GeekShed IRC Network
What Do YOU Want To See?
Feb 24th
My week long break from courses is coming up soon, and I have nothing to do for it. So I figured that I would put a day or two towards GeekShed. The only problem is that I don’t know what I should do. This is where you, the users, come into play. Although we always welcome input from our users, whether it’s a comment left here, on the forums, in #help, on twitter, or directly to a staffer, the whole purpose of this post is to solicit ideas on what you would like to see.
Here are the ground rules:
I will be leaving comments on this post open for a week, at which point I’ll close them and decide which item I will be working on.
If you have any questions or need something clarified, please /join #help and speak with Ryan, or you may post in this topic on the forum. Please leave comments here for suggestions only.
Here are the ground rules:
- It should have something to do with the website, especially the parts that are driven by WordPress (basically everything except the forums), as that is my primary area of responsibility.
- It should be something that can be done in 12-24 hours. My break is only a week long, and as much as I love GeekShed, I don’t want to undertake something that will take the entire break.
- It should be something that will benefit the majority of users (i.e. not a post about why people should join your channel).
- Obviously, the suggestion must conform to the Network’s Terms of Use.
I will be leaving comments on this post open for a week, at which point I’ll close them and decide which item I will be working on.
If you have any questions or need something clarified, please /join #help and speak with Ryan, or you may post in this topic on the forum. Please leave comments here for suggestions only.
How Do I Embed My Chatroom Onto My Website?
Feb 22nd
One of the more frequent questions we see is people wondering how do they embed their chatroom on their website, and more often than not, it’s run off of WordPress. Although I wrote this while going through the steps on a site using WordPress, the process should be similar on Drupal, Joomla, or any other CMS.
One thing to note before starting is that you need to be able to post HTML, and not have it filtered. If you are using wordpress.com, or WPMU and are not the site/super admin, your HTML is filtered and you will not be able to see the chat box when you post the post/page you’re trying to put it onto. If you cannot post HTML, it will not work because it will treat the code as text instead.
Having said that, here are 5 easy steps to embedding your chat onto a site.
One thing to note before starting is that you need to be able to post HTML, and not have it filtered. If you are using wordpress.com, or WPMU and are not the site/super admin, your HTML is filtered and you will not be able to see the chat box when you post the post/page you’re trying to put it onto. If you cannot post HTML, it will not work because it will treat the code as text instead.
Having said that, here are 5 easy steps to embedding your chat onto a site.
- Get the embed code from our website. At the very minimum, you should change the channel name. Unless you know better dimensions for your site’s layout, it might be best to leave the default size; you can always change that later (it is just two variables in the embed code).
- Add a new Page or Post like you normally would, and give it a title. While still in the visual editor (if you use it), feel free to add anything that you would like above and/or below the chat box and associated items.
- Next, if you aren’t already in HTML mode, click on the HTML button.
- Paste in the code you copied from step 1 in the appropriate place (depending on if you added text for above/below [step 2]). At this point, you will see the code, which may not make sense to you. Click the Save Draft button, then Preview.
- Depending on your theme, you might need to change the size of the chat. Once you are happy with how it looks, Publish the post.
New Staff Member – CCMike
Feb 21st
There is a concept. This concept is difficult for the author to understand. Some people call it ‘real life’. Sadly, this mischievous beast has gotten in the way once more and our newest staff member, Kyle, has been forced to resign his staff position to pursue further education. This is a great loss to GeekShed and we wish him all the best with his studies.
In an attempt to fill the gaping hole left by Kyle’s resignation, we have asked CCMike to join the GeekShed staff team. He kindly accepted this offer and we are thrilled to have him on the team. CCMike has been on GeekShed and its predecessor for 5+ years and is a great friend to many.
Like any new staff member, Mike has a lot to learn but we are confident that he will take this in his stride.
In an attempt to fill the gaping hole left by Kyle’s resignation, we have asked CCMike to join the GeekShed staff team. He kindly accepted this offer and we are thrilled to have him on the team. CCMike has been on GeekShed and its predecessor for 5+ years and is a great friend to many.
Like any new staff member, Mike has a lot to learn but we are confident that he will take this in his stride.
