Andela Chat Quick Guide

User Panel

Located on the upper left side of the screen, the user panel allows you to edit your status, personal preferences, and settings. When clicking the avatar icon, a panel will be displayed as below:

The User Panel is divided into three main sections:

• Name and Current Status: Displays the user name and the current status selected by the user
• Status Selection: The second section shows the statuses available for the user to choose: online, away, busy, or invisible.
• The Edit Status option allows the user to customize their status by adding a custom status message

• My Account and Logout
  

Preferences

In thePreferences section, you can configure and set your own preferences on Rocket.Chat server.

To access this menu, navigate to Avatar Menu > My Account >Preferences.

Appearance

Currently, there is no option to change the overall appearance of Andela Chat, but based on feedback from the Andela Community, we are working on giving users a  Dark Mode option.

Notifications

This section allows the user to change their notification preferences.

• Require Interaction to Dismiss Desktop Notification: When enabled, notifications must be attended to before they can be dismissed. i.e they will remain in the notification panel always.

• Show Desktop Notifications For: Lets you select the type of messages for which the notifications have to be triggered (for both browser and desktop app notifications).

• Send Push Notifications For: Lets you select on what type of messages you wish to receive push notifications for.

• Offline Email Notifications: Lets you set what type of message notifications you want to receive by email.

Sounds

Configure the sound used for notifications.

• New Room Notification: A dropdown to select the sound when added to a new room.

• New Message Notification: Sound to play for every new message.

• Mute Focused Conversations: When enabled, rooms that are opened and active will not create notifications.

• Notifications sound volume: Lets you specify the volume of the notification sound.

Profile

In this section, you can verify, edit and update your profile information.

To access this menu, navigate to Avatar Menu > My Account > Profile

Profile Picture: Lets you upload a profile picture, or use a default avatar.

Use URL for avatar: Takes in a URL to fetch avatar.

Name: Your name e.g. John Doe. This cannot be altered, as it is linked to your Andela platform account.

Username: Your username e.g. john.doe. This cannot be altered, it is a required default for your profile.

Nickname: Lets you set your nickname if you so choose. This is your preferred name and can be used by other users to tag you. Otherwise, your username will be your default name.

Status Message: Lets you specify a status update, along with a color.

Bio: Your bio. Let other users know who you are!

Email: Your email address. Currently this cannot be altered as it is linked to your Andela platform account. 

Global Settings

The icons on the right-hand side of the interface are related to global settings within your Andela Chat account.

Directory

In the Directory, you can search for:

• Channels - you will see public channels, and private channels in which you are already a member
• Users - all users
• Teams (not in use currently)

Managing the Sidebar

When you have joined a channel or initiated a DM, it will appear in your sidebar. You then have some options available when you hover over the channel and click on the three dots.

Hide will remove the channel or DM from your sidebar. You can find the channel again in the channel directory, or by using the search tool. The channel will also reappear in the sidebar when new activity occurs.

Mark read/unread allows the user to mark messages in a channel as read without accessing the channel. A channel can also be marked as unread as a reminder to return to the channel later.

Favorite channels are added to a Favorites section in the sidebar. You can use your display settings to configure where your Favorites section sits in your sidebar.

Leave channel removes you as a channel member. If the channel is public, you can find it in the directory and join again if you wish. If the channel is private, you will not see it in the directory and will need to be invited back into the channel by an existing member. 

Display

In Display settings, you can choose how channels and messages are displayed in the side panel.

Create New

Create a new direct message. Members of the talent community can create single and multi-user private messages, but cannot create new channels. New public channels may be added sporadically by the Community team, and Andela staff have permissions to open new private channels for the purpose of the work of the Client, Match and Delivery teams.

Channel Icons

• The icons on the left-hand side of the interface are related to settings within the room (channel, private message). Explore these icons and you will find:
  Channel information

• Channel threads

• Channel members

• Search

• Attachments

• Channel notification settings - change settings for individual channels

• And more…

Channel Members

When you wish to explore the full list of channel members, you can click on the Members button. You can search by name, and filter by online/offline. You will also find here two buttons; one opens an Invite link that can be shared with other users, the other allows you to add users directly without inviting.
It is also possible to invite individual users to a channel by typing the command /invite in the chatbox.

Message Formatting

Depending on whether you are in a Direct Message or a Channel, you will find some options for messaging.

• Channels: Emojis, text with some basic formatting options (Markdown can be used for additional formatting), and uploading a file from your computer. 

• Direct messages: Same as above, and will also include the option to leave a voice note.

These options will evolve over time to include other inputs and sources.

Adding an image

If you wish to include text when you upload an image, you can include it in the File description textbox. It will appear as normal-sized text above the image in the chat.