Hi again,

what do you think of an IRC channel as a central meeting point? I am usually on IRCNet (see http://irc.tu-ilmenau.de/all_servers/ for a list of possible servers), I joined #empeg with my bouncer today - my nick is "tigloo" when I'm there and "awaytig" when I'm not.

Eventually, the Rio/Empeg folks might want to join, too.

Or is there already a channel somewhere that I missed?

Till

There was a channel but I don't think I've ever seen it in use. Maybe it was on DAL..?

Rob

ugh.. another IRC network.. let's see.. EFNet, OPN, hybrid testnet, and my personal server.. too much IRC..

12gig red mk2 -- 080000125

What about sharing our ICQ numbers? Wouldn't that be easier and more efficient than bothering going on an IRC channel? (I am assuming that you already have an ICQ account you use regularly).

Taym
_________________________
MK II BLUE/RED 12GB #923

I do have an ICQ account but I don't like ICQ at all. (probably a matter of taste, too) Also, it is only good for messages between two users, setting up a chat with lots of people is ugly.

On IRC, the channel is always there and you can join whenever you feel like it.

Till

I agree it's a matter of taste. I hate IRC, it is just pure chaos to me. And I hate having to devote a window to that. With icq you can have tiny small floating squares that do not botehr at all and keep in touch constantly withe verybody.
And if you want to chat with more than one you can just get an IRC style window with iCQ too, so... :? However my ICQ is 4747568, TAYM. If any of the empeg people here wants to contact me I'll be more than happy :)

Taym
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MK II BLUE/RED 12GB #923

Try Jabber (www.jabber.org) - it will handle all your ICQ, AIM, MSN and IRC stuff in one program. The worst thing is choosing a client (there are HEAPS of them!), and finding one that does all the things you want. Is a cool idea though

(list 6284, Mk1 S/N 00299 4GB blue [for sale]. Mk2 S/N 080000094 6GB blue)

Trillian is also quite nice. It's similar to Jabber in concept, except it dosen't require a Jabber server. So for me at work, I can get through the firewall like ICQ could. It does do IRC as well, but it only useful for basic IRC.

I tried a version of Trillian some time ago because I didn't like the more and more bloated Mirabilis ICQ client. It was quite buggy at that time, has it gotten any better?

Btw, if you're using it, why not join the #empeg channel on IRC then? :)

Till

Also, it is only good for messages between two users, setting up a chat with lots of people is ugly.

Have you ever tried it? I've had multi-person chats going in ICQ and it works very well when it's set to IRC-style.

Simply start a chat session with somebody (right click on their name and select "ICQ Chat", then drag other users' names from the ICQ list onto the chat window.

When the chat window is set to IRC-style, it's just like IRC.

However, I agree that the always-up status of IRC is nice.

___________
Tony Fabris

Interesting. I don't think I knew about Trillian or Jabber. I thought Odigo was the only cross-platform IM client out there. That's what I've been using. I wonder how Trillian compares?

___________
Tony Fabris

In reply to:

---

Have you ever tried it? I've had multi-person chats going in ICQ and it works very well when it's set to IRC-style.

Simply start a chat session with somebody (right click on their name and select "ICQ Chat", then drag other users' names from the ICQ list onto the chat window.

---

Yes, I have tried it, and exactly because of the steps you need to do (open a chat session with somebody and then drag the users into the window) it drove me nuts. You always have to have a copy of your contacts somewhere (I lost them several times and rebuilding was ugly - I know there are tools but that there are extra tools for such simple functionality is not a compliment for the ICQ client) and you manually have to setup a chat.

On IRC, people just join, that's it. You idle if you want to and everybody is able to see that. With ICQ, you always have to ask "is xyz there" etc etc.

Nah, I don't want to go on bashing ICQ. :)

Till

> However, I agree that the always-up status of IRC is nice.

I don't understand. Whenever a user is on line in icq, it's exactly like having an irc channel open. :?


Taym
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MK II BLUE/RED 12GB #923

Umm, no.

When you connect to ICQ, you connect to a main server and you use that server to query the online status of your buddies (and only your buddies).

When you connect to IRC, you connect to a whole network (by just connecting to one server). Then you can go into a channel (chatroom), and you will see all people that participate as well in that channel. You usually have one window per channel and just see the messages one after another in that window.

When using IRC you are not restricted to a certain buddylist or anything, you can go where you want to - and other people can do so as well.

