uddeIM 0.5

Has there been any thought to a better way to view the users on the compose part of the component. Its fine now but once a site gets around 100,000 or more members then the pulldown becomes a little troublesome for the database and the users. I wonder if there is a way to implement AJAX the same way that Google Beta has it, where once you start typing in the name a list of names come up, but only the names that start with the letters that you typed in.

Post edited by: balous, at: 2006/01/04 05:08

Hi balous,

thanks for the feedback.

balous wrote:

Has there been any thought to a better way to view the users on the compose part of the component. Its fine now but once a site gets around 100,000 or more members then the pulldown becomes a little troublesome for the database and the users.

for uddeIM I have put a lot of thought in exactly this problem, that's why I came up with the solution now implemented. To save database access and to keep HTML code small and thus speed up the whole procedure, no list is loaded unless the user explicitly requests it. It is only loaded when someone clicks on "Show users".

Only around 10% of messages are composed using the empty compose page anyway, and in most of these cases users know the name of the person they want to send the message to. In the very few other cases, they can click "show users". In addition, all CB connections are displayed as direct links.

The vast majority of messages are written by replying or by using a "send a message to user" link on profile or who's online lists. I suspect that the new RC2 quick message functionality will become one of the most used ways to write a PM.

I wonder if there is a way to implement AJAX the same way that Google Beta has it, where once you start typing in the name a list of names come up, but only the names that start with the letters that you typed in.

Of course there is. But it would not solve the problem.

Because if you do not know the (user)name of the recipient, you can't "start typing", so you will have to add an option to display a full list anyway. And that's exactly how uddeIM is designed right now.

Using ajax would slown down the whole process a lot as it would load a list for "b", for "ba", for "bal" until the user has typed enough letters to access your username "balous".

But I agree with you: With 100'000 members, no list is really handy. Users would have to use a search function and try to find the recipient according to various criteria (not only the name, but also location or age or sex or interests). This is done by comprofiler's user lists, and if you have Quick Message enabled, you can send the message directly from the profile.

Ajax is very good for many uses, especially new message notifications - but I don't believe that it would help a lot here.

I have a problem with "Show limit usage at inbox". The setting is shown as neither yes or no. And when I save it nothing happens.

Christian Almgren

thanks for the quick response. i never really thought of that. i was just messing around with the messenger and pulled up the drop down list and thought about that. in my opinion, uddeIM is alot better than myPMS because of the functionality and options that are available. i just installed the newest one. i had been using the 0.4 for the longest and i loved it. 0.5 is that much better. will you be adding any more mailbox templates later or is there a way (or tutorial), that will allow users to customize their own mailbox templates to go with the color schemes of their sites? I was just going through the new messenger and checking things out. I had a few questions but I didnt want to ask all of them because I know that there are alot of questions about the messenger that need to be answered from other users. Thanks for the component, it was greatly needed.

benjamin wrote:

Hi balous,

thanks for the feedback.

balous wrote:

Has there been any thought to a better way to view the users on the compose part of the component. Its fine now but once a site gets around 100,000 or more members then the pulldown becomes a little troublesome for the database and the users.

for uddeIM I have put a lot of thought in exactly this problem, that's why I came up with the solution now implemented. To save database access and to keep HTML code small and thus speed up the whole procedure, no list is loaded unless the user explicitly requests it. It is only loaded when someone clicks on "Show users".

Only around 10% of messages are composed using the empty compose page anyway, and in most of these cases users know the name of the person they want to send the message to. In the very few other cases, they can click "show users". In addition, all CB connections are displayed as direct links.

The vast majority of messages are written by replying or by using a "send a message to user" link on profile or who's online lists. I suspect that the new RC2 quick message functionality will become one of the most used ways to write a PM.

I wonder if there is a way to implement AJAX the same way that Google Beta has it, where once you start typing in the name a list of names come up, but only the names that start with the letters that you typed in.

Of course there is. But it would not solve the problem.

Because if you do not know the (user)name of the recipient, you can't "start typing", so you will have to add an option to display a full list anyway. And that's exactly how uddeIM is designed right now.

Using ajax would slown down the whole process a lot as it would load a list for "b", for "ba", for "bal" until the user has typed enough letters to access your username "balous".

But I agree with you: With 100'000 members, no list is really handy. Users would have to use a search function and try to find the recipient according to various criteria (not only the name, but also location or age or sex or interests). This is done by comprofiler's user lists, and if you have Quick Message enabled, you can send the message directly from the profile.

Ajax is very good for many uses, especially new message notifications - but I don't believe that it would help a lot here.

Tjena Christian,

thanks for finding this little bug. It is very easy to fix.

Almgren wrote:

I have a problem with "Show limit usage at inbox". The setting is shown as neither yes or no. And when I save it nothing happens.

In admin.uddeim.php in administrator/compononts/com_uddeim at line #100 you find:
[code:1]$config_showinboxlimit=mosGetParam ($_POST, 'config_showinboxlimit , 0');[/code:1]
replace that with:
[code:1]$config_showinboxlimit=mosGetParam ($_POST, 'config_showinboxlimit','0');[/code:1]

balous wrote:

will you be adding any more mailbox templates later or is there a way (or tutorial), that will allow users to customize their own mailbox templates to go with the color schemes of their sites?

I just added the noir template and of course I hope that everybody who designs his or her own template makes it available for others as well (by sending it to me).

If you choose the default template, uddeIM uses your colours only, but it might look a little poor. The CSS files however have a lot of comments, so that it should not be too complicated to change it according to your needs.