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Post by creativechaos on Dec 14, 2016 15:29:18 GMT -5
More people should see this important thread. thank you, sidestep. i wonder, if this is put in the community section and retitled or put in as a specific subject about chat and ad free, if it would get more "hits" i would be glad to chip in for ad-free. if others knew, they might, too. With all the members we have, there is NO reason Celeste and Mimi should have to pay for this out of pocket! If we had a way to contribute to a fund, or do a drive twice a year, like the Christmas challenge or something, it could "disappear" after we met our goals, or after the month or months we did the drive. RE Java or Not: there is an option, if we stick to java platform, to change the settings to that java has to ask you every time. that is what mine is enabled to do. then i don't have to have java for anthing else but chat. works for me! and i have the world's oldest desktop and browsers. RE: gathering funds for chat: i'm trying to understand. Is java the issue, or is it that we have to pay for non-java chat? has a poll been done on this? (ie what people want). we could have a message at the top of the chat when you log on, saying what is needed to keep chat running, or the options, and a link of where to donate maybe... unless that is against proboards policy. there's always chatzy in the meantime. people still are using that. why are people not using chat anymore? is it the java? (mostly i'm on a night which is not as well attended. i prefer daytime when people are actually working more but schedule doesn't always allow that for me. i'm tagging Celeste and messymimi, hoping for their input! THANK YOU mods, for all you do. let's help ease your financial burdens. i will help in any way possible.
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Post by gifted on Dec 14, 2016 16:33:28 GMT -5
Thank you for all your work Celeste.
I am spending less time in chat for two reasons. One is that I am not maintaining a household, and challenge less. The second is that I use an Android phone, and tend to get logged out, and also can't hear a greeting when someone comes into chat.
Chat is still important to me and I am willing to support it with a monetary donation.
In chat's current form and my current technology, it is difficult for me to monitor chat for new arrivals to the room.
I will look into another way to log on to chat. If I can hear the greeting when new people come in, and if I can avoid getting bumped from the room, then I would be willing to commit to a certain amount of time as a Chat room monitor.
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Post by CourageouslyLion SeeksSerenity on Dec 15, 2016 5:18:52 GMT -5
RE Java or Not: there is an option, if we stick to java platform, to change the settings to that java has to ask you every time. that is what mine is enabled to do. then i don't have to have java for anthing else but chat. works for me! and i have the world's oldest desktop and browsers. In reply to creativechaos, Java isn't an option for everyone. The Chrome browser forbids java at ALL times. There is NO way to activate it. Chrome does this intentionally. Java works in Firefox and Internet Explorer, but not in the Chrome browser. I'm not sure what happens with Unix/Linux operating systems or with Apple operating systems. [edit to add that apparently it works for *some* Apple users?] Some computing devices and/or operating systems forbid java at ALL times. These systems/devices/browsers intentionally forbid java. The bottom line: Java-based chat works ONLY for people who have a certain type of computer/phone/device AND who have a certain type of browser. If you don't have that configuration, you can't use java at all ever. That's just how it is. A good percentage of our membership can't use the current java-based chat. I have no idea if it's a high percentage or a low percentage, but it is a good chunk. ----- Edit to add: I thought that the "Add-on Chat" company was going to develop a "non-Java" chat? Greg , what is the status with that?
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Post by CourageouslyLion SeeksSerenity on Dec 15, 2016 5:31:55 GMT -5
RE: gathering funds for chat: i'm trying to understand. Is java the issue, or is it that we have to pay for non-java chat? has a poll been done on this? (ie what people want). we could have a message at the top of the chat when you log on, saying what is needed to keep chat running, or the options, and a link of where to donate maybe... unless that is against proboards policy. The payment issue is completely separate and unrelated to the java issue. Chat is free to us, but we pay an optional extra amount to get extra features such as more smilies and colored fonts. When we don't pay, the extra features disappear -- but we still have the free plain chat. But either way, (plain or with extra features) the current chat system is java-based. We needed to raise money to pay to continue the version with extra features. Updating to say that Celeste has just now added a fundraising button for chat -- which you'll now see just inside the doorway to chat. That's the only place to pay for "fancy-java-chat" -- the button inside the chatroom doorway. (the adfree link on the forum is unrelated to chat. The adfree funding doesn't help with chat expense). ------------------------------------------------- about chat and ad free, i would be glad to chip in for ad-free. if others knew, they might, too. With all the members we have, there is NO reason Celeste and Mimi should have to pay for this out of pocket! If we had a way to contribute to a fund, or do a drive twice a year, like the Christmas challenge or something, it could "disappear" after we met our goals, or after the month or months we did the drive. replying to creativechaos , The ad-free issue has nothing to do with chat. That's yet *another* entirely separate matter. The ad-free issue is regarding banner ads on the FORUM(boards). The ads have disappeared so I guess some members have chipped in to the fund to remove the forum banner ads. ---------------------------------------- To sum up: There were three *UNRELATED* topics that somehow got combined in this thread, due to coincidental timing. The "ad-free" ("forum board ad-banners") issue is resolved (for the time being). Celeste says we have enough donations for this (for now): - We currently have enough regular contributions to remove banner ads from the forum boards. If those contributions start dwindling too low, then the SOS admin team will notify us.
