New to LibraryH3lp? Here's a roadmap.

<p>Coming to LibraryH3lp from another chat system, you may feel that your administrative user interface has suddenly transformed from:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEircpu0aPomWcGA5pR9ERY-N18gtgFABHJDsIyAPMhbRckoiSeJGSoDczib2X_eZ7KfeexDYjfC-nAVHjoZfbEY4maJLVaDL4-mPeZmj1-DdxODQbO0eJYGj5-mn4tA4EstSbcAkwveSdI/s1600/69075298_d84059ca01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEircpu0aPomWcGA5pR9ERY-N18gtgFABHJDsIyAPMhbRckoiSeJGSoDczib2X_eZ7KfeexDYjfC-nAVHjoZfbEY4maJLVaDL4-mPeZmj1-DdxODQbO0eJYGj5-mn4tA4EstSbcAkwveSdI/s320/69075298_d84059ca01.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />To something more like:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRSqdqIkfkfti3tB_zTURA_cNJz3myFAU1ksPCTFEuh3uV_uj7VYz0-JDDC-BaV_iSgcT7rjyYqW-87PL9q_t8VFY2I-RP5gBlSkv1f35vXlyQ5aV69O5yF58iT557JUThCGCf1gKqoKc/s1600/090810homer.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRSqdqIkfkfti3tB_zTURA_cNJz3myFAU1ksPCTFEuh3uV_uj7VYz0-JDDC-BaV_iSgcT7rjyYqW-87PL9q_t8VFY2I-RP5gBlSkv1f35vXlyQ5aV69O5yF58iT557JUThCGCf1gKqoKc/s320/090810homer.png" width="320" /></a></div><br />We don't deny that LibraryH3lp has lots of features, but it is not as complicated as it may appear at first glance. Yes, we have more buttons, dials, levers, and switches, but they each exist for a very specific purpose, and together they work to provide your <i>patrons</i> with the simplicity of "Push for Cheese".  Here is a walkthrough of the core concepts.<br /><br />Fundamentally, of course, is the <b>widget</b> - that box you stick in a web page that the user can type in to chat with you in real-time.  In single-operator systems like Meebo, a widget corresponds exactly to one <b>user</b>: you have one login, and this is used to sign in and answer chats.  If you share the login among multiple people, things get a little weird because all of the guest-side messages go out to all of the people using that single account. There's no need to further review the other shortcomings of this setup, as you've experienced them, but it is easy to understand and setup.<br /><br />Building on that, multi-operator systems like LibraryH3lp break the one-to-one limitation of single-account systems like Meebo.  You still have a widget, but you can have multiple user operators, all of whom can answer chats without tripping over each other.  This is a popular arrangement because it is a lot more powerful to use and only slightly more challenging to deploy.  The weaknesses of this system center primarily on organization.  But LibraryH3lp has organizational knobs too.<br /><br />From the patron's external point-of-view, you're a library, but of course internally you have branches and departments, individuals, and specialties.  When the patron contacts the "library" (via chat, phone, or email), job one is to direct him or her the individual or department best suited to provide help.<br /><br />To facilitate this, LibraryH3lp breaks the concept of a widget into two pieces: a widget and a <b>queue</b>.  The widget is still a box on your web page, and the queue specifies the target or destination of the chat.  Another way to think of a queue is as a tag or a label.  Some librarians are reference librarians, some are science specialists... some are even both.  Queues are a way to organize your users.  So you can have a widget in your page that targets your circulation or reference queue, but when an ILL question comes in you can transfer that chat to your ILL queue (tag/label) so the patron receives the most appropriate help.  Because widgets and queues are separate, this works whether the chat comes in from the web, IM, or SMS.<br /><br />Of course, once you've organized your users into queues, you shouldn't need to setup a "chat dispatch" operator who answers and routes chats.  That's silly... let the computer do it, that's what it's for.  And that is what we call a <b>service</b>.  It's a way to describe how to route the chat to the most appropriate operator.  You can say, in effect, if any of my science librarians are online right now, send the chat to them.  Otherwise send the chat to the reference desk so they can help as best they can.  If none of my librarians are available for chat, send the patron to my <a href="http://chatstaff.us/">after hours backup service</a> or to my email form.<br /><br />With all the knobs comes flexibility. Instead of just a user and a widget, we give you any number of <b>users</b> to answer chats, <b>queues</b> to organize your users, <b>widgets</b> to display in your web pages, and <b>services</b> to ensure that your patrons get the best help possible.<br /><br />Most importantly, you don't need to worry about any of that if you don't want to.  When you signup for LibraryH3lp, we set you up with one service, one widget, one queue, and one user, in a way that is functionally nearly identical to a Meebo setup.  And we send you a code snippet in your welcome letter to do all of this.  Once you've put that code into your web pages, you can learn what the knobs do later and never have to make any code changes.  That's as close to "Push for Cheese" as any nuclear power plant can get.<br /><br /><br /><span id="goog_78755167"></span><span id="goog_78755168"></span></p>

Coming to LibraryH3lp from another chat system, you may feel that your administrative user interface has suddenly transformed from: To somet...

New Services Designer (plus handy tip for creating tutorials)

<p>With LibraryH3lp's new Services Designer, it's even easier to create code snippets for embedding chat widgets into your website!<br /><br />Why snippets? With a single snippet, you can:<br /><ul><li>Associate widgets with queues, to give your chat entry points the right look and feel.</li><li>Customize how your chat service looks when offline.</li><li>Add custom HTML code before or after your chat widget.</li><li>Easily switch between our <a href="http://docs.libraryh3lp.com/which-widget.html" target="_blank">three widget types</a>.</li><li>Create <a href="http://docs.libraryh3lp.com/service-rollover.html" target="_blank">Service Rollover</a>, if desired.</li><li>Make changes from within the <a href="https://libraryh3lp.com/admin" target="_blank">admin site</a> without modifying your web pages!</li></ul><br /><div>Code snippets can be pasted into your web pages, <a href="http://docs.libraryh3lp.com/libguides.html" target="_blank">LibGuides</a>, and pretty much any place that accepts HTML and JavaScript.  Our code snippets are optimized for speed and won't interfere with loading of your larger web pages.<br /><br />Once a code snippet is deployed, you can make changes to the look and feel of your chat service solely through the LibraryH3lp admin site.  (Hopefully, your IT department won't start to think that you don't like them anymore since you can do everything yourself.)</div><br /><h4> Services Designer Tutorial (powered by iorad)</h4><div>With a new tool comes new <a href="http://docs.libraryh3lp.com/putting-widget-on-page#service-designer" target="_blank">documentation</a>, and we tried a new-to-us tool (<a href="http://www.iorad.com/" target="_blank">iorad</a>) to <b>quickly </b>get a tutorial for the new Services Design up and running.<br /><br />[Blog post edited Oct 13, 2014, since the iorad-backed tutorial content is no longer available via iorad's site.  PS] </div></p>

With LibraryH3lp's new Services Designer, it's even easier to create code snippets for embedding chat widgets into your website! Why...