IRCD(8)

✨ NAME ✨

ircd — ircd-hybrid: an advanced, lightweight Internet Relay Chat Daemon 🦋

(it lives in the System Manager's Manual, section 8, so it's a big-girl daemon, not a lil userland guy 💅)

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🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

ircd   [-configfile filename] [-klinefile filename] [-dlinefile
       filename] [-xlinefile filename] [-resvfile filename] [-logfile
       filename] [-pidfile filename] [-foreground] [-version] [-help]

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💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

So ircd is the server (daemon) program for the Internet Relay Chat Program. No cap. It's called a server because its whole job is to "serve" the client program irc(1) and other compatible programs with messages and commands. Bestie, that's literally the function. 💅

Every single command and user message gets passed straight to the ircd for processing and relaying on to other IRC servers. All of it. Zero shortcuts. ✨

This one right here is ircd-hybrid, the highly modified (and hopefully improved 🫶) variant of the original ircd program by Jarkko Oikarinen. Glow-up era fr fr.

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🎀 OPTIONS 🎀

• -configfile filename — picks the ircd.conf file this ircd should use. It's the override for the default ircd.conf that got baked in at compile time. By default that's "etc/ircd.conf" inside the prefix you installed the ircd in. 💖
• -klinefile filename — 👀
• -dlinefile filename — 👀
• -xlinefile filename — 👀
• -resvfile filename — 👑

These four are a little squad, so here's the group chat: they specify the database files used for D-lines (host bans), K-lines (hostmask bans), X-lines (gecos bans) and RESVs (jupes). By default they all live inside the var/lib/ directory of your installation prefix, named dline.db, kline.db, xline.db and resv.db. 🦋

• -logfile filename — says "not that logfile, this logfile." It specifies an alternative logfile to be used than the one specified in include/defaults.h. ✨
• -pidfile filename — the file ircd uses to stash its process ID. It's the override for the default ircd.pid that got baked in at compile time. 🎀
• -foreground — makes ircd run in the foreground. It's giving "I'm not leaving, I'm staying right here." 🙈
• -version — makes ircd print its version and then exit. Slay and dip. 💅
• -help — makes ircd print the available options and exit. Same energy, different info. ⭐

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🌈 USAGE 🌈

If you're planning to connect your IRC server to an existing IRC network, bestie, you're gonna need to alter your local IRC configuration file (typically named "ircd.conf") so it'll accept and make connections to other IRC servers. That file holds the hostnames, IP addresses and sometimes passwords for connections to other ircds around the world. 🌍

The example reference.ircd.conf in the doc/ directory documents itself. Read it carefully. Like, carefully carefully. Or you may expose a risk on your network simply by having your ircd running! 😭

🚨 Not me stressing about this: having your ircd running with a config you didn't read can expose a risk on your network. Read the reference file, periodt.

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👑 BOOTING THE SERVER 👑

It is sufficient to type ircd at the command line to start ircd-hybrid into the background. That's it. That's the whole move. ✨

If you wish to run ircd in the foreground (perhaps for debugging purposes), use the -foreground parameter. Main character debugging energy. 🔥

The ircd-hybrid package in your distribution may ship with an rc-script which handles this for you. In Debian, it is /etc/init.d/ircd-hybrid. 🫶

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🍓 EXAMPLE 🍓

# ircd -configfile /usr/share/ircd/ircd.conf -logfile /var/log/ircd.log

Starts ircd with the config file /usr/share/ircd/ircd.conf and with a log file /var/log/ircd.log. It implicitly forks back to the console — to prevent this, use -foreground. 👑

Many of the above paths are hard-coded at compile time in the include/defaults.h file, so it may be convenient to edit these to suit your needs before you compile the ircd. Do it before, bestie. 💅

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💜 COPYRIGHT 💜

(c) 1988,1989 University of Oulu, Computing Center, Finland,

(c) 1988,1989 Department of Information Processing Science, University of Oulu, Finland

(c) 1988-1991 Jarkko Oikarinen

(c) 1997-2025 ircd-hybrid development team

For full COPYRIGHT, see the COPYING file within the IRC source package. 📜

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💀 BUGS 💀

If you find a bug and you have a core file from ircd as a result, use a debugger like gdb(1) to process the core file and send a backtrace to bugs@ircd-hybrid.org. We will look at it. Fr fr. 🧚

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🌟 AUTHORS 🌟

irc2.8 and earlier: Jarkko Oikarinen, currently jto@tolsun.oulu.fi.

ircd-hybrid: ircd-hybrid development team, bugs@ircd-hybrid.org.

Manual page written by Jeff Trim, jtrim@orion.cair.du.edu, later modified by jto@tolsun.oulu.fi.

Updated by W. Campbell, wcampbel@botbay.net, Edward Brocklesby, ejb@klamath.uucp.leguin.org.uk, and highly revised by Joshua Kwan (joshk@triplehelix.org) for the Debian distribution.

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k bye, that's the whole page 💖 this is ircd-hybrid, page dated 2021-01-01, and yes she's still serving section 8 realness. drink water, read your ircd.conf, and go be a good sysadmin bestie 🫶✨