Small rake task for a better customer support chat experience with HipChat. Hide link to your support chat room if nobody is there to help. No CHAT ROOM is better than an empty one.

gistfile1.rb

desc 'Update Chat Status'
namespace :scheduler do
  task :update_chat_status => :environment do
    begin
      # Connect to HipChat
      hc = HipChat::API.new(HIPCHAT_API_KEY)

      # Fetch your support chat room id
      room_id        = hc.rooms_list['rooms'].find{|r| r['name'] =~ /conferencebadge\.com/i}['room_id']
      # Fetch users in room
      users_in_room  = hc.rooms_show(room_id)['room']['participants'].map{|p| p['user_id']}
      # Get your team user ids
      help_staff_ids = hc.users_list['users'].map{|u|u['user_id']}
      
      # Update a boolean variable, somewhere, we use an Option table in our database.
      set_status (users_in_room & help_staff_ids).any?
    rescue
      set_status false
      raise
    end
  end
end

def set_status(value)
  Option.find_or_create_by_name(:chat_status).update_attribute(:value, value ? 'true' : 'false')
end