[Harper]

This is long winded. :)

I hope somebody can take a peek at this website and maybe help me learn how I can start one of my own.

Here is the URL to my example;

http://www.roleplayuniverse.com/gore...y/whochat.html

If you go here, in order to see what the chat room itself looks like, click on one that has nobody in it. It will ask for a name and password, but I think you can put any name and any pw and it will let you in. You don't have to sign up. That's been my experience at these any how. The chat is free but if one wants extra perks then they must sign up and pay a fee.

These whochat websites are all over the place and contain multiple chat rooms under various themes. For people who like to roleplay. If there is already somebody on here that is familier with these, you probably don't need to go to the example, that I have provided above, to know what I am talking about.

These chats are browser based and use html to display avatars and colored text, etc. They have pulldowns that the webmaster can customize for each room. And the capability to link to other rooms so that one can travel from chat to chat with out having to log out and then back to another one. It looks like the Webmaster has control over all of the rooms but can give control to the room owner if they wish too. So the program must have a central control panel for creating the rooms and controlling them.

And now for my question. Where do you get a program for this type of chat? I have been looking high and low. Where would a person get something like this hosted? Or if I was to host it myself, what type of equipment would I need? Any thoughts you may have on this subject are welcomed. I would really love to start one of these of my own.

Thanks to any and all helpers for your time.

[LTheobald]

It's pretty easy to do really. A number of sites will provide ready to run chat programs for you to download and use. So the best thing for you to do would be to buy some web hosting and host the chat site yourself.

Hosting can cost as little as something like £2/$4 a month. You'll need a web host that supports a scripting language such as PHP or ASP (which nearly all do) and possibly a database such as MySQL (yet again, most hosts provide this). Once your website is set up it would just be a case of following the instructions for your chat application.

PHP based chat: http://php.resourceindex.com/Complete_Scripts/Chat/
ASP based chat: http://www.aspin.com/home/webapps/chat

Plus there is always a Java IRC applet: http://www.pjirc.com/main.php (see the demo page for an example).

That will hopefully get you started. Some quick notes though:

• Not all hosts like you hosting chat applications. Make sure it's OK to host one before you sign up.
• There are 101 chat sites out there. If you want yours to be a success, you'll need to make sure it has something other sites don't.