Contents:
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The
Basics of IRC
by Kufat This issue, I'll cover two of the useful tricks I've picked up in my time on IRC: /whois nick nick and /ping #channel. 1. /whois nick nick With a normal /whois command, you're asking the server you're currently on to tell you information about another client connected to the same network. (Another person on DALnet, for example.) This should look something like this: ¤¤¤ Whois : evenstar
(evenstar@gator085.greater.net)
(Your client may format it differently, but this is the general information shown.) Let's say you want to know if someone is currently here. Sometimes they may set themselves /away, but other times they leave no indication that they're away. You can see how long they've been idle with the following command: /whois nick nick. For example, when I type /whois evenstar evenstar, I get this: ¤¤¤Whois : evenstar
(evenstar@gator085.greater.net)
See? Now it shows how long it's been since Evenstar typed a line in IRC. CTCPs and messages in DCC windows don't change this idle time, typing in a channel, /msg, or /notice do. Depending on your client, you might have to type /raw whois nick nick. You can make a mIRC alias to automatically do /raw whois nick nick by clicking the green and white /a on the toolbar and pasting: swhois raw whois $$1 $1 Then, you simply type /swhois nick. It's
not a great big deal, but it makes life easier. I use it fairly often.
2. /ping #channel *** Bob (bob@dialup212.isp.com) has joined #channel
Ever seen that? It's a good thing to do, finding out how lagged you are when you come on IRC, but there's an easier way. The first thing that many people don't know about pinging is that me pinging you, and you pinging me, are the same thing. It's a little bit of data, sent roundtrip over the network, so it doesn't matter where it originated. To ping an entire channel (Which is very useful to find out if you're lagged from the people you'll be talking to) you just type /ping #channelname, like /ping #dalnethelp. Be prepared for a lot of ping replies; doing this on a huge channel is probably a bad idea. ;) Hope this helps, and if anyone has any questions
or suggestions or anything else they want to say, I can be reached on DALnet.
You might want to /swhois me first, though. That way you'll know
if I'm away. ;)
copyright 1999 @ Kufat |