DMDirc

DMDirc is a cross-platform Java-based IRC client designed specifically for helping you chat with your friends or make new ones.

If this is not your first experience with IRC applications, then you should get familiarized with the layout in a few minutes. It gives you the possibility to keep track of your channels and easily switch between them, view channel messages, as well as check out the available users.

You may establish a connection to a new server by providing information about the server, port number and password. You may enable the SSL connection mode and open the connection in a new server window.

You can set up several parameters related to the user mode (e.g. hide idle time and hostname, receive server notifications, conceal the channel list), build up a list with ignored entries, as well as perform a series of settings in order to ping timeout and frequency, reconnect on failure, rejoin open channels, and close queries on quit.

DMDirc lets you enter the name of the channel that you want to join and perform searches in the channel list. You may create multiple profiles (they describe the information needed to connect to a server) and use a different profile for each connection.

The application lets you define actions for responding to various events such as change the color of the channel window names in tree view when events occur (e.g. someone joined or left a channel, someone quit IRC).

DMDirc allows you to close channels on quit or disconnect, manage SSL connections (certificate and password), edit messages (e.g. ‘Bye,’ ‘Using DMDirc’) related to different events (e.g. close or quit a message), alter notifications, change the looks of the GUI and install different themes, enhance the overall functionality of the program via plugins, and configure how the utility handles different types of URLs (e.g. use browser or mail client).

DMDirc comes with a comprehensive suite of features and configuration settings, which are suitable especially for power users. On the downside, the configuration parameters are not intuitive. They require advanced computer skills in order to understand their functionality so rookies are left out of the equation.