Introducing 'Lus' | A realtime messaging platform built in Drupal and Node.js

(Available as freelancer)

Joris Snoek

Business Consultant
/ Drupal Developer

Recently we produced realtime messaging platform 'Lus' in our labs, but why and how?

Background story

A few years ago we developed OpenLucius, still a popular open source Drupal platform which could be used as social intranet, project management and/ or file management.

But at a certain point we also appreciated the value of popular realtime communication apps like Slack and Trello. Even though OpenLucius also has a task board and messaging, they aren’t in realtime. Neither does it have group messaging in channels, like they have in Slack.

Optimization of communication

We wanted to use these features to further optimize our projects and communication, both internally as well as externally, with customers and suppliers.

But Slack and Trello missed some features which are crucial for our business processes and its constant optimization. For example, we’d also liked to:

• keep our data in-house;
• have a platform that caters to and can be expand on our business processes;
• have one consistent system instead of multiple app islands, where info lives incoherently.

We were also very eager to master the modern realtime techniques in Node.js with help of Socket.io.

The Node.js realtime/ streaming techniques are also being used by platforms like PayPal, Spotify, Netflix and Uber by the way.

Introducing Lus: realtime communication platform

That’s why we developed Lus in our Lab. Lus has bundled all functions (well, the basics) we saw spread across other systems into one. It's a realtime messaging platform where you can optionally use:

• projects and tasks;
• clocking and budget management;
• documentation (wiki).

Successful experiment turns into mature product

What started out as a lab experiment, turned into a success in the field. Customers inquired about the product. Since then it has grown into a mature platform, which is being run by its first customers.

Currently we’re also developing iOS and Android apps and the necessary API for it as well.

What’s next

We’ll keep on developing the product based on feedback, mainly making current features more user-friendly and optimising code on scalability . At some point we hope to release it as Drupal distribution, just like we did with OpenLucius.

Functional details

Check the Lus website and Lus docs website.

Teaser screenshots

Realtime Messaging

Tasks

Mentions

Realtime file sharing

Your thoughts matter

As said, we like feedback. So what's your take on building this in Drupal / Node.js ? This can be from a technical -or functional point of view.

Please let me know in the comments!