We need the ability to pop-out the Chat window just like Hangouts did

[laplangh]

Greetings,

We need small and manageable Chat windows instead of the full screen ones we are forced to use now. The ability to pop out a Chat means we can move the Window about and resize it as we please. This used to be possible in Hangouts and can still be done with a draft in Gmail. This is a fairly minor change but it does have a big impact on our users.

Thank you

[icrew]

You can either use the standalone Chat PWA desktop app or go to chat.google.com to get a separate chat window. 

Hope that helps, at least a little...

Ian

Ian

[laplangh]

Thank you for replying. 

I hadn't realized that it's possible to open multiple instances of the Google Chat app. While it does work and it does help, it's not a perfect solution because there is a lot of wasted space that is taken by the side bar being opened in both windows.

Thank you again

[StephenHind]

@laplangh you can have the small chat window if you want: use the Exit full screen button at the top right:

This gives the smaller pop-up windows so you can have multiple of them (you can do this in both the Chat app and Gmail):

By default Spaces come in full screen (so you can see and use the Files and Tasks tabs) but you can "minimise" them this way to see multiple pop-up chats.

I'm hoping that's what you're looking for judging by what you're describing.

[laplangh]

Thank you for the thorough reply. Unfortunately this solution does not fit our use case as we need the chat windows to be moved independently and to take as little real estate as possible.

[icrew]

You might want to post this to the Feature Ideas section here. See https://www.googlecloudcommunity.com/gc/Feature-Ideas/gh-p/workspace-ideas-group, and https://www.googlecloudcommunity.com/gc/custom/page/page-id/Workspace-Feature-Ideas-FAQ for how to get access. This will allow it to be upvoted by others and possibly considered as a future feature enhancement.

If you are submitting a feature idea, be sure to explain the problem that you're trying to solve with the feature idea, not just the idea itself. For example, saying "when my users are trying to do 'A', they often get confused by the fact that the buttons to do 'X' and to do 'Y' look quite similar to each other, which leads to this unintended consequence" is far more likely to get fixed than a feature idea that just says "change the color of the button 'Y'".

Cheers,

Ian

[laplangh]

Thank you for the advice. I'll give it a shot later this week. Cheers

[StephenHind]

@laplangh just making sure you know you can collapse the left-hand main menu of Chats and Spaces and hide the right-hand side panel so you can make a very small window, e.g.:

You can then use Chrome's Create shortcut feature to make an icon/shortcut for a particular chat etc.

@icrew's suggestion of making a feature request is definitely the way to go if this doesn't work for you.

[laplangh]

Thank you but I think I'll need to follow icrew's advice on this one

[jjrjfitz]

I have the ability to see the compact view of google chat with the option to exit full screen. That gives me the desired minimal chat box I want but the full screen view stays in the background.  If I minimize one, I minimize both.  Can I just minimize the full screen and keep the minimal chat box open and top of other applications?

[JahdeF]

Thank you so much! This is so very helpful to know about chat.google.com. I shared it with so many people in my company. You are great and a blessing to others. Thank you!

[jjrjfitz]

I have the ability to view the compact view of chat and see the what I am calling a "minimal box view" but the large, full screen display remains on the screen. Can I minimize the full screen display and just keep the minimal box view open and on top of other applications?

[sduszynski]

YES. This is incredibly inconvenient. I always have many windows open at one time, and if I'm working on an excel doc on one screen, researching something on the other screen, I need to have the chat box popped out in the corner so that I can keep tabs on it in case a coworker is trying to contact me. 

[Sskyking]

I was just moved from Hangouts, and I wholeheartedly agree!  I have four people I chat with nearly daily, and I like having each chat window outside the browser space and overlapping on the left side.  This way I can leave a little space open from my browser on the left and be able to see if any of the chat title bars go green indicating a message.  It's far more natural, too, to look to the left for a chat window than to the right, as most Westerners are used to the top-right corner being the natural place to start reading.  I almost wonder if this feature might've been designed by someone native to the Middle East, where many read right to left?  It just feels very odd!  Using full-screen, as an alternative, also can present some confidentiality issues in some environments.

[bill_pier3]

Have you read the previous posts?  You can use the Chat service in a separate window, and even collapse the left sidebar of users, chats, and spaces, you can move this window anywhere. If you're on a Chromebook, you can also use the Android Chat app along side your Chrome browser windows!  

So, what more flexibility is needed?

[sduszynski]

Had you used the chat box popped out in the upper left-hand corner of your screen frequently before this update, Bill? If so, the difference should be starkly apparent to you. This is the best I can do now, and it's completely awful.

As you can see, I do have the chat open in a separate window. And yes, I can move it anywhere. However, unlike before, when the chat was simply the compact chat box itself and not an entire browser page, if I want to view it on the left side of my second monitor, it overlaps onto my first monitor. This means anytime I click on it to respond to someone, it pops the window open in front of whatever I'm working on on the first screen. 

So, what don't you understand?   

[bill_pier3]

.

[maurahadaway]

I used the Chat PWA and it is SO much better. Not like the old Hangouts, but definitely better.  I can make it work.

[SamCoupe]

Opening a chat in a separate window like this requires you to:

• Open a new tab with chat in it. (2 clicks)
• Drag the new tab out into its own window (click and drag)
• Select the chat you want in it (1 click)
• Resize the window so it's not huge (click and drag)
• Adjust the position of the resized window so it's where you need it (click and drag)

That's 6 clicks and 3 drag operations.

Compare that to how it used to be with hangouts:

• Click the button the pop the chat out into its own windows
• Drag it where you want it.

That's 2 clicks and one drag.

If you never leave the Workspace ecosystem the current system is just fine but if you work with software that's not part of Workspace it's hopeless. Personally I spend a lot of my day working in terminal windows, text editors and local file browser windows and I usually don't even have my main browser window open on the same desktop as the one I'm working on.

The PWA doesn't seem any better than just having chat open in its own tab.

[Turtle_Bob]

Google has a way of having a very useful product and then they screw it up.  Ex. Chat and Google Assistant.  I've had to stop using chat on my laptop and I've disabled Google Assistant on my phone.  Once very useful but are now useless.

[lva6000]

exactly as Sam wrote!  this is possible in MS Teams and in Slack also. Not in Google Chat

[HawkX]

Sorry for reviving an old-ish thread, but i was searching for a solution today and found this post...

While this is a decent workaround, the problem is that the new tab that you drag out will have a lot of "useless garbage" (bookmark bar, address bar, buttons, tab at the top) -- and the google chat has a much bigger "left side bar" when opened from chat.google.com (or from gmail which is basically the same)... that prevents making it that much smaller because of it.

The previous version of google chat or hangout had a "pop out" which would make the same size of window like when you click "open in popup", however it was stand alone, no address bar, no bookmarks, no google or gmail interface, just the selected person chat window. This is what people are trying to get back.

[dan158]

Just migrated from hangouts.  Very frustrating that this feature does not exist in google chat.  The google chat version is quite useless as a replacement.  I'm sorry the hangouts team lost this internal google battle and we all suffer the consequences.   And yes I understand there are proposed workarounds in this thread, but they don't capture the essence of the original hangouts popout that was as simple as the old AIM chats.

[joker9069]

I agree, but the ChatPWA is the closest thing we'll have. 

[gotransitfan206]

Maybe there is an extension that can open a website (chat.google.com) in a popup view like Hangouts, then you can assign a keyboard shortcut to it?