Shoutbox

Hey everyone...

I've been a user of Messenger Plus! for a VERY long time now, and have seen it come from the smallest of plugins, to the largest known across a WIDE user database.

I use the desktop contact feature pretty solidly, and I must say it's one of my favorite features. Keeping a quick eye on certain contacts is rather easy by taking a glance at the little box tucked neatly to the side of my window. And one thing that I was thinking that would improve this feature GREATLY would be the ability to see when a contact is typing to you, by just looking at that little box. Have maybe the little Messenger Plus! icon popup inside of that little box at the right side or something, which would denote that the person is typing something to you, whether you have their chat window open or not.

Sometimes, I will close conversation windows and every now and then, I get curious as to if someone is typing a response to me while I have the window closed or not, and having this feature would be a pretty nifty little tool.

Does this sound like it could be something doable for one of the next releases?

Thank you very much!
Ricky

Seems like a good idea and I really like it, but as far as I know when you close the instant messaging window with somebody the connection with them ends, so I'm not sure whether the contacts on desktop showing that they're typign would be possible.

Ahhh... Well, awhile back, I'm not sure which version of MSN it was (may have been 5.5 or 6), but I had closed an instant messaging window with someone by mistake after I had said something. And so I went into my MSN window to re-open the window, and as I re-opened it, I noticed that at the bottom it did show they were typing a response. And sure enough, they were...

So, maybe you can look into that a little bit or something...Maybe the newer MSN versions have disabled that, I dunno. But either way, even if you can't get it to work whenever the window is closed, if you could get it to work when the window is open it would be equally as awesome.

Edit: Or maybe with the desktop contacts, you could make it so that if you have a contact added as a desktop contact, whenever they're online it makes sort of a 'soft' connection with them constantly, so that you always get that feedback from them. And if they're offline, or possibly have away or be right back or one of the other statuses up, there won't be any kind of connection with them at all.

I think it's a good idea too, it could be very non-obtrusive to how the desktop contacts currently look and it would be a nice addition in my opinion.

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Originally posted by traxor
Seems like a good idea and I really like it, but as far as I know when you close the instant messaging window with somebody the connection with them ends, so I'm not sure whether the contacts on desktop showing that they're typign would be possible.

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It should be, because opening a new convo window, or typing into an existing one, reinstates the connection. The 'User is typing' message is then sent on the reinstated connection.

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Originally posted by raceprouk

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Originally posted by traxor
Seems like a good idea and I really like it, but as far as I know when you close the instant messaging window with somebody the connection with them ends, so I'm not sure whether the contacts on desktop showing that they're typign would be possible.

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It should be, because opening a new convo window, or typing into an existing one, reinstates the connection. The 'User is typing' message is then sent on the reinstated connection.

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No it shouldn't be.

As explained, when you close the convo the connection is lost and no "user is typing" message is send to you. In other words it is not possible for the desktop contacts to show any indicating if the user is typing if there are no conversation windows open.

The only possebility for this is that the desktop contact feature constantly keeps an connection open to those contacts, which goes totally against the policy of MSN to close a connection when they are idle and/or not in use to save bandwidth.

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PS: there is no such thing as a soft-connection. It iether is a permanent (flooding servers!?) connection, or not.

Also, IMHO, I don't think the feature on its own (if it was possible) would be that usefull. Also, what's next? having the ability to type something in the desktop window to send to your contacts? It more and more goes towards just another conversation window. Thus rather totally useless. If you want to know more info about contacts (current DP, etc) or the conversation, open the conversation window itself, that what it is there for. The dekstop contacts shouldn't be a replacement for all the stuff you see/can do in a conversation.

Have they changed how the protocol works then? I thought that opening a new convo window created a new connection with that contact. Same with starting to type again after the contact has closed the convo window.

Also, I'm lost as to what you mean by 'soft connection'.

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Originally posted by raceprouk
Same with starting to type again after the contact has closed the convo window.

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hmmm... you might be right in that... my mistake

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Originally posted by raceprouk
Also, I'm lost as to what you mean by 'soft connection'.

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Originally posted by HBeta
Or maybe with the desktop contacts, you could make it so that if you have a contact added as a desktop contact, whenever they're online it makes sort of a 'soft' connection with them constantly, so that you always get that feedback from them. And if they're offline, or possibly have away or be right back or one of the other statuses up, there won't be any kind of connection with them at all.

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just a quick idea

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Originally posted by CookieRevised
No it shouldn't be.

As explained, when you close the convo the connection is lost and no "user is typing" message is send to you. In other words it is not possible for the desktop contacts to show any indicating if the user is typing if there are no conversation windows open.

The only possebility for this is that the desktop contact feature constantly keeps an connection open to those contacts, which goes totally against the policy of MSN to close a connection when they are idle and/or not in use to save bandwidth.

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PS: there is no such thing as a soft-connection. It iether is a permanent (flooding servers!?) connection, or not.

Also, IMHO, I don't think the feature on its own (if it was possible) would be that usefull. Also, what's next? having the ability to type something in the desktop window to send to your contacts? It more and more goes towards just another conversation window. Thus rather totally useless. If you want to know more info about contacts (current DP, etc) or the conversation, open the conversation window itself, that what it is there for. The dekstop contacts shouldn't be a replacement for all the stuff you see/can do in a conversation.

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I'm not asking for it to be a complete replacement man... I just figured it would be a pretty neat utility to have within the desktop contact box. Much like the guy above showed... The whole "it wouldn't be useful and shouldn't be done" argument is kinda harsh, seeing as you can completely go against that statement by saying that seeing a contact type in a normal window is just as useless; cause you'll get the message when you get the message.

Seeing if they're typing to you within the desktop contact bar would be just as bit useful as seeing if they're typing to you in a regular window.

What if instead of having it display when they're typing if the box is closed, if maybe you had the chat windows opened, but minimized to the taskbar, and it would then show you for whichever contact it is you have on the desktop.

So, say I am talking to Joe and I have Joe added as a desktop contact. Also, I have Joe's conversation window open, but minimized. You could have it so that the desktop bar would display when he's typing a response so that I wouldn't have to keep going back and forth to the chat window to see if he ever read what it is that I said.