What is SSL? What Benefits Does it Offer, and How do I Use It?

Mar 23rd

Posted by Ryan in Explanation

No comments

SSL stands for Secure Sockets Layer, and is a method of encrypting data being transmitted over the Internet that is used by e-commerce sites and other sites that require sending and receiving sensitive information.. This means that when you give your credit card or bank information to PayPal or Amazon, to name two, your information is protected. The same can be done for your IRC connection.

The main benefit of connecting to IRC via SSL is that all content you send to the server is encrypted, as well as all data the server sends you. This is useful if you are connecting from a public hotspot and want to protect your passwords. If you are worried about the content of the messages in the channels you’re in, you’ll be protected on your end; however, unless everyone in the channel is also using SSL, the copies of the messages sent to them are in plain text, and could be read by anyone sniffing packets between the unencrypted user and the server. To ensure that everyone in the channel is using SSL, you can apply channel mode +z.

Since the directions for connecting over SSL differ based on the client and operating system you are using, please refer to your client’s documentation on that. The port GeekShed uses for SSL is 6697, and every server can host SSL-based connection.

Should you require assistance, feel free to leave a comment here, or ask in #help.

Related: GeekShed Certificate Authority · Login Service

Can People on GeekShed See My IP Address

Feb 17th

Posted by Ryan in Explanation

No comments

Every now and then, a question that arises in #help is if people can see the IP address of another individual. Since GeekShed encrypt users’ IP addresses and hostmasks the short answer is no, other people can not see your IP address.

The long answer is the following:

The only people that can see a user’s IP address is the user, and network staff. Anyone else will see an encrypted version of the IP address, or an encrypted version of the hostname if the IP address was able to be resolved.

Examples:

  • Instead of seeing host127-68-124-93.range127-124.virginmedia.com, other users will see protectedhost-A8B9B24A.range127-124.virginmedia.com
  • Instead of seeing 134.65.154.12, other users will see AD171E0.223C44F1.789AD83A.IP

Some users claim that they are able to see the IP address of other users. This is incorrect. What they are seeing is the IP address of the page they see when they try to visit a domain that does not resolve.

Examples:

  • If they claim to know the IP address of a staff member, with the geekshed.net vhost, the IP they really see if that of the server the geekshed.net website resides on.
  • If a user of OpenDNS claims to know the IP address of the virginmedia user (from the previous example), what they will really see is 208.69.36.132, which actually resolves to hit-nxdomain.opendns.com.
  • Some clients may resolve the “primary” domain name itself, in which case the user would see 212.250.162.12 for virginmedia.com

Disclaimer: this all goes out the window if the user unsets usermode x, which is the mode that hides their IP address/hostmask. This mode is set by default on connect and is removed either by doing “/umode2 -x” or “/hs off”. If umode x ever gets unset it can be turned back on with “/umode2 +x”

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Quit Messages and What They Mean

Jan 18th

Posted by Ryan in Explanation

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Excess flood – you attempted to send too much data to the IRC server too quickly. The server thought you were attempting to flood it, and so it disconnected you. If this is happening to you a lot, you should check to see if your client offers a setting that will prevent this (mIRC users: Options -> IRC -> Flood).

Max sendQ exceeded – you failed to receive the data from the server quick enough; the server tried to send you too much data and closed the connection. This could happen if you use /who on larger channels too often.

Ping timeout – In order to confirm that connections are still active, servers regularly send out ping requests. When a client doesn’t respond to this within a set period of time, 2 minutes on GeekShed, it believes that the connection no longer active, and closes it. If this happening to you often, you should try using the closest server to you (or the next closest, if you’re already using the closest).

Connection reset by peer – when the IRC client uncleanly closes the connection to the server , the server may not realize that the connection has been terminated. In this situation, the user still appears to be online (a ghost user). The next time the server attempts to send data to the client, it realizes the connection no longer exists and resets it; the ghost is then disconnected.

Broken pipe – when there is a sudden break in the connection between the IRC server and client, the user will disconnect with this message.

*.geekshed.net *.geekshed.net – this is a netsplit, or when one server loses its connection from the rest of the network. For a more detailed explanation, as well as images, view the WikiPedia entry on Netsplits.

G:lined or Z:lined – for some reason, the user has been banned from the network. The reason, as well as a URL where the person may find more information is always given when staff ban someone. For information on the ban appeal process, please see the Ban Appeals page.

Killed (nick (reasons)) – this is given when a user has been forcibly disconnected from the network by a staff member. The staff member’s name and a reason are always given. This should be viewed as a warning, and the user may be banned if the behavior continues.

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GeekShed Management Script

Jan 5th

Posted by Phil in Explanation

2 comments

GeekShed has an officially supported management script written by the GeekShed staff along with users Zetacon and GrimReaper. It offers a range of features including canned messages to help people with common questions as well as some decent channel and nickname management features.

We have checked out the tags directory at http://www.geekshed.net/gs-script/ so you can find each version of the script. We recommend using the latest version (i.e. the one with the highest version number). The script is the one ending in .mrc. The .sig file is the GPG signature of the script and has been included from versions 1.8 for posterity. Public key Phil Lavin (Freelance Programmer) can be found on major key synchronizing servers.

