SYNOPSIS

irc [-c chan] [-p portno] [-P portno] [-b] [-f] [-F] [-s] [-S] [-t] [-T] [-d] [nickname [server list]] [-a] [-v] [-q] [-h hostname ] [-icb] [-irc]

DESCRIPTION

The ircII program is a full screen, termcap based interface to Internet Relay Chat. It gives full access to all of the normal IRC functions, plus a variety of additional options.

OPTIONS

-c chan

Automatically join channel chan.

-p portno

Set the IRC port number to portno (default: 6667, the standard IRC port). Only supply this if you connect to a server which uses a port other than 6667.

-P portno

Set the ICB port number to portno (default: 7326, the standard ICB port).

-b

Load the .ircrc file before connection to a server, not afterwards.

-f

Use flow control (^S and ^Q) to stop/start the display. Normally these are both bound to other functions within irc. This switch is ignored if the  -d switch is used.

-F

Don't use flow control (^S and ^Q) to stop start the display. This switch is ignored if the  -d switch is used.

-s

Don't start up the ircio process to connect to the IRC server (default).

-S

Start up the ircio process to connect to the IRC server.

-t

Don't use the termcap ti and te sequences when starting and exiting (default).

-T

Do use the termcap ti and te sequences when starting and exiting if they exist.

-d

Start in "dumb" mode. All input is taken directly from stdin and all output goes to stdout without using any of the termcap(5) screen control codes.

nickname

Set the nickname (overrides the environment variable IRCNICK; default: the username).

server

Set the list of servers with which irc will try to connect upon startup. This list is also used by the program's /server command. The format for lines in the list is:

  • hostname [:portno[:password[:nick]]] for IRC connections. For ICB connections, the format is:

  • ICB/hostname [:portno[::nick[:group[:mode]]]] with group being the initial group and mode being the initial group mode. See /HELP ICB for more information about ICB.

  • If the hostname is in the format :servergroup:host.com then servergroup is taken to be the Server Group for this server entry.

-a

This adds the normal irc server list to the command line list of irc servers.

-v

Print the version and release date of ircII and exit.

-q

Start up irc quickly -- don't load the IRCRC file.

-h hostname

This option instructs ircII to use the given hostname as the local address. Useful only on multi-homed hosts.

-icb

Use ICB connections by default.

-irc

Use IRC connections by default.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The Screen:

The screen is split into two parts, separated by an inverse-video status line (if supported). The upper (larger) part of the screen displays responses from the IRC server. The lower part of the screen (a single line) accepts keyboard input.

Some terminals do not support certain features required by ircII, in which case you receive a message stating this. If this occurs, try changing the terminal type or run ircII with the -d option.

Irc Commands:

Any line beginning with the slash character '/' is regarded as an ircII command (the command character may be changed; type '/help set cmdchar'). Any line not beginning with this character is treated as a message to be sent to the current channel. To produce a listing of commands, type '/help ?'. To receive information about the commands type '/help <command> '.

The .ircrc File:

When ircII is executed, it checks the user's home directory for a .ircrc file, executing the commands in the file. Commands in this file do not need to have a leading slash character '/'. This allows predefinition of aliases and other features.

EXAMPLES

irc -c #users -p 5555

Connect IRC to port number 5555 of the default host and enter on channel #users.

irc Mermaid

Use the nickname "Mermaid".

irc Mermaid server1:5000 server2::passwd server3

Use the nickname "Mermaid" and the modified server list.

irc piglet3 :ln:irc1.lamenet.org :ln:irc1.lamenet.org

Use the nickname "piglet3", initially connecting to irc.au.lamenet.org, with also irc.us.lamenet.org added to the server list, both having a server group name "ln".

irc oink ICB/www.icb.net

Use the nick "oink" making an ICB connection to www.icb.net.

irc -d

Use dumb mode.

irc -f

Allow use of ^S/^Q to stop/start screen display.

irc -e elisa

Interface IRC with a program called elisa.

setenv IRCNICK Mermaid

setenv IRCNAME The one and only :)

irc

Set the username (if not specified elsewhere) to "Mermaid". The user's name (when provided inside parentheses in response to a WHOIS command) is set to "The one and only :)".

FILES

/usr/bin/ircII

the executable program

~/.ircrc

default initialization file

~/.irc/

directory you can put your own ircII scripts into, that can then be loaded with /load

/etc/irc/

directory containing message-of-the-day, master initialization, help files and ircII scripts /etc/irc/script/local is the master initialization file for the site, loaded before .ircrc is. This is a Debian GNU/Linux conffile.

/usr/share/ircII/

shared repository for help, translation tables and distributed scripts.

THE HELP FILES

All of the ircII commands are fully described in the help files package. The best way to start here is with the /HELP? command as this prints a listing of all available help files.

SIGNALS

ircII handles the following signals

SIGUSR1

Closes all DCC connections and EXEC'ed processes.

SIGUSR2

Drops ircII back to the command line.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES

It can be helpful to predefine certain variables in in the .cshrc, .profile, or .login file:

IRCNICK

The user's IRC nickname.

IRCNAME

The user's IRC realname (otherwise retreived from /etc/passwd)

IRCSERVER

The default IRC server(s) (see server option for details)

IRCSERVERSFILE

The file containing the default list of server(s), usually PREFIX/lib/irc/ircII.servers. This file should contain one server entry per line.

HOME

Overrides the default home path in /etc/passwd.

TERM

The type of terminal in use.

FILES

ircII uses the following files under the library directory, usually PREFIX/share/irc.

ircII.servers

The initial list of servers if none are provided on the command line.

ircII.motd

Message of the day. This file is displayed only once each time it is changed.

RELATED TO ircII…

BUGS

Please notify the current developer of the software of any bugs in current versions.

AUTHORS

Program written by Michael Sandrof ([email protected]). Now being maintained by Matthew Green ([email protected]). Debian specific extensions by the Debian Maintainer Bernd Eckenfels ([email protected]). Names of contributors and contact address can be retrieved with the /info command. This manual page written by Darren Reed ([email protected]), revised by R. P. C. Rodgers ([email protected]), by the lynX, and by Matthew Green ([email protected]).