Is there a simpler way to achieve this style of user messaging?

Question

I have created a messaging system for users, it allows them to send a message to another user. If it is the first time they have spoken then a new conversation is initiated,

Answer 1

it is being used on fiverr.com and www.infinitbin.com. I developed the infinitbin own. It has two databases like yours too. the inbox table:-

+----+--------+----------+-------------+------------+--------------------------------+
| id | useridto | useridfrom | conversation | last_content | lastviewed | datecreated|
+----+--------+----------+-------------+------------+--------------------------------+

This table is very important, used to list the conversations/inbox. The last_content field is 140 charaters from the last message between the conversations. lastviewed is an integer field, the user who lasts sends a message is the last viewed, if the other user in the conversation reads the message. it gets updated to NULL. Therefore to get notifications, you for lastviewed that is not null and not the logged in user's id.

The conversation field is 'userid-userid', therefor strings. To check if users have started a conversation, you concatenate there user_ids with a hyphen and check it.

This kind of messaging system is a very complicating one.

The second table is quite simple.

+----+--------+----------+-------------+-------+
| id | inboxid | userid | content | datecreated|
+----+--------+----------+-------------+-------+