IRC, short for Internet Relay Chat, is a text-based chat protocol that allows clients to communecate with other clients (or servers). IRC users connect to one of numerous networks and then join one or more of the channels.
- Servers:
a point to which clients may connect and talk to each other, and a point for other servers to connect to, forming an IRC network. Read more
- Client: Anything connecting to a server that is not another server.
- Develop an IRC server in C++ 98 without developing a client or a server-to-server communication.
- The executable will be run as follows:
./ircserv <port> <password> - The server must be capable of handling multiple clients at the same time and never hang.
- Communication between client and server has to be done via TCP/IP (v4 or v6).
| Command name | Definition | Usage |
|---|---|---|
| INVITE | The INVITE command is used to invite a user to a channel. | INVITE <nickname> <channel> |
| JOIN | The JOIN command is used by a user to request to start listening to the specific or multiple channels. You can leave all the channels by using 0 as a parameter | JOIN ( <channel> *( "," <channel> ) [ <key> *( "," <key> ) ] )/"0" |
| KICK | The KICK command can be used to request the forced removal of a user from one or multiple channels. | KICK <channel> *( "," <channel> ) <user> *( "," <user> ) [<comment>] |
| MODE (user) | The user MODE's are typically changes which affect either how the client is seen by others or what 'extra' messages the client is sent. | MODE <nickname> *( ( "+" / "-" ) *(modes) ) |
| MODE (channel) | The MODE command is provided so that users may query and change the characteristics of a channel. | MODE <channel> *( ( "-" / "+" ) *<modes> *<modeparams> ) |
| MOTD | The MOTD command is used to get the "Message Of The Day" of the given server | MOTD |
| NICK | NICK command is used to give user a nickname or change the existing one. | NICK <nickname> |
| PRIVMSG | PRIVMSG is used to send private messages between users, as well as to send messages to channels. is usually the nickname of the recipient of the message, or a channel name. | PRIVMSG <msgtarget> <text to be sent> |
| NOTICE | The NOTICE command is used similarly to PRIVMSG. The difference between NOTICE and PRIVMSG is that automatic replies MUST NEVER be sent in response to a NOTICE message. | NOTICE <msgtarget> <text> |
| PART | The PART command causes the user sending the message to be removed from the list of active members for all given channels listed in the parameter string. | PART <channel> *( "," <channel> ) [ <Part Message> ] |
| PASS | The PASS command is used to set a 'connection password'. The optional password can and MUST be set before any attempt to register the connection is made. Currently this requires that user send a PASS command before sending the NICK/USER combination. | PASS <password> |
| PING | The PING command is used to test the presence of an active client or server at the other end of the connection. Servers send a PING message at regular intervals if no other activity detected coming from a connection. If a connection fails to respond to a PING message within a set amount of time, that connection is closed. A PING message MAY be sent even if the connection is active. | PING |
| PONG | PONG message is a reply to ping message | |
| QUIT | A client session is terminated with a quit message. | QUIT [ <Quit Message> ] |
| TOPIC | The TOPIC command is used to change or view the topic of a channel. | TOPIC <channe> [ <topic> ] |
| USER | The USER command is used at the beginning of connection to specify the username, hostname and realname of a new user. | USER <user> <mode> <unused> <realname> |
| WHO | The WHO command is used by a client to generate a query which returns a list of information which 'matches' the parameter given by the client. | WHO [ <mask> ] |
| WHOIS | This command is used to query information about particular user. | WHOIS [ <target> ] |
While our server implementation was largely guided by RFC2812, we made sure to take into account additional resources as well:
- Beej's Guide to Network Programming
- Sockets and Network Programming in C by Mia Combeau
- RFC2810
- RFC2812
- Modern IRC Client Protocol
- irc-tester to test multiple clients and stress test the server.
- W3C IRC server to see how an official server would respond to some commands