Introduction:
On this forum you might hear at times the term IRC*, which is short for "Internet Relay Client". IRC is one of the oldest, if not the oldest, form on IM, Instant Messaging, in existance on the internet. This guide is ment for the people on this forum who which to chat with other forum members in real time, or who simply wish to know how IRC* works.

To give you an example of how conversation might be on IRC, I refer you to the mIRC* Thread.

*note: IRC is the protocol used, mIRC is a windows-based client which is used to connect to IRC servers.

Selecting a client:
If you aren't using the java clients which LocationLohan and LindsayMedia offer you need to download another client, I'll only list windows clients here since most Linux distributions come with their own clients, like:
mIRC - A well known and much used Windows client.
X-Chat - This is a ported version of the Linux client X-Chat and is the client I generally use to connect to IRC-Servers.

Connecting to an IRC-Server:
In this example I'll use #Lindsay @ Quakenet as Channel @ Network.
1) Type (or select Quakenet from the server list): This connects you to a Quakenet IRC-Server.
2) Type: This allows you to join the channel #Lindsay.
3) You can now type messages and chat with the users in the channel.

Basic IRC Commands
/whois <nickname> - This command show the information about <nickname>
/msg <nickname | channel> - Sends a message to <nickname> or <channel>, most clients don't need this command to be used when sending a message.
/notice <nickname> - Send a notice to <nickname>
/ctcp <nickname> <trigger> - Ask for a response from <nickname>, mostly used <trigger> are: VERSION, TIME, FINGER, PING.
/quit <message> - Disconnects you from the IRC Server.
/part - Parts you from a channel.
/ignore <nickname | hostname> - Allows you to ignore <nickname>

For most of these commands the named clients have build in buttons and menus so you don't have to memorize all those commands.

Quakenet:
On Quakenet you can register an AUTH name, this allows you to be added to network bots like Q, W, S, L. This is how you get one of those auths for yourself.

If you get a response from Q saying this auth is already registered you need to change your nickname until you get a response from Q asking you to send your email address.
When this is done, you'll recieve a mail from Q giving instructions on how you can activate your auth.
Once you have activated your auth you can login with:

After this command most people with Q-Auths will usually type:

This will hide your hostname from people that are whoising you

Aftermath:
I hope you all join us on IRC, so the channel gets crowded again.

This post has been edited by Gregorius: Jul 7 2006, 10:43 PM

Very nice topic, something like this should've been opened since ages. Way to go, I hope a mod pins this

think there's many tutorials in hte irc thread, but never hurts repeating it
it might be a bit too deep for the newbies though, and u spelled /quit wrong ;p

Join us on IRC ppl
it might be slow at times, but when it's active it's far more entertaining than bulletinboards.