Chat

Getting an IRC Client

There are two clients that we can recommend you try if you're a newcomer. The first one is our java client that automatically takes you to out chatroom. The java client is recommended for anyone who would like to look around and see what IRC is about without having to download any software. For those of you who are more serious about getting into IRC, we recommend using IceChat. Although it's not as powerful as the popular client mIRC, IceChat is more intuitive and easier to understand and configure.

Finding the Chatroom

Unless you use the java client, your client will need to know a little information about how to get to our channel. The following is the information that you will need to connect to the channel and a brief description of what the information is used for.

Nickname - NameToCallYou - When you say something in the channel, the message will be attributed to your nickname.
Username - If you're asked for this, just use what you used as your nickname. The username doesn't have a major role in chatrooms, but it will be seen as part of your "host address" by other people.
Server, Network, Address - irc.ecnet.org - The network that hosts our channel.
Port - 6667 - Most IRC networks use the default port 6667, and ECNet (our network) is no exception. Don't be surprised if this value is already filled in.

Once your client has all of this information, you'll be able to connect to the server. Push the connect button on your client, or if your client doesn't have one or if you can't find it, type this into the console window:

/server irc.chatspike.net 6667

When your connected, you should see a flash of information shoot across the screen. You have just connected to the ECNet network.

To join #sadie's_shack, our chatroom's name, all you have to do is type this into the console window:

/join #sadie's_shack

Talking

To say something in the channel, just type something in and hit enter. Pretty simple, eh? :)

There's a few hundred commands available for your convenience, but there's only a handful that you'll find useful at first:

/me [say something here] - Let's you talk in third person. For example, typing in "/me goes shopping." would result in "User goes shopping."
/join #[channel] - This puts you in another channel. You can see a list of different channels on the network by typing in /list
/leave #[channel] [optional reason] - Leave a channel that you joined. You can also provide a reason why you left if you'd like.
/nick [name] - Use this if you want to change your nickname once you've connected.

Don't forget to remove the brackets (the "[" and "]") when you're typing in the commands. They're just used in the list above so you know not to type in what's between them verbatim.