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The account admin system provides administrative and reporting tools
to InstantService's customers. Admin users can create and manage
departments and agents and run activity reports. I designed the
brandable user interface and navigation system, and performed much of
the rework.
Click on an image below to see a full-size version in a new window.
This is the account admin home portal, displaying the InstantService brand.
The horizontal menus across the top of the screen change depending on the
user's privilege level and current location. Each main area in the
application is represented by an icon; one of these appears on each page to
reinforce the user's sense of location.
The customer form is used to configure the user interface of a small intro
screen that appears prior to the customer chat session. This page lives
in the departments area, and the
menu items have changed to reflect this. A 3rd-level menu
is used when several screens modify portions of the same thing, in this case
a department. Breadcrumb navigation lets the user backtrack through the
screens accessed prior to reaching this one.
The response libraries store text and URLs that agents can use during a customer
chat or mail session. The response libraries screen is used to view and select
responses for editing. The example shows text responses for an agent,
but responses can also be associated with departments. The HTML layout for
this screen template was a lot of fun to work out.
Here's a different-looking home portal that sports the Sento brand. Some large
call centers that are themselves service providers want all applications they
offer customers to display a common logo and color scheme. The InstantService
sales folks like this because it means they get to sell to high-volume users.
The method I came up with to support multiple brands without dedicated machines was
to set a cookie at login that stores the desired brand, and then retrieve the
correct set of branded images and stylesheets throughout the session using the
cookie value.
Here's a "before" picture showing account admin prior to rework. The
original version used dynamic pull-down menus (which weren't all that reliable)
and which covered up the page content when used. The
navigation was not very organized; this can happen easily on a system that has one
little piece added by one developer and another by someone else. Developers
spent nearly as much time fixing navigation problems with the old menu system as
they did developing new features. The company and its customers are very
happy with the new user interface.
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InstantService is an application service provider, which means the company
hosts chat, email and administrative software on their own hardware, and charges
customers for services. This works well for both the vendor and the
customer; a new InstantService account can be up and running in production
in less than a day.
InstantService is a privately-held firm in downtown Seattle. It's a
well-managed outfit that has growing
sales and usage and enthusiastic customers.
So can you recommend any good technical books on Java/Web development?
Sure, happy to.
There's a lot you can learn for free on the web, from good sites like Sun's
Java developer site and the Google mail groups, but I like to browse for answers
in books. Sometimes seeing examples unrelated to what I'm really looking
for will spark a connection and point me in the right direction. Here are
some favorites:
 DHTML: The Definitive Reference
Danny Goodman wrote this great client-side coding reference. It covers HTML,
JavaScript and the DOM, and has good introductory chapters. The most worn-out
book I own.
 User Interface Design for Programmers
Joel Spolsky authored this cheerful little book with lots of pictures. Lighthearted
and funny enough to read on the bus, but hits the nail right on the head.
 Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide
Eric Meyer literally "wrote the book" about CSS. This is the best
place to learn what you can do with CSS and, just as important, what you should
give up on for now.
 Unicode: A Primer
Tony Graham wrote this good introduction to the Unicode standard. I'm fascinated
by internationalization on the web, and this book helps relate the different
character encoding standards so they begin to make sense.
 Java Cookbook
Ian Darwin wrote this great book full of short little examples of how to do stuff.
Saves a ton of time figuring things out.
 Java Internationalization
This book discusses how to code in Java for an international audience. The authors
do their best to get you pointed in the right direction. Well-written and interesting.
 Java Class Libraries, Vol 1
These references have examples of practically every method of every object in the Java APIs.
Just look 'em up and see how they're used. Brilliant. The hardcover weighs a ton.
 JavaScript: The Definitive Guide
David Flanagan created a wonderfully lucid introduction to the language, and also included
a solid reference in this book.
And a few handy websites:
 Java Developer Connection
Sun's Java Developer site is sort of the mother lode of all Java Sites. Get the
software, read the discussions, look something up in the API, it's all here.
 OnJava
O'Reilly publishing has a good collection of articles, book excerpts and reference
materials here.
 Google Groups
You have no idea how many times some email discussion I found in the Google groups
has solved a mystery.
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