill this niche.

If you need chat, use something dedicated to chat. If you need a blog/comments, use something dedicated to that. If you need a forum, use something dedicated to that.

Flarum's focus on extensibility can also be deceiving. I suppose you could technically do anything with extensions, and turn Flarum into some sort of web platform capable of being any or all of these things. But that sounds stupid to me. I like how much focus there's put on what the core is because it explains this so well: Extensions extend the core. They don't change it. So, what is the core? (A forum.)

JRay

wizgriz I suppose you could technically do anything with extensions, and turn Flarum into some sort of web platform capable of being any or all of these things. But that sounds stupid to me.

But that's exactly what happened with WordPress. They created a solid core based on one focus but allowed people to extend it however they needed.

antonjw

Wordpress & other CMS' have 'Post Types', because they deal with various Content Types.

Forums are about discussions. Discussions take different forms. So why not have a system which has 'Discussion Types', and handles them all well enough to unify them? In fact, you already have that, because most forums have Threads and Private Messages.

So just extending that to cover some other types ought to be well in scope for a system which is about discussion and community, for me, and didn't ought to be beyond mankind, or even forum developers ?

wizgriz

JRay How are Wordpress and Flarum related?

antonjw Forums are one form of discussion. The incorporation of PMs are there for convenience (their counterpart being email - not very convenient), and I agree with this. PMs could definitely benefit from having real-time functionality. But people should never come to Flarum specifically for this feature - PMs are usually closely related to ongoing forum discussions.

antonjw

wizgriz Technically; 'Threaded Topics' are just one form of discussion. But I am glad we agree that internet forums are all about discussion ?

JRay

wizgriz JRay How are Wordpress and Flarum related?

They are both publishing platforms. Wordpress is for sites who want publish authored content (1-way). Flarum (et al) are for sites that want publish user generated content (2-way).

antonjw

Franz Take a look at https://discuss.flarum.org/d/2068-types-of-threads-flarum-as-a-discussion-engine

I've expanded further there on the idea of thread types, and how they might work. Would be interesting to see your thoughts.

ANONIMNIQ

luceos I've been spying this feature request for some time and wondered the following.

What if the current threads would update automatically and showed who was typing/viewing. Wouldn't that make the forum more like a chat?
If the above, what form of actual chat (as proposed above) would make sense?

I like this idea. Something like this will be awesome:

ANONIMNIQ

Bonus idea for integration with Byobu extension:

luceos

ANONIMNIQ both of these are actually very interesting possibilities and within easy reach for byobu. Thanks for both!

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