Mar
15

Pidgin, IRC, Freenode

Posted by adam in Fun, Interesting, Work

IRC is an ancient, tried-and-true one-to-many chat protocol. Pidgin is a feature-rich instant messaging client that can handle many protocols, including IRC. Pidgin runs on many different platforms, including the three most popular ones. Pidgin integrates nicely with the desktop.

Here’s how to set up a Freenode IRC account in Pidgin:

  1. Open Pidgin; click Accounts -> Add/Edit.
  2. Click the Add button.
  3. Change the protocol to IRC and enter
    irc.freenode.net as the server.
  4. If you have a Screen name (called a “nick” or “nickname” in IRC
    parlance), type it (e.g. MrOpenSource) in the Screen
    name     field. If you don’t own one yet, make one up.
  5. Click on the Advanced tab, and fill in the Real
    name     field.

Now, register your nickname. This helps people recognize you, protects your
identity, and allows you to send private messages.

  1. Click on Buddies -> New Instant Message.
  2. Fill in NickServ for Name.
  3. Change Account to the Freenode account you just created,
    and click Ok. Now you can “talk” with the
    NickServ robot.
  4. The first message you send should be register PASSWORD
    (where PASSWORD is one of your choosing).
  5. Next, set an email address. This will give you a way to reset your
    password later should there be a need. Send set hide email on
    to NickServ.
  6. Next message should be set email ADDRESS (where
    ADDRESS is your email address)

Then, join #mifos. :)

Further instructions can be found here or by saying help to NickServ. Commands like /msg NickServ help do work in Pidgin.

This guide was heavily inspired by the following article on freesoftwaremagazine.com.

One more final tip: enable the “Join/Part Hiding” plugin to supress the many “so-and-so joined the room, so-and-so left” messages that will likely show up in the channel.


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