"Khar Shian Campus: IRC Channel Operator"
1-Introduction
When taking this course, please note that it is advised that you have already passed the IRC Basics course, as this course goes deeper into the material supplied previously, and works with the assumption you posses the knowledge from there.
That said, this course will go into the advanced functions of IRC, and Undernet in particular. We will go deeper into the possibilities of having Operator status, as well as the works of X, an Undernet service.
A quote from the IRC Basics notes:
'Some users in channels have additional rights. Operators are gods, they can determine everything in the channel. When an operator asks you to do or cease something, you comply or risk being kicked out of the channel. Operators can be recognized in the right-hand user listing by the "@" in front of their nicks (or screen names, though this term generally applies to individual chat programs like AIM).
That @ is typically gained by having a leadership position in the unit the channel belongs to. In #acc, judges and trainers have it. In #db, Consuls and Dark Councillors have it. For Clans, it is up to the summit of the Clan to decide. Some make everyone an Operator and some limit it to a small group of individuals.
The IRC Basics course explained the essentials of what an Operator could do. Note that this status comes with responsibility. Operators can have their status revoked for abusing their administrative options.
Note: there are no set guidelines in the Dark Jedi Brotherhood about how a channel should be ran, though general rules of courtesy are accepted throughout the Brotherhood and should be practiced. This is basically left up to the Operators of those channels, often the summit of a Clan, leaders of societies, etc. There are only a few channels in the DB which are 'official', and these are also explained in the Basics course. The primary official channel for the Brotherhood is #db.
That said, this course will go into the advanced functions of IRC, and Undernet in particular. We will go deeper into the possibilities of having Operator status, as well as the works of X, an Undernet service.
A quote from the IRC Basics notes:
'Some users in channels have additional rights. Operators are gods, they can determine everything in the channel. When an operator asks you to do or cease something, you comply or risk being kicked out of the channel. Operators can be recognized in the right-hand user listing by the "@" in front of their nicks (or screen names, though this term generally applies to individual chat programs like AIM).
That @ is typically gained by having a leadership position in the unit the channel belongs to. In #acc, judges and trainers have it. In #db, Consuls and Dark Councillors have it. For Clans, it is up to the summit of the Clan to decide. Some make everyone an Operator and some limit it to a small group of individuals.
The IRC Basics course explained the essentials of what an Operator could do. Note that this status comes with responsibility. Operators can have their status revoked for abusing their administrative options.
Note: there are no set guidelines in the Dark Jedi Brotherhood about how a channel should be ran, though general rules of courtesy are accepted throughout the Brotherhood and should be practiced. This is basically left up to the Operators of those channels, often the summit of a Clan, leaders of societies, etc. There are only a few channels in the DB which are 'official', and these are also explained in the Basics course. The primary official channel for the Brotherhood is #db.
2-What can an Operator do?
Basic functions, such as kick, ban, voice, and op were briefly addressed in the Basics course. There are also a couple of other things that Operators can do, like changing channel modes for example. Please note that adding a channel into a command is not mandatory, most clients allow you to do it without, assuming that is the channel you are currently watching. If you are not, or are using a different client that does not support that, the channel you want to ban must be added after the initial command, and before any other text in the command.
The commands:
All these are done with the following syntax: /mode [channel] +[letter] [add-ons required for the command]
Note: for banning, a hostname is required. This can be found by doing a Whois on someone. The hostname is the part with the nickname, followed by a possible username, then a @, and the rest is information on how someone is identified on his / her network. This can be an IP, or several other things. This differs per ISP.
Also, these are the usual guidelines with regards to banning. Please note that there can be exceptions to this, but these exceptions are decided on a case-by-case basis by those with the most authority in a channel.
An example: If I wanted to change the topic to 'No Humping Allowed!' in #db, I would use the following command:
/topic #db No Humping Allowed!
If someone still proceeds to hump, a warning kick is given:
/kick #db Humper No Humping Here!
The person still goes on, ignoring the previous warning. A ban is next:
/ban #db Humper!Hump@ISP.IP
Followed by a kick to remove the user permanently:
/kick #db Humper No Humping Here! You were warned.
The ban can be removed later on.
