X Windows IRC Hack
xIRCh v0.11
(pronounced "zirch")
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Old Screenshot (v0.1)
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New Screenshot (v0.11)
Get version 0.11 here: xirch.tar.gz
FYI, most of the following information was written almost 3 years ago.
Please don't flame me for any comments or references that you dissagree with,
as they were probably valid when I wrote the text. It is intended purely
for reference purposes.
What is xIRCh?
xIRCh is an IRC client that I am developing. I intend it to be fully
functional someday, and maybe on the same level as a windows program known
as mIRC. However, it is being written for the X Windows enviroment.
Why am I making it?
Yes, there are other X Windows IRC clients out there. So why make another
one? The answer is very simple. All the other ones are junk. Through my
intensive search for a good X Windows IRC client, I came across one programs
that worked well, called Zircon. This program was the best IRC client
available for X Windows, but I disliked many things about it. It severely
lacked many features. For one, it did not support the standard ircII
commands that all IRC users find so useful for quick and dirty stuff. Then
I also noticed that it completly lacked the simple ability to display @'s
and +'s before appropriate nicks in channels. It also lacked many of the
foramtting codes (color, etc.) that were supported in Windows clients like
mIRC and PIRCH. Most of all, it had no interface for simple scripting or
any advanced features. So after much frustration, I choose to make my own
IRC client, starting with little knowledge about IRC client-server
communication, except the RFC document and some help files on UNIX socket
programming.
What am I making it with?
I am writing this program entirely in the C++ programming language,
utilizing an extremely good X Windows C++ programming library, known as the
Qt toolkit. This library is soo good,
that most development time is spent on writing the program, and working on
it, rather than getting it to compile or preventing it from crashing all the
time. If you ever consider X Windows development, I recommend that you try
it. It is also well documented, so learning it is a breeze.
When can I get it?
I do not know whether I will wait until version 1.0 to distribute the
program, or if I may distribute it as soon as I have a resonably functional
pre-release version. I plan to wait until development proceeds as much as
possible, to prevent people from forming permanent opinions of a program
before it is impressive. Basicly, I don't want people hating it as a
pre-release, and then continuing to dislike it after it is a very good and
capable program, because of a bad experience with a pre-release. If I do
release it once it is resonably capable, then I may only dirtribute it as a
binary compiled for the Linux system, so I don't have to worry about
preparing the source code with all the extra GNU license stuff that is
needed for the full release. The full release will most likely contain full
sources so it can be compiled on any UNIX system that supports the Qt
toolkit.
History:
- 0.1 - Has the ability to connect to a local IRC server, login, and display
the logon messages and MOTD. It is also able to respond to pings from the
server. Support for sending raw commands to the server through a "/raw"
command has been implemented. The "/whois" query works, but I al still
having trouble getting more than one line of the reply to display unless
another query to the server is made. I have yet to complete the server
setup dialog's functionality, which should be part of this version. Once
completed, this version will demonstrate that all the underlying basics of
the program work, and that all the rest is just adding features to
pre-existing server communication code. (This version is still in
development)
- 0.11 - Implements basic channel and private message windows.
Questions? Comments? Useful information?
E-Mail me at konigd@rpi.edu