Can People on GeekShed See My IP Address
Feb 17th
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”
Flash Client Upgrade
Jan 7th
We have, for quite a while now, offered TFlash as our web based IRC client. This was originally written as a quick replacement for the Java client we used previously. TFlash has, however, stood up to the test of time and has proved to be a very popular client amongst users.
We have now decided that it is time to upgrade TFlash to make it bigger and better. To this end, we contracted Mike Parks (BigRedPimp) of thinkrightgames.com to carry out the work. He is an incredibly experienced Flash developer and has made an exceptional job of the new Flash Client.
Today we have launched this new client and it should now be embedded on all of the sites that had the old Flash client embedded.
Development of the client started in early December and, since then, a team of testers have tirelessly tested it and removed bugs. We thank them for their help. If you do however find a bug, please report it using the address at the top of the new flash client.
BigRedPimp has put in a huge amount of effort with this project and we thank him unreservedly for his time and for doing this project for such a low cost. We are glad to call him a friend of GeekShed.
If you have any questions about the new Flash client, please come and see us in #help on irc.geekshed.net.
You can see the new TFlash at http://www.geekshed.net/chat/
We have now decided that it is time to upgrade TFlash to make it bigger and better. To this end, we contracted Mike Parks (BigRedPimp) of thinkrightgames.com to carry out the work. He is an incredibly experienced Flash developer and has made an exceptional job of the new Flash Client.
Today we have launched this new client and it should now be embedded on all of the sites that had the old Flash client embedded.
Development of the client started in early December and, since then, a team of testers have tirelessly tested it and removed bugs. We thank them for their help. If you do however find a bug, please report it using the address at the top of the new flash client.
BigRedPimp has put in a huge amount of effort with this project and we thank him unreservedly for his time and for doing this project for such a low cost. We are glad to call him a friend of GeekShed.
If you have any questions about the new Flash client, please come and see us in #help on irc.geekshed.net.
You can see the new TFlash at http://www.geekshed.net/chat/
GeekShed Management Script
Jan 5th
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).
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:
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).
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.mrcAny problems, come see us in #help on irc.geekshed.net
Login Service
Jan 4th
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.
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.
What Ports Can I Use to Connect to GeekShed?
Jan 2nd
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.
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.
Subservient Chris Raises Money for GeekShed and the MDA
Dec 26th
For the past two years, Chris Pirillo has held a fundraiser on New Year’s Eve known as Subservient Chris. Both of those years, all of the money raised went directly to the IRC network to help defray expenses and operating costs. This year, we plan to do things differently.
Cory (Gimpi) Carrier was a member of our IRC network for many, many years. We were all lucky to have called him our friend. Cory struggled with Muscular Dystrophy from the time he was born, and worked tirelessly raising money for the MDA. We sadly lost Cory back on October 1st of this year, due to complications from the H1N1 Flu virus. His loss has left a huge hole in our community, and in our hearts. Therefore, we wanted to find a way to remember and honor him. Chris Pirillo is helping us do just that, because Cory was also a member of his community.
For the fundraiser this year, GeekShed will only be keeping 25% of the donations received. At the end of the night, we will be donating the remaining 75% to the Tuscon, AZ chapter of the Muscular Dystrophy Association, who worked with Cory and his family for so many years. They provided care and support for Cory – and many others – and do a lot of good things for people struggling with this awful disease.
Here’s how the fundraiser works: on New Year’s Eve from 10PM until 1AM Eastern time, Chris will turn himself into the equivalent of the Subservient Chicken. You, the community, can make your donations directly to GeekShed. For a minimum $10.00 donation, you can request something silly for Chris to do live on his stream. As you make the donation, simply put your request for him in the comments section, so that he will know what it is you want him to do.
In the past, Chris has done everything from singing songs like Barbie Girl to putting peanut butter on his face for his puppies to lick off! He’ll do pretty much anything you ask, as long as it’s legal, and not demeaning/disgusting. Please keep in mind that younger people will be watching, and keep your requests appropriate.
Please join us on New Year’s Eve for the fun and laughter. If you are able to make a donation, we would sincerely appreciate it. I know that the people we are working with at the MDA are appreciative, as well as Cory’s family.