Internet Relay Chat (IRC) is a text-based chat system. IRC is designed for group communication in discussion forums, called channels, but also allows one-on-one communication via private messages as well as chat and data transfer, including file sharing.
ICQ New is a cross-platform instant messaging (IM) and VoIP client. The name ICQ derives from the English phrase "I Seek You". Originally developed by the Israeli company Mirabilis in 1996, the client was bought by AOL in 1998, and then by Mail.Ru Group in 2010.
ChatZilla is an IRC client that is part of SeaMonkey. It was previously an extension for Mozilla-based browsers such as Firefox, introduced in 2000. It is cross-platform open source software which has been noted for its consistent appearance across platforms, CSS appearance customization and scripting.
QuakeNet is an Internet Relay Chat (IRC) network, and was one of the largest IRC networks. The network was founded in 1997 by Garfield and Oli as a new home for their respective countries' Quake channels. At its peak on February 8, 2005, the network recorded 243,394 simultaneous connections. As of 2020, there are 9 servers and about 12000 users remaining.
XDCC is a computer file sharing method which uses the Internet Relay Chat (IRC) network as a host service.
Microsoft Comic Chat is a graphic IRC client created by Microsoft, first released with Internet Explorer 3.0 in 1996. Comic Chat was developed by Microsoft Researcher David Kurlander, with Microsoft Research's Virtual Worlds Group and later a group he managed in Microsoft's Internet Division.
Haiku is a free and open-source operating system compatible with the now discontinued BeOS. Its development began in 2001, and the operating system became self-hosting in 2008. The first alpha release was made in September 2009, and the last was November 2012; the first beta was released in September 2018, followed by beta 2 in June 2020 and beta 3 in July 2021.
An IRCd, short for Internet Relay Chat daemon, is server software that implements the IRC protocol, enabling people to talk to each other via the Internet. It is distinct from an IRC bot that connects outbound to an IRC channel.
BitlBee is a cross-platform IRC instant messaging gateway, licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License.
The following tables compare general and technical information between a number of IRC client programs which have been discussed in independent published literature.
CGI:IRC is a CGI program written in Perl that allows access to IRC via a web browser. It is designed to be flexible and has many uses such as an IRC gateway for an IRC network, a chat-room for a website or to access IRC when stuck behind a restrictive firewall.
MSN Chat was the Microsoft Network version of IRCX, which replaced Microsoft Chat, a set of Exchange-based IRCX servers first available in the Microsoft Comic Chat client, although Comic Chat was not required to connect.
In computing, a log file is a file that records either events that occur in an operating system or other software runs, or messages between different users of a communication software. Logging is the act of keeping a log. In the simplest case, messages are written to a single log file.
Mibbit is a web-based client for web browsers that supports Internet Relay Chat (IRC), Yahoo! Messenger, and Twitter. It is developed by Jimmy Moore and is designed around the Ajax model with a user interface written in JavaScript. It is the IRC application setup by default on Firefox.
Freenode, stylized as freenode and formerly known as Open Projects Network, is an IRC network which was previously used to discuss peer-directed projects. Their servers are accessible from the hostname chat.freenode.net, which load balances connections by using round-robin DNS.
Ircle was an IRC client developed by Onno Tijdgat for the Macintosh computer platform. Ircle was shareware, with free upgrades. The client was scriptable with AppleScript, supported multiple channels and servers, and up to ten simultaneous connections. It was discontinued in 2009. Since 2012, Ircle was not compatible with most recent versions of OS X, and no updates were available. In December 2017 the Ircle home page displayed a poll, to end Q2 2018, to determine whether a new version should be released on OS X and iOS. The results of the poll were 311 votes in favor of a new Mac OS version, 43 votes for an iOS version, and 117 votes for both a Mac OS and iOS version, out of 528 votes cast.
KVIrc is a graphical IRC client for Linux, Unix, Mac OS and Windows. The name is an acronym of K Visual IRC in which the K stands for a dependency to KDE, which became optional from version 2.0.0. The software is based on the Qt framework and its code is released under a modified GNU General Public License.
IceChat is a full-featured graphical IRC client for Windows. Its current version is open-source and released under the GPLv2 license.
Haiku is a free and open-source operating system compatible with the now discontinued BeOS.
