NAME

       ircd - The IRCD-Hybrid Internet Relay Chat server

SYNOPSIS

       ircd   [-configfile filename] [-dlinefile filename] [-klinefile filename] [-xlinefile filename] [-logfile
              filename] [-pidfile filename] [-foreground] [-version]

DESCRIPTION

       ircd  is  the  server (daemon) program for the Internet Relay Chat Program.  The ircd is a server in that
       its function is to "serve" the client program irc(1) and other  compatible  programs  with  messages  and
       commands.   All commands and user messages are passed directly to the ircd for processing and relaying to
       other IRC servers.

       This is ircd-hybrid, the highly modified (and hopefully improved) variant of the original ircd program by
       Jarkko Oikarinen.

OPTIONS

       -configfile filename
              Specifies the ircd.conf file to be used for this ircd. The option is used to override the  default
              ircd.conf  given  at  compile  time.  By  default,  this  is "etc/ircd.conf" within the prefix you
              installed the ircd in.

       -dlinefile filename

       -klinefile filename

       -xlinefile filename
              Specifies the files to be used for D-lines (host  bans),  K-lines  (hostmask  bans),  and  X-lines
              (gecos  bans),  which  by  default  are  within  the etc/ directory of your installation prefix as
              dline.conf, kline.conf, and xline.conf.

       -logfile filename
              Specifies an alternative logfile to be used than that specified in defaults.h

       -pidfile filename
              Specifies the file used by the ircd to store its process ID. The option is used  to  override  the
              default ircd.pid given at compile time.

       -foreground
              Makes ircd run in the foreground

       -version
              Makes ircd print its version, and exit.

USAGE

       If you plan to connect your ircd server to an existing IRC network, you will need to alter your local IRC
       configuration file (typically named "ircd.conf") so that it will accept and make connections to other IRC
       servers.   This  file  contains  the  hostnames, IP addresses, and sometimes passwords for connections to
       other ircds around the world.

       The example ircd.conf in the etc/ directory documents itself. Read it carefully or you may expose a  risk
       on your network simply by having your ircd running!

BOOTING THE SERVER

       It  is  sufficient to type ircd at the command line to start ircd-hybrid into the background. If you wish
       to run ircd in the foreground (perhaps for debugging purposes), use the -foreground parameter.

       The ircd-hybrid package in your distribution may ship with an rc-script which handles this  for  you.  In
       Debian, it is /etc/init.d/ircd-hybrid.

EXAMPLE

       # ircd -configfile /usr/share/ircd/ircd.conf -logfile /var/log/ircd.log

       Starts  ircd  with  the  config  file /usr/share/ircd/ircd.conf and with a log file /var/log/ircd.log. It
       implicitly forks back to the console -- to prevent this use -foreground.

       Many of the above paths are hardcoded at compile time in  the  include/defaults.h  file,  so  it  may  be
       convenient to edit these to suit your needs before you compile the ircd.

COPYRIGHT

       (c) 1988,1989 University of Oulu, Computing Center, Finland,

       (c) 1988,1989 Department of Information Processing Science, University of Oulu, Finland

       (c) 1988-1991 Jarkko Oikarinen

       (c) 1997-2013 The IRCD-Hybrid project.

       For full COPYRIGHT see the LICENSE file within the IRC source package.

BUGS

       If  you  find a bug and you have a core file from ircd as a result, use a debugger like gdb(1) to process
       the core file and send a backtrace to bugs@ircd-hybrid.org.

AUTHORS

       irc2.8 and earlier: Jarkko Oikarinen, currently jto@tolsun.oulu.fi. See doc/old/Authors for more credits.

       ircd-hybrid-8: the IRCD-Hybrid Project, bugs@ircd-hybrid.org.

       Manual page written by Jeff Trim, jtrim@orion.cair.du.edu, later modified by jto@tolsun.oulu.fi.

       Updated by W.  Campbell,  wcampbel@botbay.net,  Edward  Brocklesby,  ejb@klamath.uucp.leguin.org.uk,  and
       highly revised by Joshua Kwan (joshk@triplehelix.org) for the Debian distribution.

ircd-hybrid-8                                     1 April 2013                                           IRCD(8)