XChat Guide

Step 1 - Launch xChat
The 1st time you run xChat, a small box will appear stating that your default download directory is set to your home directory. This means that any files that you download through xChat will be stored in /home/your_username on your computer. For now you can just ignore this as this guide doesn't go in to sending & receiving files (DCC). For more information on this please go to the xChat website and read through their faqs. So you can just click OK to continue. Now the Server List window should pop-up automatically. If you find that this doesn't happen on your machine simply left click on the 'X-Chat' drop-down menu at the top left of your screen and left click on 'Server List'

Step 2 - Setup Nick + Real Names
Now with the 'Server List' window open you need to fill in your details. There are 3 text boxes to the left of 'Nicknames'. This is where you tell xChat the name you want to appear when chatting. The reason for the 3 boxes is that if someone already has your 1st chosen nickname, xChat automatically switches to your 2nd preference. If this is nick has also been taken already it will try the 3rd. So make sure you don't enter exactly the same names in all 3 boxes. (Pic 1 – Section A)

Next up is the 'Real Name' & 'Username' section. What you enter here doesn't really matter. It could be your actual name or anything you like, even gibberish. xChat doesn't care so neither should you. Unlike your chosen nickname, this name won't be displayed besides your messages when you're chatting away in a channel. The only time other people can see this information is when they do a /whois on your nickname. So, if you don't want people to know who you real name, enter someone else in this field because as stated above, xChat isn't affected by this section so will work no matter what information is here.
(Pic 1 – Section B)

Step 3 - Choosing a server
Now that you've entered your names it's time to connect to an IRC server.
Looking at the server list window you should see lots of little planet icons. Each one of these represents a different IRC server group. The items under each planet are the actual servers you can connect to. Each server has it's own list of channels. Unfortunately, servers can't communicate with any servers outside of it's category (planet) so channels found on a servers listed under the 1st planet may not necessarily appear on a server listed under the 2nd , but when they do the only thing they have in common is the channel name. This means that if you chose a server listed under the 1st planet (IRCnet), and your friend chose one listed under the 2nd planet (DALnet), and then you both went into a channel named 'CHAT' you wouldn't be able to talk to or see each other.

So look through each of the different server groups until you find a server you would like to connect to, (remember you can scroll down with the scroll bar on the right for even more servers) and when you've found the one you want left click it once, then click the ‘'CONNECT'’ button (Pic 1 – Section C). Once you've done this a whole heap of text will start appearing. This is all the information about the server you are connection to. It has things like server rules, events, MOTD and other things. You can sit and read this if you like but usually you can just skip this. Also, if you've chosen to connect to the 'Freenode' for example, it's address is irc.freenode.net but when you connect it says you've connected to kornbluth.freenode.net or something similar don't worry, you ARE connected to freenode, it's just the server proxy trying to confuse
you. :)

If you want to connect to a specific server, but cannot find it under any of the default groups, you can add one in yourself. To do this we should 1st add a new group (planet) to your server listing. This way you can add all of your custom servers here for easy access. Left click on the 'New Group' button located down the bottom of the server list window. When the little box pops up triple click
(3 clicks) in the 'Name' section and give your new group a name. ?MyServers?. Now click OK. You group should now be listed on the server list. If you can't see it you may need to scroll the list up/down a bit. (list is sorted alphabetically). Once you have found your newly added group left click on it once so that it is highlighted. You'll notice it doesn't have any servers listed under it yet so now you left click on the 'New Server' button down the bottom of the server list window (near new group) to add a server. This is where you will need your desired IRC server's information. The 'Edit Entry' window will now appear. 1st off enter your servers name into the 'Name' section. Under the 'Server' section you need to enter the server's address (irc.freenode.net) and enter the servers port in the 'Port' section. Most servers use port 6667 so you can probably just leave this as is. Next up is the 'Password' section. If your ircserver requires a password to connect you must enter it here. If it doesn't need a password leave this blank. The rest of the fields can be left as is so just click on the 'OK' button to add your server and return to the server list. Now, under your newly added group, your server should appear. Now all that's left is to connect to it (see previous paragraph for connecting)

Step 4 - Finding a channel to join
Once you have connected to a server you need to join a channel. Channels are where you actually talk to people. To connect to a channel you will need to bring up the 'Channel List' box. You can open this by left clicking on the 'Windows' drop-down menu at the top of the xChat box and left clicking on 'Channel List Window'.

