Irc Chat

[borfast]

First of all, since there are some people that seem to have problems using the Java Applet on the chat page, I tried to find a solution for those problems. Unfortunately, I couldn't find definite solutions, because these problems seem to happen randomly and thus haven't been tracked down by the Java Applet programmers.

 

I did find some things on their forums that you may want to try if you're having problems connecting.

• Make sure you have the latest Java VM installed - http://java.com
  
• If you're behind a firewall, make sure you can connect to port 6667 on a remote server.
  
• Make sure you click YES on the security pop-up that appears when the Applet is loaded.
  
• If you clicked NO/CANCEL on the security pop-up, reload your browser.
  

Well, now that we have that out of the way, let's start with our tutorial.

Please keep in mind that I will use TCH's IRC server (IP: 66.79.162.170 ) as an example but all the commands can be applied to mostrly any other IRC server.

Also, all the commands I'll present should work on most IRC clients.

If for some reason a command doesn't work with the client you're using, please consult the program's documentation.

I cannot cover all possible commands, thinking about people that use a different IRC client, sorry.

 

OK, so when you open an IRC client, the first thing you'll want to do is connect it to an IRC server.

That can be done using the /server command.

So, in order to connect to TCH's IRC server, we'll enter this command:

/server 66.79.162.170

Note that this is done automatically when you use the Java applet on TCH's chat page, so there's no need to enter this command.

 

OK, so now we're connecter to the server. The next thing we want to do is to chose a nickname. We do it like this:

/nick TCH-User

You should replace "TCH-User" with whatever you want.

 

If the nickname we chose is available, we'll be able to register it, so let's do it with the following command:

/nickserv register mypassword

You should replace "mypassword" with a password of your choice. It should contain at least 6 characters and both numbers and letters.

 

Now our nickname is registered and no one will be able to use it unless he/she knows our password. To make sure of this, let's disconnect from the server and reconnect:

/server 66.79.162.170

 

If your IRC client is smart and tries to use the same nickname you used the last time, you'll see a message from the server saying you need to identify yourself.

If you don't see this message, it means your IRC client is using another nickname. In that case, you'll need to change your nickname to the one you want.

/nick TCH-User

Note that you just need to do this if your IRC client doesn't remember the nickname you were using.

 

Right after this, we'll need to identify ourselves as the owner of that nickname:

/nickserv identify mypassword

Once again, remember to replace "mypassword" with the password you registered your nickname with.

 

OK, now we want to join a channel so we can chat with some other people:

/join #tch

Note that TCH's IRC server automatically takes you to the #tch channel, so you won't need to join it unless you get out of it - but why would you want to do that, anyway? Still, you may want to join other channels, in which case you just need to replace #tch with the channel you want to join.

 

Now that we're in a channel, we can talk to everyone on that channel. We just write to the channel window and everyone in the channel will see what we're saying. But there are times when we may want to say something to someone in private. For that end, we open a "query" window:

/query AnotherTCHUser

[/i]You'll need to replace "AnotherTCHUser" with the nickname of the user you want to chat with.[/i]

 

Sometimes your connection may go down and come back up again in no time. In such a situation, the IRC server may not notice that you went down and keeps your nickname as being used. This is when we can make use of another command:

/nickserv ghost nickname mypassword

Replace "nickname" with the nickname you left behind and "mypassword" with your password and after entering this command, repeat the nickname change and identification routine, to get back to using your regular nickname.

 

 

Well, here it is, a quick and dirty IRC tutorial. If anyone has suggestions and/or comments, I'd love to hear (in this case, read ) them.

 

Hope you like it!

Edited March 8, 2004 by TCH-Raul

[Madmanmcp]

/nickserv ghost mypassword

 

you forgot the nickname. Without it nickserv will not know which one to kill.

 

/nickserv ghost NICKNAME mypassword

[borfast]

Quite right!

I've edited my previous post accordingly.

Thanks for the headsup, Bob!

[Madmanmcp]

Great, you can delete my notes to clean up the topic if you wish.

[boxturt]

Nice and Handy! Thanks

[Madmanmcp]

How about adding helpserv so the old folks like me with poor memory can pull up the commands while online.