How to logout and use multiple Salesforce Orgs with Chatter Desktop !

Chatter Desktop client gives no clear way to logout from a Salesforce Org. This can be because it uses OAuth  internally to authorize with Salesforce. So this post if for you, if you want to

• Logout yourself or End your Chatter Desktop session.

• Work with multiple Salesforce orgs with Chatter Desktop.

Logout/End your session on Chatter Desktop

Though this should be rare requirement, as we always keep us logged in to Yahoo/Gtalk Messengers, unless we are working on some temporary office or public machine.

This is pretty easy to do, here are the steps.

1. Login to your Salesforce org via web browser

   

2. Goto Setup > Personal Information page.

3. On this page, locate a related list / section titled “Remote Access”.

4. If you have authorized Chatter Desktop Client,  something similar to following screenshot should appear. If you see multiple entries here, please select the one, where “Application” column is having “Chatter Desktop” entry in it (same is shown in big red circle)

   

5. Next, hit the “Revoke” link, in the first column titled “Action”.

That’s it, you are now logged out from the Chatter client. This is not a true logout, we just revoked the oauth authorization. So it leaves so loop holes behind, i.e.

This logout(Revoke) will come to effect on if the Chatter desktop client is closed and restarted. If Desktop client was launched before you revoked the rights, it will keep on working normally.

But on trying to use Chatter desktop on next restart, one will get error screen like the one on left.

Work with multiple Salesforce orgs on Chatter Desktop !

Here are the steps to do this.

1. Click on the Options button, located at the top. And in the popup menu, select “Settings”, to get to the screen shown in next step.

   

2. This screen maintains connections to all of your Salesforce Production/DE/Sandbox orgs.  By default you will see just the default/selected connection and an additional unselected connection to a Sandbox.

   

3. To add a new Org/Connection, enter server name and url in text fields, as highlighted in the screen shot. Server name, can be any good name, that is easy to remember. Server URL can “https://login.salesforce.com” or “https://test.salesforce.com” for Sandbox orgs. Lets say I want to add new production or DE org. So I will use  “https://login.salesforce.com” and will hit the “Add” button.

   

4. Next, we will see the updated Connection list, as shown below. Make sure the radio before the new org name in the connection list is selected. Selection this radio ensures, that on next run, Chatter desktop will ask user again for authorizing with a new Salesforce Org.

   

5. That’s it, you are all set now. Please restart the Chatter desktop client to see start adding new org. Any time you wish to switch back to some other org, select any other existing connection or create a new one.

Ideas & Comments

I wish, Chatter desktop client makes it simple to add new orgs. For ex. a drop down, right their in the main interface that list all existing connections and ability to add a new one.

What do you say ?

Recommended relevant reading about Chatter !

• Seesmic Desktop, a popular twitter/facebook client that gives chatter integration too !

• Salesforce Chatter Desktop client download & setup !