A complete UI redesign and our biggest release ever!
New Features
- New Theme - Fresh
We've designed a brand new theme named "Fresh". The theme supports colorization and can be changed to any color through a few clicks in the admin panel. - Giphy Support
Send short moving images to your friends with Giphy. - Emoji Support
Emojis are now supported in ArrowChat. It comes with hundreds of pre-installed emojis as well as a way to easily add your own. v2.0 also supports text emojis for compatible browsers with MySQL v5.5.3+. - Updated Installer
The installation process has received a new look as well as new features to make the process even better. - Updated Administration Panel
The admin panel has received a new look as well as new features. - Theme Colorization
Themes can now be colorized (if enabled) directly through the admin panel. It is no longer necessary to change the CSS to make basic colors different. - Full Synchronization
Our push service is no longer required to sync content between tabs. All sent and received messages will now be synced up. This also means that the embedded chat will no longer cause issues when on the same page. As such, the "Pop In Chat" button has been removed.
Mobile Chat
- Typing Notification
The mobile app will now show when a user is typing. - New Message Notification
Users will now see a small preview of any messages they received from users they are not currently chatting with. - Refreshed UI
The mobile chat has been redesigned and updated in several areas. - File and Picture Support
Users will now be able to send files and images on their mobile device. - There is now an option to block (and unblock) a user, visit their profile, report spam, and clear the conversation for users.
- The mobile chat will now redirect the user to the log in page (if set in the admin panel) when they are not logged in.
- The mobile chat will now disable itself if ArrowChat is disabled or in maintenance mode.
- The floating mobile tab has been updated to display better on sites.
- Chat history can now be loaded by scrolling to the top of the conversation.
Embedded / Pop Out Chat
- Chat Rooms and Private Chat Combined
We've gotten rid of separate windows for the chat rooms and private chat. However, it is still possible to embed specific rooms using a specific URL. - Refreshed UI
The entire embedded chat has been redesigned and updated. - There are now the same options in the embedded chat as there are on the desktop version (block users, report spam, hide avatars, etc.).
- Video chat has been added.
- The embedded chat will now disable itself if ArrowChat is disabled or in maintenance mode.
- The embedded chat will now redirect the user to the log in page (if set in the admin panel) when they are not logged in.
- Chat rooms with passwords can now be embedded and it will prompt the user for the password.
- The chat room lobby is now available to leave and join other rooms.
- Chat history can now be loaded by scrolling to the top of the conversation.
Chat Rooms
- Multiple Chat Rooms
Users can now enter up to three chat rooms at once. - User-created chat rooms can now set the description and welcome message upon creation.
- There is now an option to "Feature" a chat room which will make it show above the rest in a separate heading.
- There are now hundreds of colorful chat room icons to choose from.
- There is now an option to hide the chat room user list.
General
- All flash components have been removed! The file uploads and sounds are now running on HTML5.
- The notification that a user is typing has been significantly improved. It is a lot smarter and should now always show the correct status.
- Clicking on the content area of an open conversation will now focus the text input.
- More URLs are now linkable in chat (ex: http://www.arrowchat.com and arrowchat.com).
- The Javascript file now uses /packer/ which has reduced the file size by 42%.
- Multiple messages by the same user in private chat will now only show one avatar.
- Removed Javascript substr in favor of CSS ellipsis for long text.
- MSSQL support has been switched over to sqlsrv and no longer requires the outdated PHP MSSQL extension.
- Images sent will now show up in the chat conversation instantly for non-push users as well.
- The debug tool has received a fresh look with new features.
- Squashed a ton of bugs with the mobile app.
- ArrowChat will now display an error message if it is unable to connect to the database instead of things just not working.
- The functionality of when too many user tabs are open to fit the screen has changed. It now displays a list of minimized users in a single tab instead of having to scroll left and right.
Bug Fixes
- The new message sound no longer plays on subsequent page loads.
- Fixed an issue that would cause the chat to scroll down while history was loaded.
- Having 2+ copies of our header/footer code will no longer cause issues.
- Fixed a rare issue that would prevent users from creating chat rooms.
- Fixed a rare issue that would cause minimized chat windows to have a toString JavaScript error.
- Fixed an issue with Wordpress/Buddypress integrations which caused groups to not work when the prefix was not wp_.
- Fixed an issue that was causing the chat flood error message to not show up.
- The document title will no longer flash about a new message across all open tabs.
- The user option window will now stay open when a chat room online list is refreshed.
- Small fixes with the DatingScript and SocialScript integrations.
- Fixed an issue with the phpFox integration.
- Fixed an issue with guest group IDs not being displayed properly in the admin panel.
- Fixed an issue with DOMMouseScroll in FireFox.
- Fixed an issue with the chatWith API.
Upgrade Instructions
Due to the amount of changes with ArrowChat v2.0, a complete re-installation will be necessary. All message history and settings will be lost during the upgrade.
- Step 1: Backup your existing files
You can do this be simply renaming your "arrowchat" folder to "arrowchat.old". It's very important that you backup your files in case something goes wrong. You'll then have the old files that may help you fix any issues. - Step 2: Download v2.0 and upload to your server
Download the v2.0 update from our site and place it onto your server. - Step 3: Run the install folder
Run the /arrowchat/install/ folder in your browser (ex. http://www.yoursite.com/arrowchat/install/) and follow the on-screen instructions. You can use your old includes/config.php file to help you through the installation process.
You won't need to update the header/footer code unless you named the arrowchat folder something different.
Custom Integrations:
Your old includes/integration.php file will work! Simply copy it over to the new arrowchat/includes/ folder.
We've only made one small change. Search the file for "img-no-avatar.gif" and replace it with "img-no-avatar.png" (not all integrations will have this). This will produce a sharper image.
Languages:
The language file has received a ton of new phrases. You must update your language file to avoid undefined errors.
Themes:
There have been too many changes to themes to count. No existing themes will work and they will need to be completely redesigned.