Our own chat room.

[Rudy]

Sharkey added a cool new feature to this website. It is a chat room (chat box). A bunch of us tried it out last night. It's always fun to do the chat thing. If anything, it may make you a faster typist. Below is Sharkey's explanation of this new feature. For starters, he suggested that I find out when would be a good time for us (the bus family) to get together. I think Sharkey had a good idea by picking Monday, Wednesday, and Friday starting at 5 PM west coast time. I'm sure you readers know what time that is in your geographical zone.

This is my invitation for all you forum readers to come and visit us for a fun time. I know that Friday is Christmas day, so I don't think there will be anybody there on that day, unless, you are as alone as some of us and have no real holiday celebration planned. I will be checking though. If any readers are on there, it can be our own little Christmas party.

Here is Sharkey's description of the new feature:


There is a new feature on the forum, which is that I have installed a chat tool called "ChatBox". This will allow registered users to converse in real time via their browser.

If you look at the main forum page, down at the bottom there is a category named "Who is Online?", and near the bottom of that category is now a list saying "There are X user(s) on chat now", with either a reminder to log in or a link to click to join Chat.

Once you are logged in and click the link, a popup window will open in your browser (assuming your browser allows them), and you will be presented with a new interface where you can read and enter messages. Users who are in the ChatBox with you will be listed on the left pane. Each message is prefaced with the chat poster's name. You can enter any message up to 240 characters in length and click "Send" to display your message. The ChatBox reader refreshes each 10 seconds so you can follow ongoing conversations.

If you don't post anything for five minutes, your user name gets put in the "Away" column, indicating that you might have slipped out the back door for a smoke or gone down to the bar for the rest of the night. Posting again will bring you back to the "Online" listing.

It's possible to put Smilies in your post using the "Smilie Box" link.

There may be some bugs in this installation, so we need to try it out and get a feel for how it works. I can make any needed changes once we figure out how it all works, extend the time it takes to "be away", allow longer messages, etc.

Someone (Rudy?) should help figure out how to know when we might want to gather for a chat. Something like Mon, Wed, Fri from 5:00 - 6:00 PM PST, or the like, which will allow a better chance for two or more users to be on chat at the same time.

I'll try and be on tonight at 5:00 PM PST to start up some conversation.

Post any thoughts you have on the use and function of the ChatBox in this thread.

(The ChatBox is not meant to replace our enjoyable dialog in posting here, but to provide a less formal and short term means of conversing. I don't want it to kill the flow of information on the rest of the forum, so keep those posts coming in.)

[Rudy]

Today is Wednesday. I am looking forward to see some people in the chat room this evening. It will be 7PM my time, 5PM west coast, and of course, 8PM Dennis's time. Let's get our typing skills honed. I use two fingers, and it is not very fast. I took a typing class in high school, but I don't remember a thing about the technique they taught. See you there.

[Sharkey]

Gee, Rudy, we missed you last night. I've been able to pop on and off while trying to get evening chores and dinner made.

Some improvements yesterday, I found the parts of the code that control the number of messages displayed, and the dwell time, or persistence of the messages.

The box to enter text is larger, the popup window is slightly larger. You can either grab an edge and click-drag it larger or click the middle box in the upper right corner to make it a full window. Either of these makes it easier to read, with more screen real estate to display the dialog.

Jones'n4 made the suggestion that slowing the refresh rate might be desirable.

Here are the settings as of now:

Popup window size = 640x480
Maximum number of messages to display = 100
Oldest message to display = 20 minutes old
Automatic log out time = 10 minutes of inactivity
Automatic "Away" time = 5 minutes of inactivity
Refresh rate = 10 seconds
Message length = 240 characters maximum
Text box size = 80 characters

I'm still adjusting these things so feel free to make suggestions. I'm fooling around with colors and layout, and want to make the smilies part of the posting screen instead of a separate window. Some of the engine of the ChatBox is javascript, which I don't understand at all, so I may hit the wall at what I can accomplish at some point.

[Rudy]

Sharkey, Last night was spent working on some metal fabrication of outdoor light fixtures as well as trying to capture muzzle flashes of different types of handguns on camera. The camera project did not work. I will have to figure out how to make the digital camera work on video mode or make it be able to leave the shutter open while using a tripod.

I am looking forward to chatting this evening.

[Jones'n4chrome]

Hi Sharkey,
Is there to way set an "audible notice" when someone replys to a post, that way we could multi task if someone steps away for a few minutes before replying?
Thanks for adding this to the forum, I really enjoyed it much more then I thought I would.
Chuck

[Sharkey]

It might be possible to make the computer 'ding' each time the screen refreshes, but there would need to be some sort of an application running on the client side to be able to detect new messages. I think Microsoft calls this "net meeting", which I've never seen used.

