Please, no profanity, and let's be gentle with one another, ok?
SCHEDULED CHATS are announced in the
forum*. Anyone can schedule a chat, even YOU!
Please be AWARE when you are in the chatrooms!!! People are not always what they represent themselves to be.... Please read my page on Net Safety if you haven't already done so. Also, read the other pages about internet safety under Food For Thought. Be aware and be safe!
*PLEASE USE THE TEMPORARY FORUM BELOW IF OUR MAIN FORUM IS NOT RESPONDING:
NO GOSSIP!!!! No profanity -- that means no four-letter words. No political/religious arguments. No personal attacks. No harrassment. No personal arguments that are better carried out via email, the phone, or in person. If you become angry with someone because they don't understand, then you don't allow them TO understand you.... Because of your anger, they will get defensive and close their minds. If you stay calm and try to explain, instead of getting defensive and lashing out -- they are more likely to hear your side of things.... If they still do not understand, then agree to disagree, or click on the "ignore" button and avoid them altogether. Let's all keep that in mind when we are in the chatroom, ok? It is a place of support -- not a place to hurt one another thru misunderstandings....
To use the ParaChat Room, you must have a Java-enabled browser!! If you do, see the FAQs below to learn how to use the chat room.
When you visit the web page with the chat room, and your
browser supports Java, you will see the chat window above
(give it time to load).
Click on the "OK, Connect!" button, enter your user name
(nickname) -- other fields are not required -- and click on
"OK, Connect!" again. You are in the chat room! You will see
the others in the chat room in the black window on the right.
Type any message in the text box at the bottom (where it says
"Type HERE"), hit your "Enter" key, and it is sent to all
users by default.
Check the 'private chat' checkbox and highlight the user to
whom you wish to speak privately; then, any message typed is
sent only to that user with a [PRIVATE your_name] in front of it
so s/he will know who sent it and that it is private.
To silence annoying chatters in your room, check the 'ignore
user' check box and highlight the unwanted user; then, any
message sent by that user will not be displayed on your
screen.
By default, the "Surf" button takes you to the last URL in the
chat text; i.e, the last URL someone typed in as part of their
message. If you want to surf to a URL typed before the last one,
highlight that URL, and click on "Surf". This is how you can
visit that cool site some user typed a message about.
Please note: "Surf" takes you to the URL on a separate window of
your browser so you can keep chatting on the original browser
window!
Type '*chat' in the text box (where you type to send messages)
to get a help on how to change fonts and colors for your
window.
For example:
Highlight the user name and click on the 'User Info' button to
get info on the user's login.
First, you can "ignore" their messages by clicking on the
"Ignore User" button. You can also click on the user name and
then on User Info. This will give you the user's IP address.
If you know how (or ask your sys admin) do a traceroute to the
IP address and determine the ISP (Internet provider), then send
email to the ISP -- giving as much information as possible about
log on time and the person's information -- and request some
action -- e.g., disconnecting that user's service.
The error was due to the chat server being too busy at the time
you tried to log in... In such instances, please log in again
after a few minutes. Do NOT click on "Connect" multiple times;
wait for a few minutes and then re-connect, else the Server
receives several connect requests from the same machine, and it
will actually take longer to connect. Sorry for the
inconvenience.
These errors are due to your Internet connection going down, or
due to the chat server being too busy at the time you tried the
login. Please login again after a few minutes. As stated
before, do NOT click on "Connect" multiple times; wait for a few
minutes, and then reconnect, else it will actually take longer
to reconnect.
This is just an informational message - please ignore it.
If you log back via the same machine (IP address), it detects a
more recent login and lets you in. However, if you use another
IP address (another machine or a dynamic IP address), it will
not permit another login if it still has a login under that user
name. After a time-out period of 10 minutes, the user is
automatically logged off, and you can then reuse the same user
name (nickname).
YES! Click on the "Float" button to bring up the chat applet in
a separate window (separate from the browser). This separate
chat window can be resized and moved independently of the
browser window containing the chat web page. Use "Unfloat" to
remove this separate chat window and fix it back on the chat
web page.
Please note: by default, the size of the floated window is 3/4
the size of your browser window. You can change it as you wish,
the size it comes up with is just a default start size.
This is a bug the chat server is working on; you get the message
when the system is too busy. Please retry after a while.
FAQs about the ParaChat Room:
*chat bgcolor black (changes background color of the chat
window to black)
*chat fgcolor green (changes foreground (text) color of the
chat window to green)
*chat font courier (changes font of the chat window to
Courier)
*chat fontsize 14 (changes font size of the chat window to
14)
*chat (gives a help on the entire list of commands
available)
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