How do you create multiple chat windows?Follow

I was wondering how do you create multiple chat windows?

Example: One window for group chat, one window for guild chat one window for raids one window for tells, etc.

I want to create multiple chat windows so I don't miss something important when in a group or in a raid.

I don't want to keep scrolling to find a group tell, raid tell, etc.

Please help,

Kaeerin

Edited, Tue Mar 9 11:03:49 2004 by Kaeerin

If you have many chat channels you may wish to refine the chat boxes and have many of them.

http://members.aol.com/jensig/FirstEmpkill1.jpg

This is a link to an SS of my UI.

I have 2 chat windows. All chat/guild/tells goes to my top left. All rsay/group goes to my main chat on the bottom of my screen.

I then use 3 default size windows to filter my hits, others hits, spells and junk to keep the 2 main chat boxes free of spam. I rarely miss tells, or chat. I never miss /rsay or /groupsay.

Hope this may help you.

Edited, Tue Mar 9 12:34:12 2004 by JennockFV

Honestly, Jenock's screen is way to crowded for my taste, but that's just me... :)

I typicallty just put all my chat stuff in a large "main chat" down at the bottom. The then have two smaller boxes in the top left and top middle. The leftmost one is "spam". I put everything that's combat related that I don't really need to see there (my misses, misses against me, others hits, others misses, damage shields, etc). Basically, I don't need to read any of that, but I want to know if there's combat going on around me. Seeing movement in that box is enough to tell me what I want to know. I put only my hits and hits against me in my combat box (cause that's all I really care about).

I've never had a problem keeping all chat in one box. As long as it's big enough to hold long lines and has enough lines to catch everything important, that's all that really matters. I've never felt a need to put different types of chat in different boxes. That would just mean I'd have more things to keep an eye on IMO.


As to how to create chat boxes (since no one answered that). Um... If you right click on the title bar of your main chat, there will be a drop down with a bunch of options on it. One should be something like "Create new chat". That will create a new box. You can then click on its title bar and do a bunch of thigns with it. What you'll want to do is probably rename it. You'll also want to select which chat to filter to it (also through the right click thing). Note that when you select a chat filter to go to a particular chat box, it will automatically remove that from your main chat (so you don't have to). So if you filter "my hits" into a new box, you don't have to go to main chat and remove "my hits". It's a good thing really (unless you actually wanted something to go to two windows in which case you're out of luck).


You can also specify which box will automatically accept chat, and you can set the default type of chat that the box will create. Some folks will use this to have multiple chat boxes, one that sends out group chat, one with guild, etc... I honestly don't bother with that. I leave my chat default to /say, and just type /g, /gu, /rs, /1, /2, etc as needed. To me, it's easier to just add that extra couple characters then constantly move my mouse around into different chat boxes to send chat to different channels. If that's preferable to you, there's also an option you can use for each chat that say's "Always chat here". What this means is that no matter where your mouse is on the screeen, if you hit Enter, that chat bar will automatically be activated for you to type in. IMO, this is by far the best way to handle outgoing chat, since other wise you have to click inside a window to chat.


You can of course, also move and resize your new windows. There are also options for changing the backround and border colors as well as the fade color and fade rate. You can also "lock" the window, which will prevent inadvertant moving of the window if you left click in the wrong spot, and will reduce the options on the list when you right click on the title bar (which prevents that stray mouse from randomly changing setting on you).

What I did with mine was set both the backround and border to transparent, and set the fade for both to transparent as well (um... make sure you size and position your window before doing this!). This makes the window completely transparent regardless of where my mouse is, so the text just kinda floats on my screen.


My only irritation with the chat windows as they exist right now, is that there are two options that they should have, but don't:

1. Pass through. Selecting this option will make the window completely transparent to the mouse (except for the title bar obviously since you'd need someway to change it back). The main reason cluttered windows suck is that if you are a mouseclick person like me, if your mouse is over a window, the clicks don't pass through it. I'd like to be able to make windows that I can put anywhere but still be able to use my mouse on objects "behind" the window. The problem right now is that not only does your mouse not pass through the window, but it may do something else nasty as well.


Which brings me directly to the second improvement I'd love to see:


2. Never chat here. They have an "always chat here", which I love. However, even if you've selected "always chat here on a chat box, all other chat boxes still have a chat bar on them. Um... If I've got a window for output only, I have no need for a chat bar. In fact, if you click on the wrong part of the window, it will activate that chat bar. This can be disasterous since an active chat bar means that all keyboard presses go there instead of doing things like activating hotkeys and programed keyboard keys. If you've ever seen someone in group that seems to be standing around not doing anything for awhile in combat, and then suddenly says something like: "13527811111", those are all the hotkeys they tried to hit before realizing they needed to hit enter to get control out of a chat box. It's a real pain in the butt and makes having too cluttered of a screen very dangerous IMO. If they would just give you an option to make a chat box output only (remove the chat bar), this huge problem would be solved. I'd be much less concerned about where my chat boxes are.


That's just my 2cp on the issue though.

Hmmm when I right click on my chat window, nothing happens. Could i have disabled it by chance?