The "costs of current java-chat" issue needs financing, and Celeste is organizing that:
- Paying for "fancy-java-chat", so that we don't have "plain-java-chat".
Celeste has just now placed a fund-raising button on the entrance to chat (click on chat, and you'll see it on the way into the chatroom)
The "transition to non-java chat" issue can't yet be resolved -- until some technical stuff is resolved. (The technical details are too complicated for me to understand): - We still have "java-based-chat", which some members cannot access.
There is a need to replace it with the "non-java-based-chat" ... which exists but has some technical difficulties in implementation. This seems to be something for the forum technical wizards to work out.
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Post by jean on Dec 15, 2016 9:06:59 GMT -5
There are people in chat so if you want to work COME JOIN US
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Post by lesaulerouge on Dec 15, 2016 9:52:18 GMT -5
I can access chat through an iPad with no problems, so not all Apple devices have trouble with it.
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Post by Celeste on Dec 15, 2016 13:43:23 GMT -5
Looks like we need a fund drive to support our chat room. I'll get that set up later today. Because of the spottiness of browser support, I think we'll need to change to the non-Java based chat. It is available now, Lion, but I still haven't gotten around to updating the features I can on the non-Java version (SOS emoticons, SOS personalizations of various sorts, etc). We'll need to extend the Java-based chat for now. The non-Java chat platform WILL look different and some features won't be available. We're going to have to live with the differences so that everyone who want it can get chat. I will reply to any ad-free funding questions or comments here.
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Post by angela on Dec 15, 2016 15:30:14 GMT -5
Celeste you are so awesome. I'll look for the fundraising thread... I think moving to non-Java chat would be a huge help to the members here who would benefit from the real-time motivation and support that chat can give. I look forward to seeing what it looks like. Thank you so much for your work here.
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Post by creativechaos on Dec 15, 2016 15:49:48 GMT -5
i wonder why some of us with macs have no problem accessing chat. i disabled my java but have the settings so that when i go onto chat, java asks me every time if ok to use it and i click yes and then i'm on chat! could be the newer macs can also use this setting? anyway, thank you Celeste for putting up a fundraising thread. i will donate. Steeling myself for the "new look" of java-less chat. i might die, though, without colored text options and laugh emojis cc
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Post by Greg on Dec 15, 2016 17:54:22 GMT -5
The non java chat has been ready for more than a year now. It is even on a test page of tis forum. The only problem at this point is Celeste's Executive account (Chat Owner) which will not allow her to use that chat name. I think she does have another Administrative account that can be used but I'm suew she would want to be able to use her Executive name. --------
Correction: Her forum name as Celeste will work fine as a chat administrator. There is another name that she has designated as Executive that has the problem. The importance of an Executive name is that there are some settings in the chat that can only be made by the chat Executive. ChatX will only allow one Executive per chat account.
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Post by creativechaos on Dec 15, 2016 22:18:21 GMT -5
thanks for that clarification, Greg. i'll check out the test page and try to familiarize with the changes. i dimly remember reading about that....
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Post by Celeste on Dec 15, 2016 22:35:56 GMT -5
The test page Greg mentions isn't open to the public, cc. It is NOT the same chat set-up offered in testing to a handful of our members a couple years ago. It isn't available. It wasn't satisfactory and AddonChat started over. Believe me when I say I'll let you know when it is ready!
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Post by redheaderin on Dec 16, 2016 1:32:35 GMT -5
To be honest, I can't figure out how to use chat. When I click on the CHAT tab, all I get is a page explaining chat. that's it. No chat window, nothing else.
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Post by angela on Dec 16, 2016 1:45:33 GMT -5
Can you take a screen shot redheaderin and post it to tech assistance? I'd be interested in seeing what you are seeing...
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Post by Greg on Dec 16, 2016 10:40:45 GMT -5
To be honest, I can't figure out how to use chat. When I click on the CHAT tab, all I get is a page explaining chat. that's it. No chat window, nothing else. That may very well be a result of your browser and/or your operating system. The current chat is our older java chat which we have ceased development on in favor of our newly released AddonChat X v10. The older java chat is being blocked by many systems and browsers. The fact is that they are blocking all java applications.
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