I belong to a forum for people/families of people with Tourette Syndrome. Quite a few have expressed a desire for a chat facility but it's unlikely that the site that hosts the forum can /will provide this.

Does anyone know of a free facility for setting up a chatroom so we can all get together and chat real time rather than having to post on the forums? As I'm not particularly techy, it must be easy to set up and run.

Any help gratefully received.

Thanks

http://php.resourceindex.com/detail/04099.html

I think this is what your looking for :-)

Hi FF,

SheffieldForum uses a third party chatroom that uses the Java language. It's a service we pay for - I'll try and get the details of it from Geoff.

The PHP based chat rooms will work reasonably well but they can be fiddly to set up for non-techies and can also have a 'lag' on displaying conversations that the Java based ones don't have.

Have you tried the multiple chat options in MSN - you can set up conversatins there between more than two people.

Joe

You could try this (http://phpmychat.sourceforge.net/rubrique.php3?id_rubrique=29) if you forum is written in PHP (most are) otherwise you could look into setting up a yahoo/msn group which I think do (at least used to have!) a chatroom facility :)

Originally posted by evildrneil
You could try this (http://phpmychat.sourceforge.net/rubrique.php3?id_rubrique=29) if you forum is written in PHP (most are) otherwise you could look into setting up a yahoo/msn group which I think do (at least used to have!) a chatroom facility :)

Unfortunately MSN pulled out of the chatroom market a wee while ago - they were concerned that every chatroom user was a rapacious pervert after the flower of British maidenhood. :)

I don't know about Yahoo - I stopped using them a couple of years ago after one of their upgrades left me with an application that was SOOOO slow!

(EDN - check out my abbreviated user name!! )

Joe

Thanks.

I looked at the stuff on Pauls link but to be honest, none of it makes sense to a thicko like me!! The Yahoo/MSN group sounds a good idea as even *I* can do that!!

It just wants to be somewhere that people can log onto at a certain time for a proper chat.

Thanks everyone.

Just to update ........

I've set up a Yahoo Group and it has chat facility atatched.

Thanks everyone who responded :-)

Originally posted by JoeP
Unfortunately MSN pulled out of the chatroom market a wee while ago - they were concerned that every chatroom user was a rapacious pervert after the flower of British maidenhood. :)

Anyone can set up an MSN Group, which includes a chatroom....MSN Groups Home (http://groups.msn.com/) and then click on Create Your Own Group. You will need an MSN passport, which is really easy to easy to obtain....if you use msn messenger, then you probably already have a passport.

You can make the group public or private, shown in the Groups Directory or not. I know of one group on MSN which started life on yahoo, but it was found to be too slow and limited, so it was better to go with MSN for what they needed.

If you check out the MSN Groups Directory, you will probably find there is already several groups for Tourette Syndrome.

http://www.hotscripts.com/Java/Applets/Chat_Systems/index.html

Loads there.

Joel

Try reading up about IRC

IRCs good, ive been operator in a few chats over the past 3 years
to start off you need a client.....such as mIRC (www.mirc.com) i also use no name script, it has more features such as an mp3 player and online gaming stuff :)
then you can visit any network you want (im on quakenet and astrolink.

type anything into your chat bar, preceeded with a #
eg:- #melthebell_world would open a chatroom called #melthebell_world.
then you get some friends to install mirc, enter the details of the network and channel (chatroom) they enter.
afterwards you could get a bot (eg:- on quakenet its L or Q) this will keep the channel open when everybody leaves, auto op / people etc

check out http://www.quakenet.org/ you dont have to use quakenet, its mainly for players of quake, but it might help you understand more about irc
i didnt know a thing about irc when i got invited to a new channel and made op, ive learned more in the past 3 years, still dont have a clue tho :P and most of the commands i still have saved as text files cos i cant remember em all :P

msn group is easy easy easy

and you can moderate and only let in members you approved