The Kayako Chat Gateway is a service hosted by Kayako, which let's you use your own IM apps to connect to your helpdesk to manage live chats.
Rather than using Kayako Desktop to connect to your helpdesk, your team can use their messaging apps to connect to the Chat Gateway, which in turn connects to your own helpdesk. This means that your team can handle live chat on their laptop, smartphone and tablet.
How it works
Most messaging apps use a standardised protocol called XMPP, which powers popular instant messenger services like Google Talk.
The Kayako Chat Gateway is a service hosted by us which speaks the Jabber protocol. You can connect your IM app to the Kayako Chat Gateway, and in turn it will connect to your helpdesk.
Getting started
Kayako OnDemand customers
Kayako OnDemand customers do not need to do anything to get started; they can go straight ahead and configure their messaging app.
Kayako Download customers
The Chat Gateway is available to Kayako Download customers with an active product updates and support subscription, and whose helpdesks are available over the Internet.
In order to use the Chat Gateway, it needs to know where your helpdesk is located.
To get started, you need to create a 'throw away' yourhelpdeskname.kayako.com address, which will point to your helpdesk. You only need to use this address to configure your IM app to connect to the Chat Gateway – after that, you can forget about this address.
Click here to register yours (you may need to log in).
Configuring your messaging app
In this example, we are using the IM app Adium for Mac.
The type of account you need to add will be named Jabber or XMPP (this varies depending on which IM app you are using - in this case, Adium uses the term XMPP).
You will then need to enter a username. Some IM apps may refer to this as a Jabber ID, Jabber Username.
If your helpdesk is located at http://acmeinc.kayako.com and your staff username for that helpdesk is mystaffusername then your Jabber ID will be mystaffusername@acmeinc.kayako.com Your password should simply be your staff user account password.
NOTE: Kayako Download customers will need to register their own name at my.kayako.com (which will point to your helpdesk address) to use the Chat Gateway.
Finally, you need to specify the server to connect to. This will be the Chat Gateway server address: chatgateway.kayako.com
In this case, Adium refers to it as the Connect Server, other IM apps may refer to it as Server, Hostname, Jabber Server. The port number for this server is the standard Jabber port: 5222
Handling chats
Buddy list and chat queue
On logging into your helpdesk via the Chat Gateway, your IM app buddy list will have the following:
- Staff teams and available staff (like in Kayako Desktop)
- A Visitors (Waiting) group, that lists incoming chat requests
- A Visitors (Chatting) group, that lists visitors with chats in progress
Incoming chat requests
When an incoming chat request is sent to you, it will come in the form of a new message sent from the visitor. For example, when visitor Chris requests a chat, it comes through to Jesse like this:
To accept the chat, Jesse just needs to send a response.
To reject the chat request, Jesse can send $end (or ignore the request and depending on your helpdesk configuration, another staff user will be tried or the Chris will be asked to leave a message).
$commands are never sent to the visitor.
Ending a chat
To end a chat that is in progress, send the $end command or if your IM app supports it, ('... has closed the window' notifications), simply closing the chat window will end a chat.
Transfer a chat
To transfer an in progress chat to another staff user, send the $invite Staff Name command. This will invite the staff user to the chat. In the example below, Jesse is going to transfer Chris' chat to Varun:
Varun is logged into the Chat Gateway on his iPhone at the time, and the chat invitation alert comes through to him like this:
Varun can accept the invitation request by sending a message or reject it by sending the $end command. In this example, Varun accepts the chat by sending a message:
When you accept an invitation request, the chat transcript is played back to allow you to catch up.
Once the staff user you have invited to the chat has joined, Jesse can $end command to leave, or can stay in conference mode:
Joining an existing chat
You can join an in progress chat by sending a message to any visitor listed in the Visitors (In Chat) group.
Observing a chat
If you have the permission to observe chats, you can silently observe a chat by opening a chat window (from the Visitors (In Chat) group) and sending the $observe command.
Other features
'is typing...' indicators
The Chat Gateway supports 'is typing...' indicators for both staff users and visitors (if your IM app supports these indicators too - most do).
Viewing visitor information
If your IM app supports vCards, you will be able to access visitor information (such as geo-location or browser information) by opening their vCard.
Gurpreet Singh