Load it into the remotes section of your script editor just like any other script or place it in your mIRC install dir and type:

/load -rs gs-chanscript.mrc
Any problems, come see us in #help on irc.geekshed.net

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Login Service

Jan 4th

Posted by Phil in Explanation

No comments

We have, for a while now, had a login service which links to our services database to allow you to login to areas of the site, such as the quote database, using your services login. This has always been an experimental feature however we are now happy that it’s working great and have finalized it. We have applied an SSL certificate to the site to allow your username and password to be encrypted as it passes over the Internet for our auth service to verify.

We hope to be able to use this service in the future for lots of cool areas of the site including web based nickname and channel registration.

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What Ports Can I Use to Connect to GeekShed?

Jan 2nd

Posted by Ryan in Explanation

No comments

Besides the default port 6667, all GeekShed servers accept standard connections on the following ports:

6660, 6661, 6662, 6663, 6664, 6665, 6666, 6668, 6669, 7029, 7070, 1494, and 1755


All servers also accept SSL connections on port 6697.

Should you experience difficulties in connecting, you can try another port or another server. Should you still have difficulties, you can post in the forums where someone will be able to assist you.
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Who owns GeekShed IRC?

Dec 26th

Posted by Phil in Explanation

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GeekShed IRC is owned by Geek Shed Ltd. GeekShed Ltd. is a UK registered company (company #07055433) boarded by Allan Jude and Phil Lavin as directors and Marcus Joyce as secretary. Allan, Phil and Marcus all have equal share holdings.

GeekShed Ltd. exists for administrative purposes and GeekShed IRC is run as much as a democracy as possible. Reasonable caution is taken with access to the network and not all staff hold the same access rights. Access is granted as appropriate for the task each staff member is required to perform.

GeekShed Ltd. is funded solely by donations and uses these for administrative costs and for projects that directly benefit our users.

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IRC Clients

Dec 21st

Posted by Ryan in Explanation

6 comments

At least once a week, we get asked about IRC clients that people can use. Although GeekShed offers the TFlash flash-based chat client that can be used and embedded on one’s site, unless you’re a casual chatter on a few channels, it is often beneficial to use a dedicated IRC client. By using a client, you are able to have more features such as scripts, logging, and more advanced channel moderation tools.

Below is a list of some IRC clients. It is not an exhaustive list, so if you do not like any of the clients, search around the web for one that you do like.
ClientSupported Platforms
mIRCWindows
IceChatWindows
X-Chat 2Windows
ColloquyMacintosh
X-Chat AquaMacintosh
LinkinusMacintosh
Konversation*nix
ChatZilla (Firefox addon)Windows, Macintosh, *nix
OperaWindows, Macintosh, *nix
BitchXWindows, Macintosh, *nix
IrssiWindows, Macintosh, *nix
Do you recommend any of these clients, or one that isn’t listed? Feel free to add a comment, and let us know.
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Does GeekShed have IPv6 Support?

Nov 18th

Posted by Phil in Explanation

5 comments

As of 17 November, 2009 – We do! This is currently a purely experimental feature but we would greatly appreciate your testing and feedback on it. You can connect to GeekShed’s IPv6 Round Robin at ipv6.geekshed.net.

If you require any help with anything IPv6, come see us in #help.

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Why should I register my nickname and how do I do it?

Nov 9th

Posted by Phil in Explanation

11 comments

Registering your nickname on GeekShed provides a number of benefits. The most notable of these is that registering your nickname prevents other people from using it. Once a user starts using the nickname, they will be asked to ‘identify’ to it with a password. If they fail to do so, their nickname will be changed. This helps to stop people posing as you.

Once you register your nickname, you can be added to the auto voice and op lists in other people’s channels. This enables you to be a permanent staff member in channels. You are also entitled to a vhost once you have been registered for 90 days.

Registration provides you with many benefits and is completely free.

To register your nickname on GeekShed, you must first be using it. If you are not currently using it, change to it with the command:

/nick <nickname>

For example:

/nick CrazyUser

Once you are using the nickname, you may register it in one of two ways. If you’re using GeekShed’s Flash client, register your nick from the “Options” menu at the top of the window. In any other client, use the following command:

/ns register <password> <e-mail>

For example:

/ns register supersecretpassword crazyuser@hotmail.com

Following this, you will be sent an e-mail giving you the details required to finish off the registration. Follow the instructions in the e-mail.

Each time you connect and start using the registered, you will be told that “This nick is owned by someone else”. You must ‘identify’ to it using the following command:

/ns identify <password>

For example:

/ns identify supersecretpassword

If you use mIRC, you can load the following script into the Remotes section of your script editor (press alt+R to access this) to identify you automatically. Just replace ‘YOURPASSWORDHERE’ with your actual password:

on 1:NOTICE:*This nickname is registered and protected*:?: {
   if ($nick == NickServ) {
      ns identify YOURPASSWORDHERE
   }
}

on 1:NOTICE:*This nick is owned by someone else*:?: {
   if ($nick == NickServ) {
      ns identify YOURPASSWORDHERE
   }
}

If you require help, come and see us in #help on irc.geekshed.net

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