Once the channel list window is left click on the 'Refresh the List' button
(Pic 2 – Section A) and xChat will search for all the available channels within the server you've connected to (including other servers within it's group). This may take a minute to display all the channels that are found. You can however start looking through the channels that are displayed while xChat continues to search for more. Again, remember that there are more listed off the page so you need to scroll down to see the rest. Once you have found a channel that you would like to join, even if xChat hasn't finished looking, left click on the channel name (eg. #IRC) and then left click on the 'Join Channel' button located in the bottom right (Pic 2 – Section B). Once you have connected to the channel you chose you start talking to people.

Also, at the very bottom of any xChat window you will see a bar with various tabs. These are all the different xChat windows you have open. In the picture above you can see the Channel List tab and the server that i'm currently connected to (bohica.tx.us.austnet.org). These tabs are very useful when you are connected to multiple channels at once. You can simply left click to switch between them.
NOTE: You can connect to multiple channels at once but only ONE server at a time.

Step 5 - The Main xChat window
The Main xChat window looks like this ....

Instead of going through everything you can do here I will stick to the basics. For a more detailed guide open your Internet browser and go to http://xchat.org
As shown in the above picture, to type a message to everyone simply left click in the text box at the bottom of the window, type your message in, and then press enter. When you press enter your message will appear in the middle of the main window (See Pic 3). Every time you or someone else types a message, their name will appear in the left column beside that message (Pic 3 – Section B). This is so everyone knows who said what. On the right side of the main window is a list of all the people currently in the channel. If no one but yourself is listed you may want to find a different channel as no one else is there at the moment
(Pic 3 – Section C).

Once you've finished chatting or if you would like to join a different channel you will need to leave & close the channel window you're currently in. To do this you will need to type /part to leave the channel (type this in where you type your messages) and then to close off the channel window left click on the 'X' button located just below the X-Chat drop-down menu at the top of the main window. (I've circled it in Picture 3). You will now be back at the channel list window. If you wish to connect to another channel you can do so from here. If however, you would like to connect to a different server you will will need to click the little 'X' button again so that you are returned to the 'Server List' window (like when you 1st opened up xChat). From here you can start over from Step 3 if you want to continue chatting in channels on a different server. Lastly, if you have finished chatting you can close xChat by left clicking on the 'X-Chat' drop-down menu and clicking on 'QUIT'. Clicking 'QUIT' will close xChat down completely. This means that you will leave any channels you are in and will be disconnected from the server you are connected to. If you click this by accident you will need to re-launch xChat again.

Basic xChat commands
Below you will find some of the more common IRC commands that are used often. For a far more complete list, please visit the mIRC Commands page at www.ircbeginner.com/ircinfo/m-commands.html. They will be using mIRC for their examples at this website but that doesn't matter as almost all of these commands will work in xChat as well.

/joinType /join #channelname -- to join a channel of your choice. Joining a new channel will not close any existing channels you may be in.
Example: /join #ExampleNick
What it looks like:
[18:44] * Now talking in #beginner
--Op-- ExampleNick has joined the channel
[18:44] * Topic is 'Beginner's Help/Chat Channel....All Are Welcome Here!! ®© [ENGLISH]'
[18:44] * Set by X on Sun Jul 23 16:10:34/meThe command /me is an action message.
Type /me 'does anything'
Example: /me waves hello
What it looks like:
ExampleNick waves hello/msgType /msg nickname (message) to send a private message.
Example: /msg puddytat Hey tat, how are you?
What it looks like:
-> *puddytat* Hey tat, how are you?/nick/nick changes your nickname
Example: type /nick newnickname (limit 9 characters)
What it looks like: I typed /nick luv2quilt
* ExampleNick is now known as luv2quilt/partType /part -- to leave one channel/ignoreUnfortunately, there will be times when you don't want to talk to someone, or else someone may be harassing you. By typing /ignore nickname, you will not receive anymore messages from that person.
Example: /ignore luv2quilt
To Unignore them, type /ignore -r luv2quilt
What it looks like:
* Added *!*ExampleNick@*.dialup.netins.net to ignore list
* Removed *!*ExampleNick@*.dialup.netins.net from ignore list/helpThere's one more very helpful command, and probably the one you'll use a lot when first starting out. In fact, I still use it quite a lot, and that's the built-in help menu of mIRC.
Type /help, you'll see the mIRC Help Menu open up. You can do a search from there, or you can type /help topic. Either way, a TON of information will be at your fingertips.