![\"Welcome](\"https:\/\/byrondoss.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Welcome-Screen-06-07-16-2.54.28-PM.png\")
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The ugly parts<\/h2>\n
Once you have created your Teams and Channel, you finally get a good look at what the actual screen looks like.<\/p>\n
On the left hand side you see your Teams and Channels. \u00a0In the middle is the chat area. \u00a0And in the upper right hand corner you have your search icon, how many people are in the channel and then your profile pic.<\/p>\n On each of your teams there are two choices that you have. \u00a0You need to click the three blue dots to the right of your team name to get either New Channel or Team Options. \u00a0And just for some clarification here. \u00a0You DO NOT have a way to delete either a team or a channel. \u00a0This is but one of many the most frustrating parts of Semaphor. \u00a0I understand why you wouldn’t want a Member of your teem or Channel not to have the ability to delete. \u00a0But if you are the Admin. \u00a0The one setting up this shin dig, then damn it, you should be able to delete what ever you want to. \u00a0And you can’t. \u00a0At least I haven’t found a way to yet.<\/p>\n Then down at the bottom you have two icons. \u00a0One is to view the channels you have. \u00a0The other is for any private messages.<\/p>\n Now adding channels and teams is easy. \u00a0But the hard part comes when you actually have to invite a person to be part of your team.<\/p>\n So in other programs, you just click on a link that says something like “Invite users”. \u00a0And it allows you to put in their email address and send an invite. \u00a0Well, this isn’t that simple. \u00a0Semaphor has done a great job of making this as freaking complex and somewhat complicated as possible.<\/p>\n See I just can’t invite someone to a channel. \u00a0I first have to invite them to join the team. \u00a0So what you do, is click on the three blue dots nest to your team name and then click Team Options. \u00a0Then on the right hand side is a series of letters and numbers that is specific to your team. \u00a0You must send that to the person you wish to invite. \u00a0Mind you they have to download the application first. \u00a0 Once that is done. \u00a0You have to wait for them to let you know that they have requested to join. \u00a0Yup, you wait. \u00a0And the reason for this is because Semaphor doesn’t notify you that you have any join requests. \u00a0At least, I never got any. \u00a0So unless you are just sitting around looking at the join request screen, you will never know that someone is asking to join unless they tell you.<\/p>\n Once you do get a request, you then must approve them. \u00a0I can see why this is necessary. \u00a0You want to make absolutely sure that no one other than those wanted\u00a0are in the Team you created. But I find it extremely hard for anyone to be able to match the specific invite code for the team. \u00a0So I’m looking at it from both sides of the fence. \u00a0I see a need for it, but at the same time, it’s a duplication and an extra step.<\/p>\n Once you approve the person, then they are added to the Team Directory. \u00a0Now that you have them in the Team Directory, you can invite them to the channel you created. So you can’t just invite them straight from the left of the main area by right clicking on the #General(or whatever your channel name is). \u00a0No, that would be to easy. \u00a0You have to go up to your menu. \u00a0Go to the “#General” menu, then click on the “Invite to Channel” \u00a0WTH????? \u00a0So two extra steps just to get to where you can invite the person you just invited to the team, to the channel you wanted them in all along. \u00a0 SO once you are at the invite panel, then you click on all the members you wish to include to the channel. \u00a0Simply click on the box next to their name, click on the button that says “Invite Selected” and then they are finally in the channel. \u00a0Now, I can somewhat understand why this is. As you grow your team, not everyone needs to be in a channel. \u00a0Maybe you have a #Sales channel. The billing clerk doesn’t necessarily need to be there. \u00a0That makes perfect sense. \u00a0What doesn’t make sense is how I had to go back to the support page to figure it all out. There should be a way to make this a much more intuitive way to invite people.<\/p>\n So far to get to this point, it took me all of 20 minutes. \u00a0Yup, 20 minutes to invite one person. \u00a0Now I’m sure when you have this process down, it goes a lot quicker. But wow, I was so frustrated at this point, that I almost threw my hands up and just deleted the entire application.<\/p>\n So now we have all that admin stuff out of the way, we can get to what is really the meat and potatoes portion of our little thing. \u00a0The actual collaboration with a person(s) in a channel. \u00a0It goes as all of the collaboration tools go. \u00a0You type at the bottom, hit Enter and it shows up in the middle. \u00a0But, bear in mind that each message takes a second to “complete”. \u00a0This is because the message is being encrypted before it’s sent. \u00a0I can live with that. \u00a0So long as it doesn’t take a coon’s year, I’m good with waiting. \u00a0But, and you knew there was going to be a but. \u00a0There is not a way to edit a comment. \u00a0In applications like Slack and Ryver, there is a side menu of the comment. \u00a0And in there you can edit what you said. \u00a0Maybe you need to change a misspelled word. \u00a0Or maybe you want to delete a sentence from the conversation. \u00a0You can’t with Semaphor. \u00a0So you leave it all out to the wind when you hit the Enter key.<\/p>\n You are able to attach any size file or picture that you wish. \u00a0But, there is no way to expand the picture, like you can in Ryver or Slack. \u00a0So if someone puts a small picture in there, you are going to have to download the picture and then view it on your computer that way. \u00a0That hopefully is in the works for a fix. \u00a0Otherwise that get’s a #fail.<\/p>\n Just like all the other collaborative apps, you can send a private or direct message to a specific individual in the channel or team. \u00a0So to do that, first you have to click on their avatar(profile picture), then you hit the “Message” button. \u00a0This takes you to a screen that shows just the private messages between you and that individual. \u00a0Getting here was at least painless.<\/p>\n As you can see from above, you can also give different permission levels to a person. \u00a0While this is great, at this stage, it really doesn’t matter. \u00a0But, at least there is something..right???<\/p>\n I’m gonna wrap this thing up. \u00a0I will preface this by saying, I know this is Beta. \u00a0I know this is the rough draft time. And I give Semaphor the benefit of the doubt in that area. \u00a0 BUT, and I’m not going to hold back. \u00a0If SpiderOak want this to be successful and want this to be the place for secure and encrypted communication and collaboration, then they have got to do a better job. \u00a0They can’t come to this type of application half cocked. \u00a0There are a lot of negatives right now.<\/p>\n I’m sorry to say, but Semaphor has a lot of work ahead of them. \u00a0I LOVE the idea of a 100% encrypted collaboration tool. \u00a0Unfortunately Semaphor doesn’t cut it for me yet. Nor does it cut it for the people in the ByronDoss.com community. Nor would I use this for my other business. If you want to be on the fore front of this and want to really test it out. \u00a0You can click here<\/a> and go try it. \u00a0But, it still has a lot to do. And I’m not sure if they can get it up to speed fast enough!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Semaphor by SpiderOak.. It’s a whipping I was fortunate earlier today to get an invite to try out the Beta version of Semaphor. \u00a0this is…<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\nThe invitations….Let’s get personal<\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\nThe main attraction<\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\nIn Conclusion<\/h2>\n
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