Once an AIM account is in place as a gateway, the AIM should not be signed into directly when any associated libraryh3lp operator is signed in. If an associated librarian operator is signed in with their regular libraryh3lp jabber account, that will cause the AIM account to be online, and a direct login to the AIM account will cause a message that the account is signed in from multiple locations.
With an AIM gateway in place, patrons will contact the library's familiar public AIM account using their regular AIM client, and the librarian will receive the IM through their Jabber client using their libraryh3lp account. Note that the librarian operator does NOT need to do anything special in order to receive the library's AIM messages. Further, if a patron already has a library's public AIM identity in their buddy list, that will continue to display as normal, and it will go on and offline when librarian operators with rights to the relevant queue sign in and out of their libraryh3lp accounts.
Since all of the chat and IM traffic for a queue is centrally managed, librarian operators can come and go in shifts without disrupting each others' work. When there are zero operators for any given queue signed in, that queue and AIM identity will switch to offline status. They will go back to online status when at least one operator signs in again.
Let's look at an example. Memorial Library has an admin account called memorial-admin. Memorial-admin created a libraryh3lp queue called memorial-library and they would like to include an AIM account called m3morial. They have two librarian operator accounts that monitor their chat and IM services: Sally (sally-memorial-lib) and Ed (ed-memorial-lib). Their queue's web chat widget is at the following URL, and they can embed this in other web pages, make pop-ups, etc:
http://libraryh3lp.com/chat/memorial-library@chat.libraryh3lp.com
With the AIM gateway, they can now integrate their AIM account with this queue. In the libraryh3lp.com admin web interface, after creating their queue, they will select "my gateways," and list the AIM account name (m3morial) and password.
Now, when either of the librarian operators signs into their libraryh3lp operator account in their Jabber client, the library's AIM account m3morial will come online as will their web chat widget.
If two librarian operators are signed in at the same time, they will both get patron IMs (and web chats), but only the first to type will become connected with the patron.
We've made a few screencasts (Flash required) to help illustrate many parts of libraryh3lp:
- Example site setup. Shows admin account registration, user (librarian operator account) creation, queue creation, and AIM gateway creation. (1:42; 1.7 MB)
- Example widget creation and librarian client setup. Basic chat widget implementation in simple HTML page. Widget is offline until librarian operator signs in to monitor it in Pidgin client. (1:55; 1.8 MB)
- AIM conversation example. Reviews AIM gateway in admin interface. Shows AIM patron in Pidgin having conversation with librarian operator in Psi. Note that patron does not need Pidgin; it was just convenient for testing. (2:31; 3.4 MB)
- Presence changes. Illustrates widget and AIM buddy online/offline presence changes while librarian operator signs in and out of Psi client. (0:45; 745 kB)
- Multiple operators. Illustrates a patron arriving through a chat widget asking a question when two librarian operators are online for that queue. One librarian is in Pidgin while the other is in Psi. Also illustrates librarian's view of chat when patron disconnects. (2:11; 2.97 MB)
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