

Show HN: Hosted IRC for Teams (my first startup) - pepijndevos
http://teamrelaychat.nl/

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ad93611
There is an opportunity for IRC and XMPP protocols to co-exist in the same
group chat and solve customer needs better.

One of our customers is a YC company, that moved their group chat from a IRC
based system to our XMPP based group chat product[1], because IRC did not work
well for them. After they started using us, we figured that some people still
preferred IRC and some wanted the ease of use of XMPP. The solution was a
simple bot that will bridge the messages between the IRC channel and the group
chat. This is now working out very well for them.

They now have benefits of both IRC and XMPP on their website. I'll be happy to
talk more details and possibly collaborate. My email in profile.

[1] - <https://groups.gaglers.com/>

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philsnow
You can also have an irc interface to xmpp group chats using bitlbee.

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sandstrom
Perhaps there is something to learn from grove.io (I'm not saying it's a bad
idea, only that you should learn more about what didn't work for them -- which
you presumably already have)

<https://grove.io/blog/grove-shutting-down-october-13>

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dsl
Pownce, Convore, Grove, all shared similar fates, I think its more indicative
of the founder not the business.

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iloveponies
Personal opinions of said founder aside, all three were bringing arguably
trivial products to market where there already was a large presence of two or
more players dominating (Twitter/Facebook/status.net for Pownce,
HipChat/Campfire for Grove) and with a lack of game-changing innovation to
separate them.

Makes less sense to blame the people, rather than lay blame to what they did
(or did not) do.

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dsl
> bringing arguably trivial products to market ... with a lack of game-
> changing innovation to separate them.

It sounds to me like you are judging the founder. Not that I would disagree
with you.

Don't get me wrong, I think Leah is awesome. She just builds up companies for
soft landings/aquihires and pockets some money along the way. There is no
reason a viable company couldn't exist on the grove model.

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bravura
I need it to be dead simple for people to join the chat, using existing chat
clients. i.e. whatever they have installed, I can't ask them to install
something new.

What I mean is this: A lot of people I want to invite into chat, it's an
experiment for them and they aren't really committed.

Oh, I have to install IRC software? Sorry, too much work.

Oh, I can't access it from AIM/gchat/etc? Sorry, too much work.

These are the people I want to onboard, so they can see the value in
participating in my chat room.

What is the tool that allows me to attract anyone to the chat room, without
them installing new software?

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jakerocheleau
Would the best solution be a web-based client? I have XChat on all my Windows
machines and use Colloquy on my Macbook so I never worry about IRC support.
But it's obvious that not everybody uses IRC on a daily basis.

I would wonder if it's possible to support people using their own desktop
client, while others alternatively use a webpage on the site which connects
into the same IRC channel.

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kami8845
I don't want IRC. I want HipChat (inline images, ability to directly upload &
share media, persistence, good searching, integrated video, HTTP API) but with
non-shit native clients. IRC is a fucking dinosaur, I feel something like this
doesn't have the capability to really improve the situation.

