EPIC5(1) BSD General Commands Manual EPIC5(1)NAMEepic5 — Internet Relay Chat client for UNIX like systems
SYNOPSISepic5 [-a] [-b] [-B] [-c chan] [-d] [-f] [-F] [-h] [-H hostname]
[-l filename] [-L filename] [-n nickname] [-o] [-O] [-p port] [-q]
[-s] [-S] [-v] [-x] [-z username] [nickname]
[server description list]
DESCRIPTION
The EPIC5 program is a unix-based character oriented user agent
('client') to Internet Relay Chat. It is a fully functional ircII client
with many useful extensions. This version works with modern irc2 server
networks as of early 2006. Support for non-irc2 networks (such as OPN or
MS Comic Chat) is hit-and-miss.
OPTIONS-a Append the server description list to the default server list. The
default behavior is for the server description list to replace the
default server list.
-b Operate in so called “bot mode.” This implies the [-d] option.
EPIC5 will fork(2) immediately and the parent process will exit,
returning you to your shell. Some system administrators do not
look kindly to their users running bots, and they have disabled
this option. Even if your administrator has not disabled it, you
should not assume this gives you automatic permission to run a bot.
If you do run a bot without permission, your administrator may get
very angry with you, and possibly revoke your account. In addi‐
tion, most IRC operators on public irc networks have very little
tolerance for people who run bots. So just a word of caution, make
sure that your system administrator and your irc administrator have
given you permission before you run a bot.
-c chan
Join the specified channel the first time you successfully connect
to a server.
-d Operate in “dumb mode.” The client will not put up a full screen
display, and will read from standard input and write to standard
output. This is useful if the output normally looks awful (because
you are using an incorrect TERM setting, or your terminal descrip‐
tion is spectacularly broken), or you just don't want to use the
pretty interface. This option will be turned on automatically if
your current TERM setting is not capable of a full screen display.
-h Display a moderately concise help message and exit immediately.
-H hostname
Use the IP address of the specified hostname as your default local
IP address. This can be used if you have multiple IP addresses on
the same machine and you want to use an address other than the
default address. You might need to use this option when
gethostname(3) does not return a hostname (in some poorly config‐
ured NIS environments). The use of multiple IP addresses on a sin‐
gle machine is commonly referred to as "virtual hosting", and each
IP address is a "virtual host". Please understand that an irc
client may not tell the irc server what your hostname should be:
the server alone determines that. Servers typically use the canon‐
ical hostname for an IP address as your hostname. Because of this,
this option will not permit you to use a CNAME (secondary hostname
for an IP address), because the server will use the canonical host‐
name instead. This option overrides the IRCHOST environment vari‐
able.
-l filename,[filename]
Use the specified filename(s) as the startup file. The startup
file is loaded the first time you successfully connect to a server,
unless you specify the [-B] option. This overrides the EPICRC
environment variable. If this option is not specified, and the
EPICRC environment variable is not set, then ~/.epicrc is the
default startup file.
-n nickname
Use the specified nickname as the default nickname whenever you
connect to an irc server. This option overrides the IRCNICK envi‐
ronment variable. This option can be overridden if you specify
nickname argument in the command line (see below).
-p port
Use the specified port as the default port for new server connec‐
tions. The default port is usually 6667. Make sure that the
servers you want to connect to are listening on this port before
you try to connect there.
-q Suppress the loading of any file when you first establish a connec‐
tion to an irc server.
-s Do not connect to a server after reading the startup script.
Instead, present the server list and advise the user to connect to
a server manually.
-S The EPIC5 program is being run as a shell script. You must make
this look like #/path/to/epic -S other args.
-v Output version identification (VID) information and exit.
-x This undocumented feature turns on all of the XDEBUG flags. Refer
to the help files for XDEBUG if you want to know what happens if
you use this.
-z username
Use the specified username when negotiating a connection to a new
irc server. This overrides the IRCUSER environment variable. If
this option is not specified, then the user name specified in
/etc/passwd for your user is used. This feature was formerly
undocumented, but because of identd(8) this option isn't as useful
as it once was. If you are a sysadmin, please install identd, and
then this flag will provide no value to your users.
nickname
The first bare word found is taken as the default nickname to use.
This overrides all other options, including the -n option and the
IRCNICK environment variable. If all else fails, then the client
uses your login name as the default nickname.
server,[server]
After the nickname, a list of one or more server specifications can
be listed. Unless you specify the -a option, this will replace
your default server list! The -a option forces any servers listed
here to be appended to the default server list. The format for
server specifications is:
hostname:port:password:nick
Any item can be omitted by leaving the field blank, and any trail‐
ing colons can also be omitted.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
The Screen:
The screen is split into two parts, separated by an inverse-video status
line (if supported). The upper (larger) part of the screen displays
responses from the ircd(8) server. The lower part of the screen (a sin‐
gle line) accepts keyboard input.
