hehe.. well you want kick + ban, max online limit ? (i will leave out the start/stop times as you can figure a way to deal with that manually -- ie make the link not work or have a default screen -- for now)
also, i'm using a decay algorithm that offloads the server and it's kinda not right yet.
basically, if you are just idling in the chat window, your delay between async xmlHTTPRequests decays to a longer time (to a limit of course).. this offloads the server load..
when you start chatting or doing things in the chat window, the decay is restored to the 'fast' value (configurable)
i will get a prototype up tomorrow or next day for you to play with.
once caveat.. php 5, so i can use the zend built in json_encode routine (very fast).
if you MUST have php4, then there is a workaround, but i don't recommend. (slower and in php code vs compile c)