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sgt
Agree - for me, the persistence is the most important, something which IRC
doesn't offer. I'm not always on, and in a business setting it's crucial to be
available for messages at all times, even if I'm going to actually read the
messages later. I can also find out what the others have been discussing.

~~~
dsl
Check out IRCCloud, they keep a client connected on your behalf 24/7 then let
you connect to it when you open the web app.

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tjosten
Why would I pay for IRC?

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scriptdude
I know right? Am I missing something here? What does this server offer _extra_
that would explain the hefty $20p/mo pricing? I can just open a free private
IRC channel on any server and use that?

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pbiggar
Describe "on any server". Like a $20/m AWS micro?

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kyrias
On any IRC server. There's absolutely no reason to host your own.

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danial
This looks cool. Nice job.

I like the IRC style of chatrooms as it's familiar to me, but as others have
already stated, I would prefer a service that provides additional features
(ala HipChat or Campfire) such as file sharing, searchable history, and allows
attendees to jump on a video call. Bonus points if you allow users to join
over the phone as well.

We use Google Hangouts for video conferencing with my team of 3 (all remote),
but we have to keep a campfire session open for sharing files and links
relevant to the discussion. Even with this set up I'm missing a way to join
our ad-hoc conference calls over the phone when I'm away from my computer.

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StavrosK
Hey, this looks like it would go well with what I'm currently developing:
<http://www.getinstabot.com/>. I'll give it a shot, congrats!

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pepijndevos
That looks great. How does it compare to, say Hubot? That's what is running on
TRC.

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StavrosK
Well, the idea is that it will provide more functionality without the hassle
of hosting it yourself. As to the specific commands, Hubot has more, at the
moment, but Instabot's list is growing.

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fredoliveira
Perhaps creating a thin layer of middleware so that your work supports hubot
scripts is a good idea, then!

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StavrosK
Yep, but hubot scripts are already very short and easy to implement, so it
shouldn't be much trouble either way!

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christianboyle
It's a bad idea to use "I'll" and "Forever" in the same 6" radius of each
other.

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niggler
"I'll publish the deploy scripts and help you migrate."

This might actually be useful sooner rather than later.

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pepijndevos
I'm in here and on the demo server to answer questions and take feedback.

Word of advice: don't all pick demo1.

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nixgeek
If you control the IRC daemon is there any reason we can't have full server-
side logging of all channels and 1:1 interaction in a similar way to HipChat,
et al?

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Xylakant
How does it compare to grove for example?

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pepijndevos
Good question. They are obviously similar in that they are both IRC and more.
The key is in the 'more' part.

One thing I'm working on is file sharing. This already works in the web
client. Desktop is going to be tricky, involving DCC probably.

Currently my search/history story is not so strong, but that's also being
worked on: <https://github.com/znc/znc/pull/325>

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jokull
Congrats! It’d be cool if I could collect uploaded files and logs into S3.

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pepijndevos
You can! Well, sortof.

On the web client you can upload files to S3. Logs are stored on local disk
though.

Web interface for logs is being worked on:
<https://github.com/znc/znc/pull/325>

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klrr
Why is it soo expensive? Otherwise relatively good idea.

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pepijndevos
Because you get a full VPS, maintained by me.

At 10 people, it's already cheaper than other services, which usually charge a
few bucks per user.

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wedtm
Your pricing is what failed it for me. I can get a 512MB VPS from DigitalOcean
for $5/month.

I love this idea, though. I just feel that your approach of giving a full VPS
is a bad idea. People who want a full VPS will buy a full VPS for much cheaper
than the 20GBP you're offering it for.

What you need to do is multi-tenant your hosts, and isolate them from each
other. Then you'll get costs savings that you can pass on to your customer;
which will put you in line competitively with the likes of HipChat and
Campfire.

Great idea, can't wait to see what comes of it!

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absconditus
The cheapest Campfire plan is $12 per month and the second cheapest is $24.
HipChat is $2 per user per month. 20 euros per month with no user limit is
entirely in line with this pricing.

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rekoros
Can I search chat history with this tool?

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ninetenel
What are the advantages of this over say a hosted jabber or lync system?

also what authentication options are available I can't seem to find a mention
on the site

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btipling
Personal projects are not startups. I don't know where this falls in, but it
bugs me when I see something where someone maybe spent a couple of weeks on it
and call it a startup. Have you talked to investors? Have you quit your day
job? Are you seeing startup like weekly growth?

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pepijndevos
I'm pretty serious about this.

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pbiggar
If I may ask, why? I don't personally think this is going to be successful,
what with Hipchat and Campfire in the same space (which are very very popular)
and grove.io having a good name for it and competing directly against you.

Edit: I think you also misunderstand the value proposition for your customers:
you mentioned above that you should buy because you get "a full VPS,
maintained by me", which is very odd.

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city41
There is also Flowdock[0], which wants to compete pretty aggressively here
(disclaimer, I work for the company that bought Flowdock)

[0] <http://www.flowdock.com>

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pbiggar
Yes indeed. I have a FlowDock account and my company (<https://circleci.com>)
integrates with you guys.

I'm curious though: how big are you guys? I only mentioned HipChat and
Campfire as they appear to be pervasive, and while I've been hearing more and
more people mention Flowdock, it doesn't seem like you're an 800 pound gorilla
that he should be afraid to compete against (yet!).

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city41
I don't know how much I can really say to be honest, but I do think Flowdock
will compete more in the future.

~~~
pbiggar
Cool, looking forward to seeing it!