I don't like this "I have to have your number to be able to talk to you" restriction. IRC is more relaxed.

Till

Trillian at 0.63 is rather stable, and it's at the point where features are being added all the time.

As far as IRC though, I can only join one IRC network, the one run internally. I don't have easy access to any external networks from work.

Sorry, I was a bit cryptinc in my question. I know very well how IRC works, I just meant: what is the actual, practical difference between that and ICQ? If you're on line, you can start a chat session irc style (graphically speaking) anytime with whoever is online and available. That's exactly like IRC.

Well, that's true that you have to have a certain ICQ number to chat with its owner, but personally I consider that a big advantage. Again, matter of personal preferences :)

Taym
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MK II BLUE/RED 12GB #923

ICQ is peer to peer, which means it is much more subject to connection problems. Sometimes people can't see each other in chat in icq. It's a pain to have a decent number of people in a chat. IRC is on a central server, its much more stable than icq. I use icq, but its quite a piece of bloatware - it takes up more ram as the database gets larger.

Sean

means it is much more subject to connection problems. Sometimes people can't see each other in chat in icq.

And this is different from IRC how, exactly?

_______________________________________________
Tony Fabris Has Left IRC (Connection reset by peer)

ICQ gave me definitely less problems than IRC. Both in terms of reliability and due to proxies, fwalls, etc. Also, ICQ can be either peer to peer or client server, depending on what you prefer. And I prefer much more ICQ's GUI. Takes less space on your desktop. :)

Taym
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MK II BLUE/RED 12GB #923

ICQ is a client server app until you open an icq chat. Lets I say I invite 6 people into the chat. 4 people won't be able to see the other 2 and miss out on their parts of conversations. It's very strange. I think ICQ Chat uses peer to peer rather than going through icqs servers. On IRC you connect to a central server, to a room thats permanently there. You can always see the other people in the chat, and you dont have to invite all the people into the chat every time you want to have one.

Sean

ICQ is client/server for the "who's online" list only. Everything else such as chat, messaging, file transfer is peer-to-peer.

There's the exception of specially delivered messages through ICQs servers when a user goes offline while sending him a message, but that doesn't count for me. :)

Till

The real problem with ICQ chats is that they are peer to peer. And as such, they often don't work through firewalls. What does work (and this fact confuses quite a few people) is the "who is online" function and many messaging functions.
The second problem is that you have to know each and every person who is interested in joining a chat.
How does a "empeg newbie" join an ICQ chat about empeg (or empeg programming)?
With IRC that's no problem at all: He (or she) just joins the right channel.
With ICQ, he first has to ask someone who is on the chat already to invite him in.

ICQ is great to keep an eye on which of your friends are currently online.
IRC is great for meeting (new) people with the same interest.

cu,
sven

proud MkII owner (12GB blue/green/smoked, #080000113)

ICQ also moves the burden of joining the group from the individuals to a central person..that's a big deal.

Fly me to the moon...

Personally, so far I found ICQ much easier to configure through firewalls than IRC. Obviously that depends on how the fw are configured, but I more than once could not let an irc client go thorugh a firewall, whils, still so far, i ALWAYS managed to configure ICQ to go thorough firewalls. I would say FW are a problem for both. All you say regarding Peer to Peer is correct, still that does not make ICQ less versatile than IRC.

Taym
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MK II BLUE/RED 12GB #923

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the problem I seem to have had with ICQ chats were caused by ICQ chat being peer2peer. What I mean is this:
ICQ does a client to server connect to announce its own online state as well as getting the online state of your buddies. On a multi-user chat though, anybody but the first person on that chat (the first one who invites the others) uses a peer2peer connect to that first person's ICQ client.
IRC on the other hand always uses client-server connects.
In other words: To initiate a channel on IRC, you only need the ability to make an outgoing TCP connection (to connect to an IRC server). To create a multiuser chat with ICQ, you need the ability to accept incoming connections (to let others join your chat by connecting to your client).

cu,
sven

proud MkII owner (12GB blue/green/smoked, #080000113)

Yes, sven, you're right. But I don't see how that causes problems. I mean: you have ICQ and go on line. You see who's on line and your friends see you as well. When anyone wants to initiate a chat, he/she just have to do so, and anybody else can join. So I don't see any big difference, practically speaking, from IRC. Except, of course, with ICQ you and your friends must have authorized each other previously. Which may be annoying to many, but I find very important and useful.
Then, as far as the FW is concerned, both with IRC and ICQ you need to be able to receive and send on TCP/IP packets on some specific ports, na matter if you are in a client/server or a peer2peer situation, and that may be a problem depending on how the fw is configured. As a matter of fact, ICQ has a config panel that lets you chose WHICH tcp ports to use, and that made me solve all the connection problems, so far. I did not succeed with IRC, which I still can't use from my office. But again, it all depends on the fw settings... And of course, maybe I am doing something wrong on my IRC client cfg...

