Phoenix Network Forums

Understanding the following will be your first step to learning how an IRC bot connects to a server and then does what it's been programmed to do. (I'll be assuming you know how to use telnet, already)

For the purpose of this tutorial, we'll be setting up a raw IRC session with irc.anoxs.net on port 6667.

• The first thing you'll see when you connect to irc.anoxs.net will be nothing. Generally, most IRC servers will issue some kind of indication that you've connected successfully which looks somewhat like this:
  
  :irc.server.net NOTICE AUTH :*** Checking ident...
  :irc.server.net NOTICE AUTH :*** No ident response; username prefixed with ~
  :irc.server.net NOTICE AUTH :*** Found your hostname
  
• After you've connected, the server will then wait for a response from you. To save yourself from recieving a ping timeout you should now send a pong command to irc.anoxs.net. It will look like this:
  
  PONG irc.anoxs.net
  
  (Now would be a good time to copy that command and be ready to paste it every now and again to avoid a ping timeout)
  
• Now you have to identify yourself by supplying a NICK and USER like so.
  
  NICK test
  USER test 8 * : this is a test for a tutorial
  
  These two are just telling the server what you'd like your nickname to be and some information about you, the user. In mIRC these fields are filled when input your email address and real name.
  
  (If you're told that you have not registered, you should probably send another pong and then try typing NICK and USER again)
  
• Once you've completed this step you'll be greeted with the Message Of The Day. You can show this message again by simply typing MOTD at any time. (Please notice this is done without a forward slash).
  
• Joining #phoenix is super easy:
  
  JOIN #phoenix
  
• Sending a message to #phoenix is a little different....
  
  PRIVMSG #phoenix : Hi guys.
  
• Sending a message to Tim is much the same as the above:
  
  PRIVMSG Tim : Hey Tim.
  
  I won't go on, but WHOIS, WHO, PING, KILL, KICK all work the same way as you'd expect them to, only without a forward slash.
  
• By this stage you'll probably be missing your GUI and will want to leave:
  
  QUIT : brb
  or
  PART #phoenix
  

With all of this in mind and a basic understanding of PERL, you should now be ready to make your very own, simple, IRC bot.

NOTE: If you want to learn more about the IRC protocol, consult the RFC1459 or send me a PM- and I'll try to explain as best as I can.

This tutorial is nice! I'm going to sticky it, it can be useful for lots of users in this forum.

Nice tutorial Asbestos, I'm glad you wrote it

Well this clears a lot of things for scripters and even newbie with the help of perl knowledge can made there own bot very sticky and impressive

Thank you.

It is really useful for newbies. Good work!

Cool! This will come in use, but for the most part learning about telnet.

this is a very good tutorial

I saw a story on digg yesterday which went through the details of making an IRC bot in Python from scratch.

Since it's relevant to this topic here's the link.

Uhm, just wanted to ask if how you can do a CTCP PING to a person? And how to reply when you're sent by a ping? Thanks in advance

first you must know, that a CTCP is nothing else but a PRIVMSG.
A request begins with the ASCII Code "1". I am not sure, but I believe the replys start with something else. I have no time to lookup it now.

What about DCC chat?

is afaik a CTCP DCC <mode> <ip> <port>, while the ip is as integer.
For more details read: http://www.invlogic.com/irc/ctcp.html

Just a little bump.

If you send messages like this, they will appear to others like

<you>--fjdhfjdf
(replace the -- with 2 spaces - the forum strips it down to 1 space all the time)

2 spaces, wich is ugly

PRIVMSG <target> :<text>

for example

PRIVMSG FliPPeh :You suck

As with any other command using a colon