Using the Chat app
This page walks through the Chat app at chat.centralcodestation.com as someone using it for the first time. What you can do depends on the Chat permissions your administrator has granted to your role. Administrators: see the Administration overview.
Sign in
Section titled “Sign in”Select Sign in in the top bar. On Sign in to CCS Chat, select Continue with Central Code Station. You sign in with your Central Code Station account and come straight back to Chat. New here? See what CCS Chat does returns you to the welcome page.
Choose a workspace and an application
Section titled “Choose a workspace and an application”A workspace is your organisation (a tenant). On Choose a workspace, select yours. If you belong to several, you can switch later. If you belong to none with Chat switched on, the screen says “Your account isn’t a member of any workspace with Chat switched on yet.” Continue where you left off takes you back to your last application.
Then, on Choose where to chat., select an application. Conversations live inside one application. An application that has Chat switched off is greyed out with Chat off and cannot be opened. If none has Chat, the screen says “Chat isn’t switched on for any application you can use in this workspace.” Select ← Other workspaces to go back.
If there is only one choice at each step, Chat skips the screen.
Once you are in, the top bar has a workspace menu (Switch workspace) and an application menu (Switch application). The account menu, opened from your initials, has Switch workspace, Manage account, Enable notifications and Sign out. If your role allows it, an Administration link also appears.
The chat screen
Section titled “The chat screen”The left side lists your conversations, newest activity first. When a new message arrives, its first words show under the name. A New label marks conversations with unread messages. Select Load more at the bottom for older ones.
| Type | How it looks | What it is |
|---|---|---|
DIRECT |
The other person’s name | A conversation between two people |
GROUP |
A name | A private conversation with several people |
CHANNEL |
A name with # in front, and Private when it is private |
A space for a wider group. Public channels can be read without joining |
To start a conversation, select + Conversation, search in Search people (2+ letters)…, tick one or more people and select Start conversation. Pick more than one person and you can name the group. To create a channel, select + Channel, fill in Channel name, an optional description, Public or Private, and select Create channel. Each button appears only if your role allows it.
Write and react
Section titled “Write and react”Type in Write a message… (@ to mention someone) and select Send, or press Enter. Press Shift and Enter for a new line.
- Reply quotes the message you answer. Cancel with the ✕ on the reply bar.
- @mentions: type
@and choose a person from the list. Their name shows in bold. - Reactions: select 👍 ❤️ 😂 🎉 😮 or 😢 under a message. Select it again to take yours back.
- Edit and Delete appear on your own messages. Edited messages carry an edited label. A deleted message shows “Message deleted”.
- Someone with moderation rights can delete other people’s messages.
In a public channel you have not joined, Join to post adds you. In groups and channels, Leave is at the bottom of the conversation.
Unread, typing and presence
Section titled “Unread, typing and presence”Unread conversations show New in the list. If new messages arrive while you are scrolled up, ↓ New messages jumps to the latest. “name typing…” appears while someone writes, and a dot beside a person’s name shows when they are online. At the bottom, Live means updates arrive as they happen. Reconnecting… means Chat is restoring the connection. Archived conversations carry an Archived label and cannot be written to.
Notifications
Section titled “Notifications”Chat shows a small message card when a message arrives in a conversation you are not looking at. To be told even when the Chat tab is closed, turn on web push: select Allow notifications in the Turn on notifications banner, or Enable notifications in the account menu, and accept your browser’s prompt. If your browser has blocked notifications, change that in the browser’s site settings. Sign out removes the notification registration on that device.
What you cannot do without permissions
Section titled “What you cannot do without permissions”- With no Chat role, Chat says “You can open Chat here, but you don’t have a Chat role yet” and asks you to have an administrator assign you one.
- If your role has no Chat permissions yet, it says your role “doesn’t allow any Chat actions in this workspace yet”.
- Without lookup permission you cannot search for people (“Your Chat role doesn’t include looking people up.”). Without the matching create permission you do not see + Conversation or + Channel, and you cannot create groups.
- Without send permission you can read but not write: “Your Chat role doesn’t allow sending messages here.”
Ask your tenant admin to change the permissions of your role. If you lose access to a conversation while you have it open, Chat returns you to the main screen with “You no longer have access to that conversation.”
Sign out
Section titled “Sign out”Open the account menu and select Sign out. Chat marks you offline, removes web push from that device and ends your Central Code Station sign-in too.