New version chatbox

Once I close the chatbox or shoutbox, is there any way to open it back up without having to restart Mozilla?

No, since it would be Mozilla that is running it.

The new log page is in place. I'm still working out what kind of stats I'm going to do.
The new corner chatbox is in place.

You can now personalize the color of your name in the chatbox (Click here, scroll down). Don't abuse it.

Just something about the name colour which I said in the Chatbox, but you might have missed:

When the standard colour is selected, if you hover over the name, it turns white, as links are prone to do. If the user has a colour selected, however, and you hover over their name in the Chatbox, there is no change.

I don't know whether this is intentional or not. The cursor still turns into the hand, by the way, it's just that the link doesn't turn white on mouse hover.

Nothing I can do about that. Really, I'd rather the names be the normal text color, but since that varies, it's a pain to fix it up that way.

Can I ask how things like that work with the Chatbox?

And a question that's slightly off-topic, but still relevant - can PHP variables (I think would be the right name for them) be used in CSS documents?

Can I ask how things like that work with the Chatbox?

Not sure what you mean.

You can use PHP variables in CSS if the CSS is being output by PHP

Sorry. What I mean is the name colour, mostly, and how it works as a link. What type of scripting is used to achieve that within the Chatbox?

The relation of CSS to this is that... in fact, I'll post some CSS code I use on my sites for menus:

A.menu:link { color: #000000; text-decoration: none } A.menu:visited { color: #000000; text-decoration: none } A.menu:active { color: #FFFFFF; text-decoration: none } A.menu:hover { color: #FFFFFF; text-decoration: none }

I don't need to explain it to you.

My thoughts were that, if the Chatbox makes use of stylesheets for it's style, code such as that above could be used to set the links - for the first two (:link and :visited), the colour code could be replaced by a PHP variable, whilst the bottom two (:active and :hover) could have the #FFFFFF colour code to make them white.

Just to go to the PHP variable - I have very little knowledge of PHP, so I'm probably wrong, but is it possible to send what the user chooses as their name colour in their user options as a PHP variable, which can then be placed into something like that above?

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I have doubts that above would work, but they're my thoughts on the link hover =/= white matter. A lot of fuss for a tiny... well, it's not even a problem.

The issue is that the PHP code doesn't have access to the default color and that the set color overrides the color for all states of the link, including hover.

Ah, fair enough. So to try and 'solve' it would mean re-writing a lot of the code? A hell of a lot of work for something that's purely aesthetic.

To prevent confusion, which was the true point of the colored names in the first place, I've put in place a system where colors are first-come, first-serve. If someone else is already in the chatbox with a name length close to yours and your selected color, you will be assigned the closest alternate.

For example, if Chruser (length 7, profile color red) is already in the chatbox, and Lenny (length 5, profile color red) joins, Lenny's name will be in orange instead of red.

Any way to still check shoutbox stats?

The old archive page is still up, though not for long.

And recent threads is live!

So whoever has the longest name gets to keep their color?

No, whoever is already using it gets to keep it. If there's someone already in the chatbox with a name of similar length using your color, your color gets changed for the session (not permenantly). This is so you can keep up with who's saying what without having to read the names, which was the whole point of adding the colors in the first place.

Opening the Chatbox no longer disables the Recent Chatbox Messages window. Instead, the Recent Chatbox Messages window is disabled as long as the Chatbox is open; once your Chatbox session expires, the Recent Chatbox Messages window will reappear on the next page load.

Also, I'm working out a technology in my head that will allow you to open the chatbox in the same window/tab as you're browsing in. I'm not sure if I can make it work, or how well it will work, ATM.

On the Recent Threads display in the chatbox, you can now clear the list and only threads with new posts since the last time you cleared it (during the session) will appear; this makes it easier to "bookmark" your spot.

Mini chatbox first stage is live. Right now it doesn't stay open between page loads. That's part of its second stage. In the meantime, feedback on the rest is welcome.

It's a lot less annoying than a popup when I type.

I also attempted to fix your z-order issue. Does it still appear under avatars?