KIRC(1)

💖 KIRC — bestie's guide to the KISS-est IRC client ever 💖

okay so. kirc is from the KIRC(1) manual, filed under User Manuals, and it's genuinely one of my favourite little programs. let's get into it 🫶

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✨ NAME ✨

kirc — KISS for IRC 💅 (yes, Keep It Simple, Stupid — she said it, not me)

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🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

kirc [-s server] [-p port] [-n nick] [-c chan] ...

that's it. that's the whole vibe. the ... is doing a LOT of heavy lifting there and I respect her for it.

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🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

so kirc is an extremely fast and simple IRC client, and she was designed with portability in mind. like, that was the whole assignment.

here's the iconic part: this client reads from STDIN and prints to STDOUT. so literally all your traffic can be multiplexed, and text can be parsed or modified using external commands. no cap. you want to pipe your IRC through grep? go off. you want to pipe it through cowsay? unhinged, but valid.

and all the highlighted text and color? you control that with ANSI escape sequences. full customisation, main character energy only. ✨

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💜 OPTIONS 💜

one bullet per flag, bestie, I don't make the rules:

• -s server — overrides the default host, which is irc.libera.chat. so if you're not hanging out on Libera, this is your girl.
• -p port — overrides the default port, which is 6697. (that's the TLS one, iykyk 🔥)
• -c chan — specifies the channel(s) to JOIN. multiple channels get delimited by "," or "|". yes you can absolutely join several at once, go be social.
• -n nick — specifies the NICK connection nickname. pick something cute.
• -r real — specifies the user's real name. (you can lie. I won't tell. 🙈)
• -u user — specifies the USER connection username.
• -k pass — specifies the PASS connection password. keep this one secret bestie, fr fr.
• -a auth — specifies the SASL PLAIN mechanism authentication token.
• -e — specifies the SASL EXTERNAL mechanism. no argument needed, she just knows. 💅
• -x — reads from STDIN and passes each line, delimited by "\n", as a command to the IRC server after the initial connection. scripted IRC, we love to see it.
• -v — prints the version information to stderr, then exits. bye bestie 👋
• -V — increases verbosity. causes raw IRC messages to be printed when sent or received. chaotic and I'm obsessed. 🍓

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🎀 COMMANDS 🎀

these are the things you type once you're in there. the group chat syntax, basically:

• /<command> — send message to IRC host (e.g. /JOIN, /PART, /WHOIS, etc.). the classic. the icon.
• /#<channel> — set default message channel to <channel>. so you don't have to keep typing where you're talking. queen behaviour.
• <message> — send PRIVMSG to the default message channel with <message> as the content.
• @<channel|nick> <message> — send <message> to the specified <channel> or <nick>. the direct-message move.
• @@<channel|nick> <message> — send a CTCP ACTION containing <message> to the specified <channel> or <nick>. and here's the cute part: if no <channel> or <nick> is specified, the <message> will be sent to the default message channel. (this is your /me energy, for the record.)

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🌈 AUTHOR 🌈

Michael Czigler <michaelczigler at icloud dot com> — thank you for my life, king 👑

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💀 BUGS 💀

Please report them! she's begging. please. do it. 🙏

ngl a bug report is just a love letter with extra steps.

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and that's the whole page, bestie! 🧚 no cap, kirc is a whole mood. this one came to you from the KIRC(1) User Manuals, NOVEMBER 2020, on Linux — so like, she's been serving since 2020 and she's still that girl. periodt. 💖✨🎀🦋🌸