Now you may be thinking; “That chat program is still around?” or “What the heck is a eye-arr-see?”
Well let me tell you my friend. It stands for Internet Relay Chat and it’s been around for 34 years. It’s pretty much perfected at this point and quite easy to use if you have even the slightest technical knowledge.
So IRC servers are separate from one another with each server having it’s own admins. Each server you connect to has it’s own bots ran by individuals to messages and ask for things.
IRC servers work by sending slash commands much like discord does. To message another user you might type /msg coolboot2000 hello world! Piracy on IRC works by sending a bot a pm with the pack number you want.
“Where do I find servers and bots and pack numbers?” It’s as easy as using a xdcc search engine. http://sunxdcc.com/ has both a search and a list of networks. (DCC is Direct Client to Client meaning no files pass thru the server and XDCC is a version of DCC that allows large files to be transferred.)
“How do I connect?” You use an IRC client with SSL support. ~mIRC~ AdiIRC for windows and Hexchat with a patch for Linux. Once installed you can use the slash command /connect or use the clients GUI buttons to make a connection to the server.
“How do I make my own IRC client?” Follow the specifications here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Internet_Relay_Chat_commands There are a ton of pre-made IRC libraries for pretty much every programming language.
Best luck friends!
edit: updated 11-6-23
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I think this post should come with a huge disclaimer that IRC is highly addictive and a major time suck. If you’re trying to remain productive, avoid IRC.
SOURCE: I was on IRC all the way back to the 90s.
Fun fact - some games also have integrated IRC clients!
Unreal Tournament 99 (and now Unreal 227) is one of them. Don’t seriously use it lol, it’s just funny how the internet worked back then to have that included in a game.
Unreal Tournament 99 (and now Unreal 227) is one of them. Don’t seriously use it lol, it’s just funny how the internet worked back then to have that included in a game.
But…You’re saying we could have an Unreal IRC client!? Who wouldn’t want an IRC client with a retro game attached? 😂
I haven’t used IRC since the 90’s but it blew my mind the other day when I found out mIRC is still going.
Oh wow. I completely forgot about mIRC.
Looking in my emails I still have my registration email for it. Dated 17th May 2003. Over twenty years ago! The links in it all still work too!
Thank you for registering your copy of mIRC, much appreciated. Your registration name and number are shown below. To enter your registration you must run mIRC, open the Help menu in the menubar, and then select the Register menu item. You can also register by pressing the keys Alt+H+R while in mIRC. Removed Removed xxxxxx-xxxxxxx Please remember to print out this email and to save it in a safe place for future reference. Getting started: If you are new to mIRC, you can find a beginner's guide to getting started at http://www.mirc.com/install.html Useful FAQs: The IRC and mIRC FAQS, which can be found on the mIRC website, answer most if not all of the frequently asked questions relating to IRC and mIRC. Recommended reading! You can also find answers to specific questions in my personal FAQ at http://www.mirc.com/khaled/faq.html Mailing list: If you'd like to be notified when a new version of mIRC is released, you can add your email address to the mIRC mailing list at http://www.mirc.com/mailing.html Helpful links: The 'More Info' section on the mIRC website has links to many interesting IRC-related websites, including links to books on IRC, technical information, and more. Hint of the day: Each window in mIRC has a system menu with useful features. You can view it by clicking the top left corner button in any window. See the 'System Menu' section in the mIRC help file for more information. Thanks again, Khaled
Where are the files ultimately hosted and who is paying for the bandwidth?
How do the servers avoid being taken down?
Where are the files ultimately hosted.
by the bots.
How do the servers avoid being taken down?
connections are Direct Client to Client. the server never sees any data. Same way google gets around linking to pirate sites. They don’t host any files themselves.
That’s not true. IRC is a client-server system. Your messages go to a server and are “relayed” to clients.
It’s not a p2p messaging system
I started using it on a daily bases since I switched to Linux. The distro I use as daily driver and other large projects have their support team on IRC.
It is much much better than posting on forums. You get instant response.
It is much much better than posting on forums. You get instant response.
Agreed. Even for channels that aren’t tech-related, if I have a quick question, I typically get a faster, more in-depth response than forums/Reddit/whatever. They may not always be the correct answer, but they usually point me in the right direction. Anyone still hanging around on IRC tends to have good troubleshooting instincts.
Since RARBG shut down, I been using IRC more often for 2160p releases that are tougher to come by. Also, I never stopped using it for chatting. You won’t ever catch me using that bloated Discord garbage.
Could you tell a resourse for 2160p releases? Did not know IRC could be used also for such “big files”.
Seems like the recommended https://sunxdcc.com/ has some 2160p releases, though not anything that usenet or private trackers wouldn’t already have better versions of (from what I can tell).
IRCHighway ebooks channel is great
I recently bought mIRC for this purpose after 30 years of borrowing it. Felt like I needed to being a relevant piece of software after all this time.
Is it really still the best IRC client in the world? I stopped IRCing 15 years ago but nobody came close back then.
I prefer HexChat for a Windows IRC client.
“Is that code?” - people seeing my IRC client of old. Yes, I want my IRC back.
Irssi baby
