2 ngIRCd - Next Generation IRC Server
4 (c)2001-2010 Alexander Barton,
5 alex@barton.de, http://www.barton.de/
7 ngIRCd is free software and published under the
8 terms of the GNU General Public License.
13 I. Upgrade Information
14 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
16 Differences to version 16
18 - Changes to the "MotdFile" specified in ngircd.conf now require a ngircd
19 configuration reload to take effect (HUP signal, REHASH command).
21 Differences to version 0.9.x
23 - The option of the configure script to enable support for Zeroconf/Bonjour/
24 Rendezvous/WhateverItIsNamedToday has been renamed:
25 --with-rendezvous -> --with-zeroconf
27 Differences to version 0.8.x
29 - The maximum length of passwords has been raised to 20 characters (instead
30 of 8 characters). If your passwords are longer than 8 characters then they
31 are cut at an other position now.
33 Differences to version 0.6.x
35 - Some options of the configure script have been renamed:
36 --disable-syslog -> --without-syslog
37 --disable-zlib -> --without-zlib
38 Please call "./configure --help" to review the full list of options!
40 Differences to version 0.5.x
42 - Starting with version 0.6.0, other servers are identified using asynchronous
43 passwords: therefore the variable "Password" in [Server]-sections has been
44 replaced by "MyPassword" and "PeerPassword".
46 - New configuration variables, section [Global]: MaxConnections, MaxJoins
47 (see example configuration file "doc/sample-ngircd.conf"!).
50 II. Standard Installation
51 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
53 ngIRCd is developed for UNIX-based systems, which means that the installation
54 on modern UNIX-like systems that are supported by GNU autoconf and GNU
55 automake ("configure") should be no problem.
57 The normal installation procedure after getting (and expanding) the source
58 files (using a distribution archive or GIT) is as following:
60 1) ./autogen.sh [only necessary when using GIT]
65 (Please see details below!)
67 Now the newly compiled executable "ngircd" is installed in its standard
68 location, /usr/local/sbin/.
70 The next step is to configure and afterwards starting the daemon. Please
71 have a look at the ngircd(8) and ngircd.conf(5) manual pages for details
72 and all possible options.
74 If no previous version of the configuration file exists (the standard name
75 is /usr/local/etc/ngircd.conf), a sample configuration file containing all
76 possible options will be installed there. You'll find its template in the
77 doc/ directory: sample-ngircd.conf.
82 The first step, autogen.sh, is only necessary if the configure-script isn't
83 already generated. This never happens in official ("stable") releases in
84 tar.gz-archives, but when using GIT.
86 This step is therefore only interesting for developers.
88 autogen.sh produces the Makefile.in's, which are necessary for the configure
89 script itself, and some more files for make. To run autogen.sh you'll need
90 GNU autoconf and GNU automake (use recent versions! autoconf 2.53 and
91 automake 1.6.1 are known to work).
93 Again: "end users" do not need this step!
98 The configure-script is used to detect local system dependencies.
100 In the perfect case, configure should recognise all needed libraries, header
101 files and so on. If this shouldn't work, "./configure --help" shows all
104 In addition, you can pass some command line options to "configure" to enable
105 and/or disable some features of ngIRCd. All these options are shown using
106 "./configure --help", too.
108 Compiling a static binary will avoid you the hassle of feeding a chroot dir
109 (if you want use the chroot feature). Just do something like:
110 CFLAGS=-static ./configure [--your-options ...]
111 Then you can use a void directory as ChrootDir (like OpenSSH's /var/empty).
116 The make command uses the Makefiles produced by configure and compiles the
122 Use "make install" to install the server and a sample configuration file on
123 the local system. Normally, root privileges are necessary to complete this
124 step. If there is already an older configuration file present, it won't be
127 This files will be installed by default:
129 - /usr/local/sbin/ngircd: executable server
130 - /usr/local/etc/ngircd.conf: sample configuration (if not already present)
131 - /usr/local/share/doc/ngircd/: documentation
134 III. Additional features
135 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
137 The following optional features can be compiled into the daemon by passing
138 options to the "configure" script. Most options can handle a <path> argument
139 which will be used to search for the required libraries and header files in
140 the given paths ("<path>/lib/...", "<path>/include/...") in addition to the
143 * Syslog Logging (autodetected by default):
144 --with-syslog[=<path>] / --without-syslog
146 Enable (disable) support for logging to "syslog", which should be
147 available on most modern UNIX-like operating systems by default.
