Progress is slow
But is happening!
Initial Features for Chatr
After a brief Twitter chat with @stiplady he suggested that I should get some initial features up for people to see as that might help with people suggesting new or improved features.
The following is a list of features I expect to be available from the start. I would say these are the standard features people expect from a live chat solution.
Visitor Tracking
- page history
- page url
- keywords
- Standard info (IP/Location/Browser/OS)
Live Chat
- secure as standard (SSL)
- canned responses
- operator pass through
- online/offline
- offline form
- customisable chat window
- proactive invites
- customisable
- email / print copy of transcript
- on page customer chat window (instead of popup, or conferrable)
- pre/post chat forms
- operator/customer typing notification
- web page push?
Call Me Back
Reporting
- response times
- missed chats
Fully Hosted
MenuBar icon
- customisable (number of visits, new chat)
Growl Integration
- Notification of new visitors
- chat request notificaiton (on click open Chatr to new chat window)
- fully customisable
Dock Icon
- number of visitors
- bounce on request
- customisable
Multi site support
There are also some things I want to add in but will, understandably, be in a future release:
- iPhone/iPad client
- Desktop sharing and remote control
- VoIP integration
- CRM integration (pull customer data across so available from Chatr)
- Zendesk / 3rd party support ticket integration
- create new support ticket from operator console
- send copy of chat transcript
- Facebook integration (Chatr tab to chat from FB)
- Enhanced analytics
- Twitter integration (to monitor @ and DM messages. Chatr short links to instigate chat)
- Rated live chat experience
- Grow Chatr into more “in-depth” communication app?
What do you think?
What do you think of these features? Is there anything you desperately want to see that’s been missed? If you’ve got an idea head over to Chatr’s Get Satisfaction page or click the feedback button on the left and submit your idea now!
Edit: I’ve installed DISQUS so you can also leave your comments and ideas below.
It will be much easier to extend Alfred in the next release, as well as import and export packaged scripts and workflows created by other users.
The native plugin API will come in the future and will allow feedback into Alfred’s results without creating performance problems.
NOTE: Before you ask “Ooooh when are you releasing this??”… this is a mockup in Fireworks which I will be programming over the coming months :)
Time for “All Go”
So today I closed down DomainDonkey and, aside from the “day job”, I’ll now be focussing solely on Chatr development.
I’m both sad to see the end of DD but also very excited about the future.
Why Chatr? A little background.
Why Chatr when there are lots of live chat solutions already out there?
A good question. Over the years I have tried most of the live chat software that there is. As a Mac user I’ve never been truly satisfied with the Mac clients supplied (if supplied at all). Either they are very very poor or they just load a website within a program window or there is no Mac client at all.
Well I’m a Mac user. I don’t want to have to run Windows from my Mac just to use some live chat software. I want a dedicated, highly functional client that works natively on my Mac.
Why not just use a web based service / Silverlight client / Adobe Air?
I’ve tried. I’m a big fan of cloud based software or SaaS (Software as a Service) but I don’t believe it delivers in this area. It just isn’t as smooth as it should be even when you run it in something like Fluid to create a stand alone browser so it looks like a program.
My problem with Silverlight clients / Adobe Air is that, whilst they are cross operating systems, everything seems to be contained within the window which isn’t very effective. I’ve never found one that’s easy to use. The best software I have run on a Mac for live chat has been a Silverlight client. It was quite good but it had some bad points (notifications only in the window so it had to be at the front all the time) and it looked like windows software. On my Mac? Yuk!
So there we have it. After suffering and getting frustrated the time has come to stop procrastinating about doing my own software and start doing it! There is a big learning curve ahead. I’ve not written in Cocoa before (or Objective C) so I have to learn that - this is going to be the bulk of the work. In my mind I can already picture the software and how it will function.
I hope I can create something that Mac users will be happy to use!
Logo has been created. A simple starting point that will see me through development at least!
