#io-chat

This update's focus is almost entirely on server moderator features, so from the surface it may not look like such a big deal, however a lot of massive changes were made to the server code resulting in much better server performance, memory management & several server moderator features.

We've brought back server kicks and bans for those naughty users who don't quite like sticking to our terms of service. We are pretty lenient, but it is still mandatory that you abide by those terms. The Server Control Panel has received several new upgrades to better equip your trusty server mods to make sure everything runs smoothly, and the community stays strong!

Furthermore you can now Report users that are bothering you. This will inform us that the user is a bad egg, and we can take actions to prevent them from harassing other users. It is still advised that you Block the user ( Right next to the Report button ), they will have no idea that you have blocked or reported them, they will believe you are still receiving their messages, but you will not see them.

In this update I took action upon the decision that I was bored with IO-Chat’s styling, so I decided to change some things around. The chat themes are now room-based, so instead of a global theme, each room can have their own themes. This feature is still in alpha, so room owners will not be able to create their own themes until the next update. However, you will notice that some rooms do have their own styling, like Roleplay or IOHQ. You can disable room themes by selecting either “dark” or “light” in the Theme selection in your settings. “Native” needs to be selected to see room themes.

And speaking of settings, we’ve completely gotten rid of the top navigation. What was previously known as “My Account” can now be found in the bottom right corner. This frees up more space for the rooms, and looks relatively nicer on mobile.

Though these seem like big changes, the biggest change is actually under the hood. Now, we are officially encrypting user passwords. This means that not even I, having physical access to the server, will be able to see your password anywhere!

Future minor patches of this update will include more elaborate settings, for now I’d like to focus on making sure everything introduced is stable :-)

DONE:

Parse links in MOTD.

Parse links in About.

Implement room-specific CSS.

Cleaned up file serving.

New mentioned sound!

Made messengers also play mentioned sound.

Encrypting passwords on registration.

Encrypting passwords on login to match them.

Fixed mention sound no-play bug for desktop.

Added “global whispers”.

Added “local whispers”.

Silenced bot commands from showing in room.

Added Server Moderator alerts.

Created new Dark theme!

Added ability to ignore room themes.

Removed topnav.

Moved “account” options to bottom of screen.

Made modal boxes fill screen on mobile view.

Made tab-bar scrollable on mobile view.

I am happy to release 2015’s first update, 1.1.5. In this update we’ve rearranged some things in the client. Reputation points are now moved to the userlist instead of being posted with each message, and voting can be done by clicking a name on the userlist without private messaging them. This new pre-messenger screen will give you the option to ignore the user, message the user or change their reputation. For room mods and admins, the pre-messenger screen offers you the ability to mute, unmute, kick or ban a user. The private messenger interface itself has changed quite a bit as well. We have completely ditched the empty userlist box that held the ignore button and reputation points to make more space on mobile devices for conversations.

The /admin command, which opens up the room’s control panel (RCP), is now available for room moderators. An admin can specify a moderator in the “roles” panel and that user will be able to access it the RCP. Moderators will be able to view every panel on the RCP but will not be able to write to it. changing settings or moderator roles will not work, but access to the userlist, banlist and statistics panel is still pretty useful. This will be expanded on greatly in 1.1.6.

The “Users” panel in the RCP has a very handy feature now called IP Catching, this will tell you if there are multiple users using the same IP in the room. Though the RCP will not give you their IP, you can be assured that if it tells you they are using the same IP, then that means they are either next to each other, in the same building, or perhaps even the same person. That’s up to you to investigate and act upon yourself, but if you ban one, neither of them will be able to come back. ( at least not under that IP ).

Perhaps the most waited for update on IO-Chat is Chat History. This allows you to see up to 50 posts ( including join/leaves ) that happened before you joined. No longer will you drop in unaware of the ongoing conversation at hand and feel lost and afraid. This will only be stored however if there is someone in the room. If everyone leaves the room, this history will be cleared completely as this would be considered a room close.

IOHQ is a small organization of specialists dedicated to creating flexible web applications like IO-Chat.com. We dream big and refuse to become content.

Well what’s next?