149 * ZLib Compression (autodetected by default):
150 --with-zlib[=<path>] / --without-zlib
152 Enable (disable) support for compressed server-server links.
153 The Z compression library ("libz") is required for this option.
155 * IO Backend (autodetected by default):
156 --with-select[=<path>] / --without-select
157 --with-poll[=<path>] / --without-poll
158 --with-devpoll[=<path>] / --without-devpoll
159 --with-epoll[=<path>] / --without-epoll
160 --with-kqueue[=<path>] / --without-kqueue
162 ngIRCd can use different IO "backends": the "old school" select() and poll()
163 API which should be supported by most UNIX-like operating systems, or the
164 more efficient and flexible epoll() (Linux >=2.6), kqueue() (BSD) and
166 By default the IO backend is autodetected, but you can use "--without-xxx"
167 to disable a more enhanced API.
168 When using the epoll() API, support for select() is compiled in as well by
169 default to enable the binary to run on older Linux kernels (<2.6), too.
172 --with-ident[=<path>]
174 Include support for IDENT ("AUTH") lookups. The "ident" library is
175 required for this option.
178 --with-zeroconf[=<path>]
180 Compile ngIRCd with support for ZeroConf multicast DNS service registration.
181 Either the Apple ZeroConf implementation (e. g. Mac OS X) or the Howl
182 library is required. Which one is available is autodetected.
185 --with-tcp-wrappers[=<path>]
187 Include support for Wietse Venemas "TCP Wrappers" to limit client access
188 to the daemon, for example by using "/etc/hosts.{allow|deny}".
189 The "libwrap" is required for this option.
194 Enable support for PAM, the Pluggable Authentication Modules library.
195 See doc/PAM.txt for details.
198 --with-openssl[=<path>]
199 --with-gnutls[=<path>]
201 Enable support for SSL/TLS using OpenSSL or gnutls libraries.
202 See doc/SSL.txt for details.
207 Adds support for version 6 of the Internet Protocol.
210 IV. Useful make-targets
211 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
213 The Makefile produced by the configure-script contains always these useful
216 - clean: delete every product from the compiler/linker
219 - distclean: the above plus erase all generated Makefiles
220 next step: -> ./configure
222 - maintainer-clean: erase all automatic generated files
223 next step: -> ./autogen.sh
226 V. Sample configuration file ngircd.conf
227 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
229 In the sample configuration file, there are comments beginning with "#" OR
230 ";" -- this is only for the better understanding of the file.
232 The file is separated in four blocks: [Global], [Operator], [Server], and
235 In the [Global] section, there is the main configuration like the server
236 name and the ports, on which the server should be listening. IRC operators
237 of this server are defined in [Operator] blocks. [Server] is the section
238 where server links are configured. And [Channel] blocks are used to
239 configure pre-defined ("persistent") IRC channels.
241 The meaning of the variables in the configuration file is explained in the
242 "doc/sample-ngircd.conf", which is used as sample configuration file in
243 /usr/local/etc after running "make install" (if you don't already have one)
244 and in the "ngircd.conf" manual page.
247 VI. Command line options
248 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
250 These parameters could be passed to the ngIRCd:
253 The daemon uses the file <file> as configuration file rather than
254 the standard configuration /usr/local/etc/ngircd.conf.
257 ngIRCd should be running as a foreground process.
260 Server-links won't be automatically established.
263 Reads, validates and dumps the configuration file as interpreted
264 by the server. Then exits.
266 Use "--help" to see a short help text describing all available parameters
267 the server understands, with "--version" the ngIRCd shows its version
268 number. In both cases the server exits after the output.