Artifex IRC Usage

We use IRC as a conferencing tool.

Currently we have 3 channels:

• #ghostscript - A public channel that anyone can join and ask questions.
• #mupdf - A public channel that anyone can join and ask questions. We do not have full control over this yet.
• #artifex - A company confidential channel open to staff members and invited NDA-d developers.

The easiest way to access #ghostscript is to use a weblink like: http://webchat.freenode.net/?channels=ghostscript

That uses a browser-based irc client, called Kiwi. It seems to be powerful enough to get you into #artifex, but many people prefer to use a "proper" irc client. I use Chatzilla, but other developers use xChat, Miranda and even emacs.

In order to get into #artifex you will need to register your nickname, and be invited to the channel.

Registering your nickname.

In your irc client there should be a place you can configure your preferred nickname. Pick a nickname that no one else has registered. Good luck with that.

Start your irc client, join freenode, /join #ghostscript.

/msg nickserv register TopSecretPassword your@email.address

You'll then get emailed a message with a line to paste back in. Once you've done that, your nick is reserved for you, and you can use it to log in.

Logging in.

Each time you start up, you should identify yourself with nickserv:

/msg nickserv identify TopSecretPassword

This will log you into the system, and let you have access to invite only channels, such as #artifex.

Apparently if you set the "network password" to ':nick TopSecretPassword ' then you'll be automatically registered on startup.

Joining #artifex

Once you have been set up on #artifex once, and you are logged in, you can just do:

/msg ChanServ invite #artifex

and that will invite you into the group.

How to do initial group setup for a new user

It's possible that all you need to do is:

/msg Chanserv access #artifex add YourCleverNickName

If that isn't enough, try the following:

Invite the new user nickname to the group:

/mode #artifex +I $a:YourCleverNickName

or

/mode #artifex +I YourCleverNickName!*@*

The "$a:YourCleverNickName" name must match the NickServ account name. These are usually the same, but need not be (in case you're logged in with different nicks authenticated to the same user from multiple clients for example). The second YourCleverNickName!*@* only matches the nick you're currently logged in as.

Make that user an operator:

/msg ChanServ flags #artifex CleverNickName +voAti

How to setup a whole new private irc channel

I used the instructions here:

https://botbot.me/how-to-setup-irc-channel/

Chatzilla setup

I use Chatzilla, a firefox extension as my IRC client, because it runs everywhere. Just add Chatzilla as an add-on to Firefox, then start it to get going.

Once you've registered your nickname with nickserv etc, we can set it up so that you connect securely each time.

In the Chatzilla menu, choose Preferences... to get the preferences window.

In Global Settings => Startup -> Locations, Add "ircs://irc.freenode.net:6697"

Hopefully then you should get an "ircs://freenode.net:6697" on the left hand side. You may need "OK" and then restart chatzilla at this point.

Once you've got the preferences window up again, click on the "ircs://freenode.net:6697" on the left hand side, then under "Lists", add the following to the "Auto Perform" entries:

• /join #ghostscript
• /join #mupdf
• /msg nickserv identify TopSecretPassword
• /msg chanserv invite #artifex
• /join #artifex

OK, and exit. That should be enough so that you startup, get identified (logged in), and connected to all three channels automatically each time.

gs-commits setup

Unrelated to IRC, but putting it here for now, so this doesn't get lost.

Our mailman mailing lists are setup to reject mails from non-subscribed addresses. This causes a problem for the gs-commits list because commit notifcations from casper are sent from e-mail addresses that no longer really exist (user@ghostscript.com). So for new users on casper with git commit rights, we need to explicitly whitelist the ghostscript.com address.

You must have sudo privileges on casper.

So, log into casper, and do:

sudo /var/lib/mailman/bin/config_list -o gs-commits.cfg gs-commits

That will create a text file in the current directory called "gs-commits.cfg" which contains the configuration for the gs-commits list. Open that file in your favourite editor, and search for a line starting with "accept_these_nonmembers" - that line contains a comma separated array of whitelisted e-mail addresses.

Append to the the list a comma, then the new user's user name on casper, @ghostscript.com in single quotes. Basically, follow the form of the existing list. The list is long, so be careful about the closing ']' of the array.

Having appended the address, save and close the file, exit the editor.

Then do:

sudo /var/lib/mailman/bin/config_list -i gs-commits.cfg gs-commits

That reads back the edited the gs-commits configuration, and installs it for the list to use.

-- Robin Watts - 2015-11-19

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