2 .\" ngircd(8) manual page template
4 .TH ngircd 8 "Sep 2023" ngIRCd "ngIRCd Manual"
6 ngIRCd \- the "next generation" IRC daemon
14 is a free, portable and lightweight Internet Relay Chat (IRC) server for small
15 or private networks, developed under the GNU General Public License (GPL).
17 The server is quite easy to configure and runs as a single-node server or can
18 be part of a network of ngIRCd servers in a LAN or across the internet. It
19 optionally supports the IPv6 protocol, SSL/TLS-protected client-server and
20 server-server links, the Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) system for user
21 authentication, IDENT requests, and character set conversion for legacy
24 The name ngIRCd stands for
25 .IR "next-generation IRC daemon",
26 which is a little bit exaggerated:
27 .IR "lightweight Internet Relay Chat server"
28 most probably would have been a better name :-)
30 By default ngIRCd logs diagnostic and informational messages using the syslog
31 mechanism, or writes directly to the console when running in the foreground
34 The default behavior of
36 is to read its standard configuration file (see below), to detach from the
37 controlling terminal and to wait for clients.
39 You can use these options to modify this default:
41 \fB\-f\fR \fIfile\fR, \fB\-\-config\fR \fIfile\fR
44 as configuration file.
46 \fB\-n\fR, \fB\-\-nodaemon\fR
47 Don't fork a child and don't detach from controlling terminal.
48 All log messages go to the console and you can use CTRL-C to
51 \fB\-p\fR, \fB\-\-passive\fR
52 Disable automatic connections to other servers. You can use the IRC command
53 CONNECT later on as IRC Operator to link this ngIRCd to other servers.
55 \fB\-y\fR, \fB\-\-syslog\fR
56 Write log messages to the syslog even when running in the foreground. This only
59 was given on the command line
63 The following options prevent ngIRCd from starting regularly, but perform a
64 specific action and then exit the daemon again:
66 \fB\-h\fR, \fB\-\-help\fR
67 Display a brief help text and exit.
69 \fB\-t\fR, \fB\-\-configtest\fR
70 Read, validate and display the configuration; then exit.
72 \fB\-V\fR, \fB\-\-version\fR
73 Output version information and exit.
75 .I :ETCDIR:/ngircd.conf
77 The system wide default configuration file.
79 .I :ETCDIR:/ngircd.motd
81 Default "message of the day" (MOTD).
84 The daemon understands the following signals:
87 Shut down all connections and terminate the daemon.
90 Shut down all listening sockets, re-read the configuration file and
91 re-initialize the daemon.
95 to use "ngircd \-\-configtest" to validate the configuration of ngIRCd after
96 making changes to the configuration files!
98 When ngIRCd is compiled with debug code, that is, its source code has
99 been ./configure'd with "\-\-enable\-debug" and/or "\-\-enable\-sniffer" (witch
100 enables debug mode automatically as well), you can use two more command
101 line options and two more signals to debug problems with the daemon itself
106 \fB\-d\fR, \fB\-\-debug\fR
107 Enable debug mode and log extra messages.
109 \fB\-s\fR, \fB\-\-sniffer\fR
110 Enable IRC protocol sniffer, which logs all sent and received IRC commands to
111 the console/syslog. This option requires that ngIRCd has been ./configure'd
112 with "\-\-enable\-sniffer" and enables debug mode automatically, too.
117 Toggle debug mode on and off during runtime.
120 Dump internal server state to the console/syslog when debug mode is on (use
121 command line option \-\-debug or signal USR1).
123 Alexander Barton, <alex@barton.de>
125 Florian Westphal, <fw@strlen.de>
127 Homepage: http://ngircd.barton.de/