Since the website at talk.eduk8.me just isn’t up to everyone’s standards on using IRC for group chats I’ve put together a brief tutorial on installing a Chrome app that works a lot better than the website. It is also prettier. 🙂 (I also stumbled acrossed Tiny Tiny IRC tonight, but the install is a little more involved, so this will be a later project.)

For this tutorial, you’ll be using Google Chrome. There is a Chatzilla add on for Firefox, and if there is a demand, I’ll put together a tutorial for Firefox users (although you’ll probably be able to use this one to get started with Chatzilla). In Chrome, go to the Chrome Apps store and search for CIRC (or click the link). Install the app, and then launch it.

You’ll be created with a nice chat box, but you’re not connected to any servers yet. Before you connect to a server, you’ll need to set a nickname. In the message box, type /nick NICKNAME where NICKNAME is the nickname you want to use.

Now you are ready to connect. In the message box, type /server talk.eduk8.me (If you haven’t noticed, all of the IRC commands start with a slash (/)). CIRC will connect you to the server.

Once on the server, you need to connect to a room. Type /join #tlah to join the Teach Like a Hacker. Rooms are created and destroyed on the fly. If you join a room that doesn’t exists, a room will be created. And as soon as the last person leaves a room, the room is destroyed.

Now that you’re in the room, start typing! On the left you will see a list of members of the current room along with a list of connected servers and channels. Anything typed in the box that doesn’t begin with a slash will be sent to everyone in the room.

Want to go native? Or mobile? Here are some other clients to check out:

• iPhone: TurboIRC – Free or Colloquy – $1.99 The iPhone clients have an issue with the fact iOS will kill the app when it’s in the background running for ~10 minutes. Both of these clients will warn you before they are disconnected.
• Android: TurboIRC – Free
• Windows, Linux, OS X: jIRCii – Free (Requires Java 1.6+ but their website is awesome! This client is unbelievably fast.)
• Windows: HexChat – Free
• OS X: Colloquy- Free
• Linux: Pidgin – Free (Does about every instant messenger service)
• OS/2: Quassel IRC – Free
• Amiga: WookieChat – Free
• Atari ST: AtarIRC – $5.00
• Apple //e, C64, C128, Atari 8-bit: Contiki – Free (Requires additional hardware)

(This is just a list to get you started, there are a plethora of clients available for the modern operating systems!)

It’s funny the cycles that tech goes through. When the Internet was in its infancy, everything was as open as it could be. The protocols were all based on open standards, and your machine could talk to any other machine. Then came the online services of the 80s. Compuserv, AOL, Delphi, Prodigy. Each service trying to keep you in their own little world. Messages did not pass between the services for the most part. In the 90s with the creation of the world wide web things became more open again. THe juggernaut of AOL/Compuserv collapsed while the other services faded into obscurity. This lasted until the middle 00s with the popularity of social media services such as Facebook and Twitter. We are now moving back to the 80s where everyone wants to keep you on their service. Alas, that is a rant for another day…

Fortunately, there are technologies that have been around to help minimize some of these influences. Today I’m talking about Internet Relay Chat (IRC). Created in 1988, IRC is a simple chat protocol that supports channels (or rooms) and private messages.

To help you get started, I’ve set up a chat room called #eduk8me on Freenode. To connect, you simply have to visit the Freenode web chat client. Create yourself a nickname, enter the captcha, and click Connect. The channel field will already be filled in.

Welcome to #eduk8me! Send me a private message saying hey! This will send me a notification.

/msg mr_rcollins Hey!

The simplicity of the protocol has some issues that we’re not used to dealing with. The first is that there are no accounts. You can reserve your nickname though, so others cannot use it unless they have the password. Freenode has a FAQ which deals with nickname registration. If you are just starting out you really don’t need to worry about it.

Where this comes in handy is when you want to have a group chat. IRC doesn’t require yet another user account and can scale pretty well. There are ways to do moderated chats too.

Check it out and tell me hi!