The commands:
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| b [hostname] | Ban (prevents people from joining the channel) |
| i | Invite only (people can only join if invited by an Operator in the channel) |
| k [key] | Key (people need a key/password to join the channel) |
| l [amount] | limit (allows only the specified amount of people to join the channel) |
| m | Moderated (allows only people with Operator or Voice status to speak in the channel) |
| n | No external channel messages (no messages from outside the channel can be sent) |
| p | Private (keeps the channel off the /list command) |
| r | Registered only (only people with an X account can join) |
| s | Secret (keeps the channel off the list of the /whois command) |
| t | Only ops change the Topic (allows only Operator to change a channel topic) |
| v [nick] | voice (gives the user the Voiced status (Operators only)) |
| o [nick] | operator (gives the user the Operator status (Operators only)) |
All these are done with the following syntax: /mode [channel] +[letter] [add-ons required for the command]
Note: for banning, a hostname is required. This can be found by doing a Whois on someone. The hostname is the part with the nickname, followed by a possible username, then a @, and the rest is information on how someone is identified on his / her network. This can be an IP, or several other things. This differs per ISP.
Also, these are the usual guidelines with regards to banning. Please note that there can be exceptions to this, but these exceptions are decided on a case-by-case basis by those with the most authority in a channel.
- A warning.
- A warning kick.
- A short ban.
- A longer ban
- A CoJ (with regards to official channels) / Clan Summit (with regards to clan channels) ban.
- A permanent ban.
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| /kick [nick] [reason] | kicks the user |
| /topic [text] | sets a channel topic |
An example: If I wanted to change the topic to 'No Humping Allowed!' in #db, I would use the following command:
/topic #db No Humping Allowed!
If someone still proceeds to hump, a warning kick is given:
/kick #db Humper No Humping Here!
The person still goes on, ignoring the previous warning. A ban is next:
/ban #db Humper!Hump@ISP.IP
Followed by a kick to remove the user permanently:
/kick #db Humper No Humping Here! You were warned.
The ban can be removed later on.
3-X
No doubt you have seen X mentioned before now. X is used as the primary tool to maintain channels registered with Undernet. It can be used to automatically set modes on given users (who must have an X/cservice account for this to work), set channel modes, prevent loss of Operator status in the channel, keep channel settings saved, and prevent the loss of channels to others.
3.A-Registering with X
http://cservice.undernet.org/live
Simple as that. Follow the information, and you will be registered. Note: this does require a non-free email account. Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo, etc. don't work. Your ISP account, or any other account usually does work.
Simple as that. Follow the information, and you will be registered. Note: this does require a non-free email account. Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo, etc. don't work. Your ISP account, or any other account usually does work.
3.B-Logging in with X
After registering, open IRC. Then, use the following command to log in:
/msg x@channels.undernet.org login [nickname] [password]
To change your password, or view more information, go to http://cservice.undernet.org/live and log in there.
/msg x@channels.undernet.org login [nickname] [password]
To change your password, or view more information, go to http://cservice.undernet.org/live and log in there.
4-Using X
The following command is used to call upon X:
/msg x [channel] [command] [additional arguments]
A full list of commands can be found here.
There are several levels of X access, ranging from 0 to 500. This might seem extreme, but there are some basic levels of access. A higher level user than you will have to grant you access before you can use the commands (in other words, simply registering will not give you operator status).
All commands are fully explained in the link above.
/msg x [channel] [command] [additional arguments]
A full list of commands can be found here.
There are several levels of X access, ranging from 0 to 500. This might seem extreme, but there are some basic levels of access. A higher level user than you will have to grant you access before you can use the commands (in other words, simply registering will not give you operator status).
| Level | Description |
|---|---|
| 0 | everyone |
| 1 | registered user |
| 25 | user with access to Voice commands |
| 50 | user with access to Kick and Topic commands |
| 75 | user with access to Ban, Unban and Op commands |
| 100 | user with access to Op, Deop, and Suspend commands |
| 200 | user with access to advanced Kick and Status commands |
| 400 | user with access to Clearmode and user statuses. |
| 450 | user with access to channel settings |
| 500 | Channel Owner |
All commands are fully explained in the link above.