Sorry mate, it's been done. http://peekko.com/chat/HomePage.html
Actually that's not what I was looking for, so it's been done twice. There is another one which works on some frameset or other so it's 100% browser-based. But like all web2.0 projects it has a silly name so it doesn't rank for anything. -Rob Mark Prokosch wrote: > Hi, > I have a cool idea for SOC 2006 and I would like to know if it's > something the Python Software Foundation would like to sponsor > andsomeone here would like to mentor. It's an extremely buzzword > compliant TurboGears+GreaseMonkey affair <wink>. > > The idea is to allow people while browsing the web to interact with > other people on the same page/site/domain/topic. You will automatically > join an ad hoc chat room and be able to chat with peers. The experience > will be like an automatic IRC where every web page is a channel. > > Imagine that you are reading some blog entry and would like to ask or > say something. You can post a comment of course, but often it takes > time for the comment to show up and it's not always appropriate to > clutter the persistent comments area with everything that comes to > mind. Another scenario, that happens a lot to me is that while reading > a newsgroup post I want to ask something, but I hesitate to post to the > group because the answer may have already been given 4 messages ago. > So, in this situation I search through the newgroup archive extensively > to make sure my question has not been answered already and only then I > post it (and still I fear the RTFM response). > > I belivee that this project can really deomnstrate the prowess of the > Python+TurboGears ecosystem (language+standard libraries+third part > libraries+web framework) as a great web programming environment. TG 0.9 > has lots of features that can make this project shine: identity > framework for managing users, TinyMCE for editing messages and Mochikit > for making a rich user experience on the client side. > > So, here is the core idea: > > * Chat server maintains chat rooms and associated lists of chat > participants (may or may not require an account) > * Chat rooms are created spontaneousely as users surf to new web pages > * A chat room is destroyed when there are no more users on its > corresponding web page > * The user's browser displays a chat panel embedded in the web page or > a popup chat window (a-la Mochikit's logging pane) > * If it's a popup window then a single window can be used to host > multiple chats from multiple web pages (in different tabs or different > browser windows) > * The chat panel contains the handles of the current members and > transcript of the chat. > * The user can send rich text messages and see the messages of other > members > * The user can edit the messages she sends in a word processor like > environment > * The user can send images as part of the message > > So far, it all sounds pretty basic chat stuff except for two things: > > 1. How to embed the chat panel in any old web page > 2. How to detect when the user surfs to a new page and notify the > server > > The solution I picked is to concentrate on a single browser: Firefox. > Firefox has a wonderful feature called Greasemonkey. It allows you to > inject your own JavaScript code into any web page. So, a GreaseMonkey > script will connect to the chat server (via AJAX) whenever you browse > to a new page. The chat server will send back the members list and > possibly the entire chat panel. This way the original GreaseMonkey > script can be very simple and the server controls both the UI and the > functionality of the chat on the page (the server can send JavaScript > code too of course). What about other browsers? It is possible to > inject code into IE using browser helper objects > (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_Helper_Object). I know there is > also some sort of Greasemonkey for Safari > (http://www.ditchnet.org/wp/2005/11/11/release-a-cocoa-app-friday-safari-guide-12/). > Anyway, for a summer project (that supposed to showcase Python+TG) I > think it's best to focus on Firefox and not spread myself too thin by > trying to fight browser quircks on different operating systems. > > I would like to implement the server as a TurboGears application. I did > a couple of projects with TG 0.8 (including using MochiKit for AJAX > interaction) and I can't wait to do a TG 0.9 project. > > This project can be further developed along two branches: adding cool > chat features (rich text, avatars, emoticons etc) and > performance/scalability (distributed server farm, lots of users per > server, hierarchical caches etc). > > If you like this idea, I will create a detailed proposal and submit it > to Google. > > Cheers, Mark Prokosch > > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TurboGears" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/turbogears -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
