Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
For Windows, Mac OSX and Linux, there is
Xchat
(http://www.xchat.org/).
Pidgin (http://www.pidgin.im/) for Linux and Windows supports many protocols
including IRC, as does Adium (http://www.adiumx.com/) for Mac OSX. And for
all platforms, the Mozilla browser suite has an extension called
Chatzilla
(http://www.mozilla.org/projects/rt-messaging/chatzilla/) which supports IRC.
Using IRC
Connecting to a chat room is straightforward. We'll show the basics of using
IRC (a good tutorial may be found at http://www.irchelp.org/irchelp/irctutorial.
html). An IRC client is required. IRC clients operate in two modes. What you
type into the input window will be sent to the chat channel and seen by other
users. But you can also type in commands, which alter behavior and are not seen
by others. IRC commands always begin with the '/' symbol. Most graphical IRC
clients have menu pull-down options for the most common commands, so it is
typically not necessary to remember them, but it should always be possible to
use the command mode directly.
Example:
Connecting to an IRC Channel
You start by setting up a
username
or nickname for yourself; either with a
log-in screen for the client, or with the
/NICK nickname
command. You have to know the IRC channel name you want to interact with
and the server that it is hosted on. You can use the menu pull-downs to con-
nect, or type
/SERVER server-name
/JOIN #channel-name
andthenyouwillbechattingonthechannel,untilyouusethe/LEAVEcommand.
Messages you send to the channel will appear in the discussion window preceded
by your nickname, so that everyone can identify the sender. It is also possible to
send a message to a single inidividual on the channel, using
/MSG nickname message
If the channel does not exist when you join it, it is created new and you become
the operator. Being the operator allows you to set some policies regarding