My next area of interest is to put the link to the chat, and the list of users on it into the left hand menu, so you don't have to be looking at the forum index page to see if the chat is in use. This is a pretty trivial project, but one that will have to wait for a day or two. I have to go to the city this afternoon, and I probably won't be back until after 6PM, if not later.

[Rudy]

I was on the "Chat Box" last night. There have been many great improvements. I urge everyone to join the fun. There is a lot of info on it in the Trouble Report forum under the title " Feel Like Chatting?".

[dadeo]

anyone remember the old forum schoolbusconversions.com? I think it was also orisus.com? that was about 10-11 years ago. It had a chat room too and was real cool. I think i found the original header.... yes, here it is:


Accually, thats where I got the name for my bus "Oddjob". One guy on the forum suggested it to me because I was doing odd jobs at the time.... I forget the dudes name, I think e started the housetrucks forum on yahoo... heres a picture of his bus, i think


Anyway, thats cool that there's a chat room here too... wonder if it'll work on my phone?

[dadeo]

Yuri, that was his name.

[Dennis The Bus Dweller]

I wonder what happened to Yuri? He was an oddball, he would fit right in here with us

[dadeo]

dunno, in Sep. 2004 he wrote on the yahoo housetrucks group:
"What have I been up to, neglecting my home so? Well, I always told
folks that the bus was, in one sense, "sailboat training", and
indeed, I've been making my way as a freelance tall-ship sailor and
traditional boat carpenter/rigger."

Maybe he's on the high-seas?

[Sharkey]

That's a couple of blasts from the bus/truck past.

Schoolbusconversions.com was also known as orisus.com (Oregon Is Us), and was the handywork of a fellow named Greg who lived in his bus with his partner in Rose Lodge, a small commuity near Lincoln City on the Oregon Coast. The two of them had lived in the bus for years both in Rose Lodge and Portland.

Greg put together a chat room, using the services of an outside provider if I remember. There were several members that I recall, including Cece, who bought a bus in Richmond, West Virginia, and did a complete conversion on it before moving to Florida. On the trip, the engine blew and stranded her in BFE.

There was also Buskid, the now famous Crownbus.com owner, whose screen name was Taf.

Archive.org has an archive of past pages from Greg's site, dating back to 2000. Some of the later archived pages lead some sub-pages, such as photos of Cece's bus before and after conversion.

Greg purchased the domain housetruck.com and maintained it for a time, but all his presences on the internet seems to have faded away with time.

Last I heard, his 1959 Dodge bus conversion had been destroyed by a falling tree. The bus' name was Orisus.

Last I heard from Yuri was in a 2003 email:

Sadly, I haven't been even within sight of my bus in over 8 months. Opportunities have taken me somewhat farther afield these last few months. I've broken into an interesting field; serving as bosun aboard traditional sailing wooden vessels. Bosun, of course, is short for "boatswain", which is a simple way of saying "the guy who gets to maintain everything that actually makes the dratted boat sail".

The years of buslife have well-prepared me for boatlife; the boats are usually more spacious than the bus! I will have to get the bus back under me at some point here, as I'll need some accommodations when (if?) building my own boat.

The last time I moved the bus was a decent 40-mile run, somewhat dampening my enthusiasm about my "great" highway mileage. An overdrive would be wonderful... I kept my foot into it for most of the trip, steadily climbing (but still in 4th gear!) and cruising up to 60 mph on the few flats. I managed 8 mpg, better than the 4-5 mpg cited by some housetruckers, but sobering nonetheless. My previous 50-mile trip had been less hilly, on much slower secondary gravel roads, and I had gotten 12 mpg then. I suppose I'll just have to get an axillary gearbox... or commit to slower driving.

Well, not much new to report, except for the complete lifestyle shift. Hah! I can't recall who the quote is by, but it goes something like, "The greatest thing is to be able to sacrifice all that you are in order to become all that you can be."

I think I'll be out to the farm, where the bus is parked in a little birch grove, and spend a night or two before shipping out again.

So, it sounds like you spent some time on the old chat too?

[dadeo]

Yeah I was using it for a little bit, right after I got my bus. What happened was, I first got interested in converted buses at a Dead show, sorta lit the flame. Then i saw my friends-friends bus and got more inspired. Finally, I saw, through a link on orisus i think, your site which had the effect of throwing gasoline on the flame!!! Then I bought my bus here: http://www.westernbus.com/ and sorta converted it, then I was using the forum for ideas and just to do something to exercise my sorta obsession with house buses.
I remember, as I said before, Yuri suggesting the name for my bus:

Also, he was explaining double-clutching to me. My bus didnt require it, I was just curious.

[Dennis The Bus Dweller]

Well, we're going toneed more pics then that

[dadeo]

I'll put more, but I'll make a post on the bus barn forum