Below are instructions for finding your way into our new IRC chat room. If you want to participate in Tuesday’s chat and you’re new to IRC, I’d suggest you try it out before Tuesday afternoon so that you can familiarize yourself with how it works (and you can call for help if you can’t get in).
If you use Mozilla Firefox as your internet browser (Windows or Mac):
You can use a java application called “ChatZilla.” Download it here (click the “install” link at the very bottom of the page, right hand corner). Once you’ve restarted Firefox, you should see “ChatZilla” as a new option in the “Tools” dropdown menu.
Click on ChatZilla to open it up. Once you’re in (don’t worry about the gobbledygook on the screen), type the following three commands in the command line at the bottom of the window (make sure to include the slash “/”):
/nick your BMG user name or other nickname (e.g., I would sign in “/nick David”)
/server irc.bluemassgroup.com
/join #bluemassgroup
(Please note that you may need to hit CONTROL+ENTER to actually send your command, or text.) You should see a list on the left of who else is online, and a large window that will show the conversation. Now you can just chat away!
If you use Windows but don’t use Firefox as your browser:
There are lots of IRC client programs designed to run on Windows – if you already have one, you should be able to use it. I tried a couple, and found that Visual IRC was the easiest to use. Download it here (any of the “Mirror” links should work), and follow the installation instructions (let it apply the default settings).
Once the program is installed, open it up and (if you’re a newbie at this, like me) let it take you through the detailed instruction set. It will ask you for your “nickname” (probably your BMG user name, though it can be whatever you want), as well as a backup nickname in case your first choice is taken (unlikely). It will also ask you for an “ident” and a “real name.” It doesn’t much matter what you enter here, as far as I can tell…just follow the directions and enter something reasonably related to you.
When it asks you for a default server, enter “irc.bluemassgroup.com”.
Once you’ve finished the initial interview, you should be at a mostly-blank screen with a button called “Start” in the upper left-hand corner. Click that button. That should open a window in which the words “irc.bluemassgroup.com” appear near the top. Click the icon at the upper left of the box that says “connect” when you hover over it.
You should see a bunch of messages (which you can pretty much ignore). Type the following into the command line at the bottom of the window (be sure to include the slash “/”):
- /join #bluemassgroup
That should put you in the chat room – you’ll see a list of who else is present on the right side of the window, and you can chat away.
If you use a Mac but don’t use Firefox as your browser:
You have a couple of IRC clients to choose from. Pick one of them here.
Since I’m not a Mac user, I can’t give you step-by-step instructions on what to do, but the general idea should be the same. First, assign yourself a nickname. Second, hook yourself up to a server called “irc.bluemassgroup.com”. Third, connect to the channel called #bluemassgroup. The commands to do this will generally look like the three listed in the Firefox/ChatZilla discussion above.
Whew. Problems? Please let us know, either in the comments or via email.
drgonzo says
is super old school. good call!
cos says
Those of you who use Trillian for instant messaging can use it for IRC too. You don’t need a new program. I don’t know how to use Trillian myself, so I can’t give any more help than that.
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And if you prefer the old-skool Unix text mode irc client (IRC II), I’ve set up a login on irc.bluemassgroup.com that will let you use it. Send me your email address and I’ll tell you how to log in. My address is cos at massfordean dot-org.
cos says
If you downloaded ChatZilla and got a popup saying software installation is not enabled, and you can’t figure out how to fix it, ask yourself: did you once use an older version of Firefox, and then upgraded it? If so, this might be the cause.
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This bug only affects people who used Firefox 1.0 and upgraded to Firefox 1.5 on the same computer.
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In Firefox 1.0, there was an option in the preferences to enable or disable software installation. In Firefox 1.5, they fixed many of the security bugs that were the motivation for disabling software installation, so they removed that option, and just left software installation enabled for everyone. But if you upgrade Firefox 1.0 to Firefox 1.5, the old setting carries over! That means if you had software installation disabled in 1.0, it’s still disabled in 1.5, but now there’s no option in the preferences to enable it.
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Yes, this is dumb. Fortunately, there’s a workaround.
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Type this into your address bar, as if it were the URL of a page you want to go to:
about:config
Hit enter. You’ll get a little box labelled “filter” – type install in that box. Look for the line below that says xpinstall.enabled and see if it says “false” in the last column. If it does, double click on it so it says “true”. Or, right-click on it and choose “Toggle” from the menu, which will also change it to “true”.
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Now you can install Firefox extensions like ChatZilla (and a host of others).
cos says
Clarifying one point in David’s instructions above: Yes, David could indeed say “/nick David” and use IRC with that nickname. But if your BMG username has spaces in it, that’s not allowed.
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Pick a short nickname, up to 9 characters long, that starts with a letter and has just letters and numbers. Some other characters are also allowed (such as _ and – and ^ and |) but if you stick to letters and numbers you won’t have a problem.
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So, for example, if your BMG name is “Smart, Sexy, & Liberal”, do something like this:
/nick smartsexy
/server irc.bluemassgroup.com
/join #bluemassgroup
cos says
We got a couple of visitors to the channel today besides me and David. They dropped by while I wasn’t paying attention to the window and signed off before I came back, so I just wanted to say hi here đŸ™‚ Also, to point out that IRC channels are often used as online “hangouts” – just leave a window open while you do other things, and check it every once in a while to see if anyone’s around or said something. So, if you do drop by, say hi and leave your window open for a while – maybe someone else will sign on before you leave.
charley-on-the-mta says
OK, this is dumb, but when I enter a command in the bottom window of Chatzilla and press enter, nothing happens. I get a carriage return, but no information seems to be sent or registered at all. What am I missing?
charley-on-the-mta says
After some twiddling, I discovered you have to hit CONTROL+ENTER to actually send a command, or text, or what have you.
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Arggghghghgh
david says
I used ChatZilla yesterday – didn’t have that problem. No idea why it’s acting so oddly for you. Cos, any ideas?
charley-on-the-mta says
OK, if you press enter and it gives you nothing but a carriage return, you can do one of two things:
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1. Press CONTROL+ENTER to send your command/text, as I discovered, or:
2. Go to the dropdown menu Chatzilla -> Preferences -> Global Settings -> click the Global tab -> deselect “Multiline input mode”. That’s what was screwing me up in the first place. I have no idea why that was the default preference. Agrhrhghghg
cos says
That’s an odd default, but fortunately, it doesn’t seem to be the default for anyone else I’ve seen try it (including me on OS X and my friend on Windows XP, and David on whatever he runs).