If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

[Scott B]

I recently added a chat feature using Live Chat (http://www.livechatinc.com/) to a client's site and it is FANTASTIC! I highly recommend it. So easy to set up, lots of customization options and a breeze to integrate with your application.

And no, not getting compensated in any way for this endorsement. Just really excited about the product!

[agillbb]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

Good to know about this paid service - I am sure they are excellent.
Did you by chance look at this free service? Looks easy enough to integrate. Some small firms look to save where ever they can.
https://mylivechat.com/

[CharlesParker]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

soooo, how did you integrate this application with yours?

[Scott B]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

Hi Charles, Once you customize your settings, Live Chat will generate the javascript code for you. You then just simply paste this into your html on the page (just before the closing </body> tag). If you have an application with multiple pages (as I did), you will need to paste it into every page on your site. Alternatively, I suppose you could also create one html page with it and simply do an a5winclude() on each page.

[Scott B]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

Hi Charles, Once you customize your settings, Live Chat will generate the javascript code for you. You then just simply paste this into your html on the page (just before the closing </body> tag). If you have an application with multiple pages (as I did), you will need to paste it into every page on your site. Alternatively, I suppose you could also create one html page with it and simply do an a5winclude() on each page.

Andy - thanks for the link to mylivechat. I have not looked at them, but very good to know about.

[CharlesParker]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

I have an html page that loads in the home tab of a tabbedui. Since that loads every time a user logs in I think it would be a great way to broadcast messages and interact with users. Do you think it would work as I am suggesting?

[Scott B]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

Why not just place the code directly in the tabbed_ui.a5w page?

[stanlyn]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

Hi Scott,

I'm going to need a chat integration. It goes something like this... On the mobile app, there is a panic help button that when clicked, starts an automated chat session that pushes user details including account and location info to our support desk. The mobile app stores the account info on the device. The support desk computers is always looking for these chat messages and needs to alert the c/s rep while automatically pulling up all related account info, location map and nearest service centers to them. The c/s computer must do all this automatically while the c/s rep is chatting with the client. Cutting out monthly costs is also very important...

Is Alpha and any of these chat tools up to this sort of task and if so, what is the difficulty level?

Your thoughts on implementation please,

Thanks,
Stanley Barnett

[Scott B]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

Hi Stanley - Yes, Alpha and Live Chat are definitely up to this sort of task. While its not the simplest scenario, Live Chat has a plethora of JS API tools. And, because these are in JS, they play nicely with Alpha on an a5w page. On a 1-10 scale, with 1 being very simple and 10 very difficult, you're probably looking at about a 5 or 6.

[CharlesParker]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

I think the very word plethora implies 5, lol.
Thanks for the tip!

[CharlesParker]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

I implemented the mylivechat very easily with an html page in a tabbedui, I noticed that I can add a script that will assign the chat username to what ever I want.
via
mylivechat_username ("whateveryouwant")

I wanted to set the value there to "=a5ws_getcurrentuser()" but since it is an html page and not an a5w
how would i handle that?
many thanks for your advice

[kkfin]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

For html page. Use ajax.

If you do not have it already you can load it in head section:
But it just before </head> tag.

<script src="javascript/alphaAjax.js"></script>
(this is just what you need to make ajax so there is just few lines of code in the file)

Then in just before </body> tag add

<script>makeRequest('ajax.a5w','passparameters=if you need');</script>

And in ajax.a5w put

<%a5
dim whateveryouwant as c
whateveryouwant = a5ws_getcurrentuser()

? "mylivechat_username ('" + whateveryouwant +"');"
%>

(this example presumes that your html page has access to mylivechat_username js function.)

[CharlesParker]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

This is the "Script" from Mylivechat that they give you to incorporate values.

<script type="text/javascript">
function MyLiveChat_OnInit() {
MyLiveChat_SetUserName("test user");
MyLiveChat_SetEmail("[email protected]");
MyLiveChat_SetDepartment("Default");
MyLiveChat_SetQuestion("test question");
MyLiveChat_SetContextData("This is VIP");
MyLiveChat_SetProductName("Sample Product");
MyLiveChat_SetProductKey("Sample_7065");
}
</script>


I put my UX componant on an a5w page, and one of the fields in the component is "userid"

I basically want to insert the value of that - however the value of that text field is actually always a5ws_getcurrentuser() and is a hidden field.


it sounds like your telling me to make 2 pages here, am I right? (I am thinking that since I am using an a5w page I dont need to)
so I made a page called ajax and place the var code as stated above but changed
mylivechat_username to MyLiveChat_SetUserName to match what they have.
that did not work though, so I still need some additional direction to get this to work.
any additional advice?

Seems like it should be fairly easy but I have not done this before so please bear with me.



Thanks!

[CharlesParker]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

OK, I figured it out from what you gave me! Thank you Ken!

[CharlesParker]

Re: If you're looking to add a chat feature to your site - Live Chat is the way to go!

Since the componant is already on an a5w page this code worked and inserts the value of a5ws_getcurrentuser into the setusername field for thsoe of you wanting to know what worked!


<script type="text/javascript">
function MyLiveChat_OnInit() {
MyLiveChat_SetUserName("");
<%a5
dim whateveryouwant as c
whateveryouwant = a5ws_getcurrentuser()
? "MyLiveChat_SetUserName ('" + whateveryouwant +"')";
%>
}
</script>