Taym
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MK II BLUE/RED 12GB #923

Just while we are on topic, did you ever check out groove ? www.groove.net - it's a quit impressive thing although it's a big app. This one also work via HTTP tunnels through firewalls and proxies and allows you to transfer anything between PC's on the internet and behind your firewall. I use that to transfer files from home back to my PC at work even while I'm not there. The concept is to build groups of users which share all sorts of stuff. I found it very cool.

Hi.

So I don't see any big difference, practically speaking, from IRC. Except, of course, with ICQ you and your friends must have authorized each other previously. Which may be annoying to many, but I find very important and useful.

This is exactly where our opinions defer: You prefer the closed-user-group type chat that ICQ provides, I prefer the open-to-all type chat IRC provides. I didn't find any way to effectively join a group of people on ICQ without knowing any of the members beforehand. Don't get me wrong: I used to utilize ICQ alot some time ago (and probably will do so again some day in the near future), and it is absolutely great for its purpose. IRC, however, also has its pros. Namely its openness: You can join a group by topic instead of by person like on ICQ.
If two empeg enthusiasts (that do not yet know any off the older ones, but happen to stumble over these UEBBS pages) want to join a realtime chat about the empeg, there are basically these situations that are possible, if noone else with this interest is currently online:
ICQ: They both find some ICQ numbers on these pages, add one or more of them to their buddy-List, but noone is online currently, so they are not approved and find noone to chat with. They have to wait until the get approved by someone and more importantly, they have to join the very same chat.
IRC: They find an IRC server from the list that was referenced somewhere on this BBS and join the channel mentioned in that particular post. Bingo, two enthusiasts meet each other without any big problem.
IRC has disadvantages though: There are many IRC networks, but only one ICQ network, so if you know who you are trying to contact, ICQ is probably better. IRC is open to all, so it is also open to hostile people, like spammers and script kiddies. ICQ is closed, but this might also lock friendly people out. ICQ has some, too. ICQ only works if you know whom to contact. IRC works if you know what you want to talk about. ICQ also allows multiple chats on the same topic, even by the same people. How are you about to find a chat that is already open? Let's say A,B,C,D and E are in each others buddy list and all enjoy chatting about the empeg. Now A,B and C are online and invoke a multi-person chat. While that chat is open, D and E go online. E contacts D to ask him if a chat is currently open. As D doesn't know about the chat A,B and C invoked, he simply invokes one with E. We now have two chats about the empeg instead of a single one with all five in it.

Well, we could discuss this topic for years, and would still be discussing the same pros and cons of ICQ and IRC as we did to date. I like ICQ because it can notify you if someone gets online, without a need to keep a window open and in sight. but I like chatting on IRC a lot more, because new people can join without much hassle.

cu,
sven

proud MkII owner (12GB blue/green/smoked, #080000113)

There are many IRC networks, but only one ICQ network

Well, there are actually several instant message networks, thus prompting me to change over to Trillian. Lets see, theres ICQ, AIM, MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, Jabber, and Oldigo I believe right offhand. There definitly needs to be some work in this area before it becomes even more fragmented. But with AOL and Microsoft being behind 3 of the above, thats doubtful.

And my small comment on the subject, I do like IRC better for chatting, but I rarley do that anymore. I use ICQ for it's origional purpose, Instant Messaging. (Also the reason I don't like the other clients that much. Their setup turns them into IC programs (Instant Chatting)).

Why not set up a Java IRC client somewhere keyed to connect to the empeg channel? Would solve a few problems at once.

Why not set up a Java IRC client somewhere keyed to connect to the empeg channel? Would solve a few problems at once.

Funny you should say that. ICQ has a Java IRC client you can stick on a web page so all you need to do is go to a URL to join the channel. The circle is now completed, Obi-Wan...


___________
Tony Fabris