micolous.id.au

The result of a blogging accident

exchat

eX-Chat is a fork of X-Chat 2.6.0. It aims to preserve the traditional interface of X-Chat 1.8.x and 2.0.x, over some of the newer changes, while still adding some of the new features from current versions. This is one of those projects where I had some motivation and got annoyed at xchat enough to do this, however for now, I’m using irssi again in screen (it suits me better, as I can move around my IRC session to different computers), so this software is no longer maintained, and will probably only ever have this one release. If you want to reuse the name and continue the spirit of this project, please contact me, and I’ll pop a link to your project here.

Warning: Because this software is unmaintained, it will have every security issue and bug that effects X-Chat 2.6.0. Please take care before using this software on a public IRC network. As I don’t have an interest to continue this project, these will not be fixed, and you’ll have to fix them yourself.

Changes so far:

  • Security bugfixes. Stricter use of exec in commands other than /exec itself, to try and prevent arbitrary code execution. The bases covered so far with this are:
    • CTCP Sound (remote)
    • /dns (local)
    • URL handling, also now displays a warning why a URL doesn’t have optionsto open it in a browser. XChat 2.6.0 would quietly remove the options.
  • Reverted to the “classic” light-grey on black theme. The white theme always looked stupid in my opinion, even on Windows.
  • Restoring configuration options that were removed in X-Chat 2.6.0. xchat-gtk is not xchat-gnome.
  • A basic Debian package configuration is included. Minimum work for you package maintainers, eh? :)
  • ChatJunkies is no longer the default IRC network set, instead we use whatever is first alphabetically.
  • Server selection dialog no longer comes up by default.
  • Servers now default to UTF-8 encoding, even if you’re not on Win32.
  • The “Usermenu” is now turned on by default, and can be turned on and off in the Preferences dialog.
  • The Server menu has some of the old options re-added to them, however not everything works yet.
  • Auto-rejoin on kick is configurable in the preferences. It is turned off by default, because many channel operators find it annoying and defeats the purpose of /kick, and will ban you instead.
  • colors.conf is now called colours.conf.
  • Default CTCP VERSION reply is just “exchat irc client”. The version number, machine type and OS aren’t reported (unless you explicitly want it to be in “CTCP Replies”). The reason it is not just “exchat” is a popular trojan “protection” software, known as “IRC Defender” automatically glines (network ban) any user with a one word version reply, by default, because of one particular trojan that actually sends a random one-word version reply. Because there are so many IRC network admins out there, who enjoy not bothering to actually configuring the software properly at all, this work around had to be done. This effects numerous other IRC clients. Feel free to complain to them about it, and the behaviour of exchat will change in the future.

Releases

0.1.0

This is the initial release. Download. These are the notes:

  • This is currently in alpha testing. There will be bugs. Please report them.
  • This package currently conflicts with xchat, as some files have the same name as X-Chat’s. Additionally, many UI elements and files still say X-Chat on them. These things will be ironed out in future releases.
  • The settings files are in a different location however (~/.exchat), so it will not touch your existing X-Chat setup. The configuration files are currently compatible, however you won’t be able to take your xchat.conf from eX-Chat and put it back on X-Chat.
  • The specfile is broken, and will need fixing, however I don’t run Red Hat, so I don’t really know how.
  • The server menu items aren’t enabled yet. You may wish to add your own Usermenu commands instead.
  • Many translations will now need updating (new/modified strings).
  • This is also my first attempt at modifying X-Chat. I still need to get a complete feel for the code.

This has only been build tested on Linux (ubuntu), for amd64 and i386. Don’t kill me. :)