Some terminals do not support certain features required by epic5 , in
which case you receive a message stating this. If this occurs, try
changing the terminal type or run epic5 with the -d option.
Irc Commands:
Any line beginning with the slash character “/” is regarded as an epic5
command (the command character may be changed). Any line not beginning
with this character is treated as a message to be sent to the current
channel. The client has a built in help system. Install the help files
(they should be available at the same place you got the client) and then
type “/help” to open up the help system.
The .epicrc File:
When epic5 is executed, it checks the user's home directory for a
~/.epicrc file, executing the commands in the file. Commands in this
file do not need to have a leading slash character “/” This allows pre‐
definition of aliases and other features.
PRACTICAL EXAMPLES
Certainly any description of epic5 in this man page will be sorely inade‐
quate because most of the confusion doesn't even start until after you
get the client to connect to a server. But if you really have problems
getting the client to connect to a server, try some of these:
epic5
Try this first. This will assume all the defaults. If the person
who is maintaining epic at your site has done a halfway decent job,
this will put you on a server that is somewhat local to you.
epic5 nickname irc.domain.com
or something similar will attempt to connect to the irc server run‐
ning on the host "irc.domain.com" (fill in a real irc server here)
with the nickname of well, "nickname". This is the most common way
to specify an alternate server to use.
epic5 nickname irc.domain.com:6664
Sometimes, some servers are really busy, and it can take them a
long time to establish a connection with you on the default port
(6667). Most major servers on big public networks accept connec‐
tions on many different ports, with the most common being most or
all of the ports between 6660 and 6675. You can usually connect
much faster if you use a port other than 6667, if the server you're
connecting to supports an alternate port.
epic5 nickname irc.efnet.net
If you're totally stumped and trying to get on efnet, try this.
epic5 nickname irc.undernet.org
If you're totally stumped and trying to get on undernet, try this.
epic5 nickname irc.dal.net
If you're totally stumped and trying to get on dalnet, try this.
FILES
/usr/local/bin/epic5 the default location of the binary
~/.epicrc default initialization file
~/.epic/ directory you can put your own epic5 scripts
into, that can then be loaded with /load
/usr/local/share/epic5 default directory containing message-of-the-day,
master initialization, help files and epic5
scripts
THE HELP FILES
Starting up the client is the easy part. Once you get connected, you'll
probably find you have no idea what you're doing. That's where the help
files come in. If the person who maintains irc at your site didn't
install the help files, pester them until they do. Once the help files
are available, use the “/help” command to get started. There are a
bazillion commands and a multitude of nuances that will take a few months
to get down pat. But once you do, you will be so firmly addicted to irc
that your wife will divorce you, your kids will leave you, your dog will
run away, and you'll flunk all your classes, and be left to sing the
blues.
USEFUL WEB RESOURCES
<http://www.epicsol.org/> The EPIC home page
<http://help.epicsol.org/> The Online EPIC Help Pages
<http://www.irchelp.org/> Lots of great help for new irc users.
SIGNALSepic5 handles the following signals gracefully
SIGUSR1 Closes all DCC connections and EXEC'd processes.
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
It can be helpful to predefine certain variables in in the ~/.cshrc ,
~/.profile , or ~/.login file:
IRCNICK The user's default IRC nickname
IRCNAME The user's default IRC realname (otherwise retrieved from
/etc/passwd )
IRCSERVER The user's default IRC server list (see server option for
details)
HOME Overrides the default home page in /etc/password
TERM The type of terminal emulation to use
SEE ALSOircd(8)BUGS
Any non-trivial piece of software has bugs. EPIC5 is no exception. You
can refer to the KNOWNBUGS file that is distributed with the client
source code for a list of problems that are known to exist and may or may
not be fixed some day. If you find a bug that is not listed there, you
can refer to the BUG_FORM file that is also distributed with the source
code. It will give you instructions on how to fill out the report and
where to send it.
ERRATA
The online documentation probably should be in docbook form rather than
in the current help format. The entire help system is a hack.
This manual page only describes the options to epic, but doesn't tell you
what to do once you get connected.
AUTHORS
IRC II was created by Michael Sandrof (ms5n+@andrew.cmu.edu). The cur‐
rent copyright holder of IRC II is Matthew Green (mrg@mame.mu.oz.au).
EPIC5 is maintained by EPIC Software Labs (list@epicsol.org).
MANPAGE AUTHORS
At one time or another, this man page has been edited by Darren Reed,
R.P.C. Rodgers, the lynX, Matthew Green, and EPIC Software Labs.
July 31, 2006
