WHERE CAN I SAVE THE CHAT CONVERSATION FOR MY APP?

[AceK]

hi everyone, hope all is well. I've designed a chat application, the sever part of the application is connected to a database to capture registration details of the new subscriber and authentication details of existing subscribers. My problem is that I don't know how to capture the chat conversation between two people so that when the conversation is ended it can be saved for them to continue where they left off next time. My problem is that I don't know where to save the conversion (i.e. in the database or some text file). thanks

[N36fSL3A]

I'd say the database.

[ResidentBiscuit]

Either or. Text files are nice in case they need to view the conversation offline. Database is nice if this app runs on multiple platforms. They can chat on their phone, and then pick up the conversation on their computer, for example.

[13bSLyTq]

SQL Database, as .text files increase the amount of File Storage needed too much, however for a "less experienced" developers who cannot\does not program with SQL, .text files might be the easiest.

Facebook is a great example, all the friends of a single account is stored in a database similar to SQL but called FQL (Facebook Query Language).

[ResidentBiscuit]

Text files for conversations will take up very little room. This entirely depends on what functionality OP is wanting. If a centralized database is not necessary, then no sense in adding it in. Just adds complexity.

[chrisname]

Plain text files would be simpler and probably wouldn't take up much space, but if you wanted to do fancy highlighting and other formatting it would be better to use a light database like SQLite because it presents the data in a more flexible format - it wouldn't have to be parsed a second time and it lets you share conversations across multiple devices more easily. You could also add a feature to generate plain text files.