{"id":2842,"date":"2011-10-30T05:14:10","date_gmt":"2011-10-30T09:14:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/blog\/?p=2842"},"modified":"2021-10-19T06:48:45","modified_gmt":"2021-10-19T10:48:45","slug":"irc-chat-protocol","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/blog\/irc-chat-protocol\/","title":{"rendered":"IRC: The Longest Standing Chat Protocol"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>On our personal computers, we have <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aol.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">AOL Instant Messenger<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.yahoo.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Yahoo Messenger<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/support.skype.com\/en\/skype\/all\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">MSN Messenger<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.skype.com\/en\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Skype<\/a> and perhaps, if you are one of those users who has friends on all of those networks, a multi-messenger program, like <a href=\"https:\/\/trillian.im\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Trillian<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pidgin.im\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Pidgin<\/a>.\u00a0 On our phones, we have mobile versions of these, or we have proprietary messaging software such as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.blackberry.com\/us\/en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Blackberry Messenger<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>We live in a world where the ability to be connected to others instantly is so important that we are bombarded with ways to do so.<\/p>\n<p><strong>IRC: the program that helped the world communicate in real time<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In 1988, an avid Bulletin Board Service (BBS) user was inspired to replace the chat function on the service called \u201cMUT\u201d or \u201cMultiUser Talk\u201d with something a bit more elegant.\u00a0 From that moment of inspiration came <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mirc.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">IRC, for \u201cInternet Relay Chat\u201d<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>During its early days, IRC was used primarily for group discussions held in real time.\u00a0 Through the use of a client to reach the server, the user chooses a nickname to go by in the channel (chat room) that they choose to be in.\u00a0 Most IRC servers do not require that you register an account, however most offer the option so that your nickname will not be taken by another user.<\/p>\n<p>When a user connects to a server, they then choose a channel or a chat room in which they want to participate and from there go on to meet and speak with others from around the globe. Initially IRC was a plain-text only service, however as time went by and new client programs were created, this became more of a standard although not a hard and fast rule.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Common and historical uses for IRC:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Common chat about topics with groups of people<\/span><\/strong>: Usually each channel will have a topic assigned to it by the person who created it.\u00a0 It is generally considered rude to break away from the topic unless the room is designated as a hang out rather than a discussion room (<em>don\u2019t you wish some days on the Internet that rule was still respected?).<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">File Sharing<\/span><\/strong>: Some of the first file sharing activities originated on IRC through its transfer protocol called DCC (Direct Client to Client) transfer.\u00a0 Users would enter a room and through the use of automated \u201cbots\u201d, which allow users to set up profiles and list what files they had available for sharing, they would then send a private message (PM) to the user who had files which they desired and negotiated a transfer.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Government uses:<\/span><\/strong> A little known fact is that in the early \u201890s both the US government and the Russian military had critical uses for IRC.\u00a0 The United States used it during the Gulf War to securely and quickly send information about ongoing conflicts.\u00a0 The Russian military the next year used it to report on their coup, otherwise silenced by a Russian media blackout.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>IRC in today\u2019s information superhighway<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Other chat services have followed it throughout the years, but IRC has remained a favorite for the technologically astute because of the flexibility of the code used to communicate and share files across the net.\u00a0\u00a0 For example, IRC was one of the first protocols to be ready for the jump to <a href=\"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/guides\/dns\/#ipv4ipv6\">IPv6<\/a>.\u00a0 Users are the base of the IRC experience, creating scripts and bots that host user profiles, play music in the channel, handle notes as if they were e-mail from user to user and even play games.<\/p>\n<p>The channels became one of the first real examples of the Internet, becoming a world onto itself.\u00a0 While not flashy and filled with bright colors like some chat programs now available, and certainly not offering web cam chats or voice chats, the atmosphere keeps bringing people back.\u00a0 Even in this day of Flash everything and phones that do everything but read your mind (<em>is there an app for that?<\/em>), IRC still today pulls users back into its simple, elegant world.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Servers, Channels and Services<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>So, are you ready to go explore the world of IRC? Excellent! Allow me to give you a short guide to the spoken and unspoken rules of this ancient place:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>IRC is not anonymous.<\/strong> Do not expect that you are impervious to attack or information phishing while on IRC. While some servers do mask your hostname, not all of them do, and once the message leaves your keyboard and goes out into the open chat room \u2026 it\u2019s there. Anyone can log it, save it, edit it, etc.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Choose an intelligent handle or nickname<\/strong>. A nickname that states the interest that brought you to the server in the first place is always a good choice. For example, you join #Dalnet and enter a room named \u201cPastry as Art\u201d which you gather from the title is a room about the art of creating pastry. Using the nickname of \u201cLadyfinger1972\u201d would not be unheard of. You enjoy eating and\/or making ladyfingers and the 1972 might be your birth year, or the year you graduated culinary school. On the other hand, use a nick name like \u201cBigBadBear\u201d, and you\u2019ll start hearing the chuckles.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Do not accept DCC\u2019s from those who you do not know and trust!<\/strong> A DCC is a file transfer and can contain any number of viruses which would do bad things to your computer. You may start to notice at this point that some of these rules apply everywhere on the net.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Be polite<\/strong>. Read the rules of the room if they are posted and generally behave in a way that shows that you have respect for others who are sharing the room with you. This is one rule that doesn\u2019t apply so much on the rest of the Internet; maybe this is what brings people back.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Last but certainly not least<\/strong>: do not send private messages without making sure that the recipient is OK with being PMed. They might be busy, or they might not want to talk to you at all. Don\u2019t force yourself on others.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>IRC was created to facilitate communication between people all over the world in order to share information about their hobbies and interests. While its command-line interface may be increasingly foreign to a world that\u2019s even phasing out mice and keyboards for touch screens, it\u2019s not hard to learn. There are many great servers out there, ranging from those aimed at teenagers and their interests, to adult dating sites and colleges who have rooms for their students to gather and converse about last night\u2019s lecture. More than twenty years after its introduction there is still something for everyone! So, kick back, log in and have a nice chat!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On our personal computers, we have AOL Instant Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, MSN Messenger, Skype and perhaps, if you are one of those users who has friends on all of those&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2863,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2733],"tags":[3926,3233],"class_list":["post-2842","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tools","tag-files","tag-skype"],"views":152,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2842","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2842"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2842\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2863"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webhostinggeeks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}