IRC on Windows

How do I get to #freeasd from a Windows machine?

Go to this URL with netscape, internet explorer, or whatever you use:

http://www.tucows.com/us.html

and pick the state closest to you. Assuming you use Win95, choose "Win95/NT" from the choices on the left hand side of the main screen When that page comes up, scroll down to "Entertainment", and click on "Chat IRC Clients". When that page comes up, scroll down on this page to "MIRC", and click the download button beside it. (Remember where you saved it to.) It's about 856k, so go make a sandwich or something, depending on your connection speed. After your download is done, you can exit your browser and open up windows explorer. Find the directory or folder you saved the file to, and double click on the file. It should install itself to the mirc directory. Just click ok, and it will go fine.

Now, click the windows start button, got to programs, and then go to MIRC. Click on MIRC32 and the program should start up. The about box should pop up, so just hit the X and get rid of it. Also, the MIRC setup box should be up there on the screen, so fill in the info as best as you can. Just be sure you choose "UNDERNET" as your server in the drop down box. Try to pick one close to you, but Undernet: US, MO, Springfield is a good server to use as it's usually not too busy. There is no need to put your real e-mail address in the boxes if you don't want to, and I wouldn't recommend it anyway. Just make one up. But, you can use your real one if you want.

On the Local Info box, fill in just your Local Host, for example, if you are on ibm.net, you would type just ibm.net in the box. On Connect you should click the IP Address box. Lookup method should be Normal. On the Options box, everything should be checked, and you shouldn't change any of the boxes. On the Identd box, I have the enable identd server box checked, my nickname, Unix, 113, and the show Identd requests checked. On the firewall box, the only thing I have there is port1080. That's all the setup required.

Next you click on Connect to IRC Server on the same box or, if you are at the main window, click on the little lightning bolt on the toolbar and below the file menu. That should get you connected. If you make it that far, a box should pop up that says MIRC Channels Folder. Type the name #freeasd in the box, click add, then choose it again in the bigger box and click on join. That should get you there. Chat away. When you are done, click on the commands menu and choose part channel. That will close the #freeasd window. Next click on the commands menu again and choose Quit IRC to break the connection. You can now exit the program by either clicking on the X to close the window, or choose the file menu and click on exit.

I hope that this is not too oversimplified for you, but I believe there are others who are trying to get on IRC also, and since I was writing the thing I figured I might as well make it workable for anybody.