List of mild irritations...

Xaphan · Newbie Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Posts: 60

Hi All.

I'm listing a few of my current mild irritations with SearchIRC - Nothing against the mods/admins etc, they're only human... but some of the other creatures need culling -- Think it's time we put chlorine in the gene pool again...anyway here goes. Anyone else thinks of anything [without adding my name in the list] that's irritating on these boards, feel free to add to the list.

1) The people who consistantly post their network, almost religiously over and over again in the Network Announcements section. I'm sure everybody can think up of a network or three that do it, and usually by a specific oper on the network.

--- I believe they were modified so the AUTHOR could REPLY to their OWN topic's, and therefore not have to have 10 threads for "The <Well Spammed> IRC Network". [Am I wrong??]

2) These boards don't seem to be handling cookies correctly. Either that, or they don't like Windows. I've tried on all three of my computers to login [sucessful] and then go to "Latest Posts" and have it ask me to relogin again. -- Not handy when you haven't been to the site in a few days and you wanted to see the posts which are latest, without having to fluff around and do it manually. Opera, Firefox, and Internet Exploder all do the same thing, on different Windows operating systems. [hopefully it's not an irritating hint].

3) Autojoin upon connection to a network, or SAJOIN. It's rude! It's obnoxious! It's taking the IRC Session CONTROL out of the USERS hands and FORCING them to do something they may not want to do. [I wonder what'd happen if I started yelling "RAPE!!" in the channel next time..]

4) I've visited a quite few networks in the past week, most of them the same old thing... IRPG, Radio... getting old now... but didn't bother me. A couple of networks, Operators have found /OS GLOBAL commands a way of talking in a channel. Irritating to have a notice going everywhere, because an Operator decides to spam the whole network with a link, then the next one spams the whole network with just "LOL" via Global... and then the conversation starts via Global. [We don't care! Use Globops or Wallops!]

I have taken the following from http://www.irchelp.org/irchelp/ircd/ircopguide.html. It's from a [former] EFNet Operator, and well worth the read for the newer Network Administrators.

Interacting With Users and Other Operators
This is the most important aspect of "opering". It will make or break you as an operator. There are a lot of politics that go on in the irc operator community and, whether you like it or not, these politics are here to stay. Fighting this and complaining about it will get you nowhere.

From what I've seen, most opers look down on users, make fun of them, and ignore them. Try to avoid this ego trip side of opering. Answer private messages, unless it is someone just sending you a hate message. Opers would get a lot less crap from users if they would be a little less egotistical. Something I might suggest is that you spend an hour or two every couple of weeks helping the newbies out in #irchelp or whatever equivalent you may find.

One thing to be wary of is that users will frequently try to manipulate you into helping them takeover channels. Very rarely will a user simply report a bot without a reason. Generally this will be because a bot tookover a channel or a user is flooding them. Fairly regularly you'll get these requests from users who want someone killed off the server so they can take control of a channel. Because of this, request the channel in addition to the nickname so you can see what's going on before you kill or K-line.

Frequently, you will get requests from other operators to kill or K-line a user. Opers should be trusted unless you've had problems with someone in the past. You should always require a reason before killing or placing the K-line. If it's in the least bit questionable, add "requested by <oper>" or something similar to the K-line reason.

If you are being harassed by a user on the network, handle it like a user should handle it, not like an oper has the capability of handling it. The temptation of killing a user for flooding you is something that pretty much all of us give into on occasion, but it's generally not the right response. If we are going to expect regular users to simply /ignore flooders, then we should do the same. Though I have to admit, a user must be pretty stupid to flood an oper...

On occasion, opers have their disagreements. There is a bit of a pecking order that exists in the oper ranks, usually with hub admins and opers being more "powerful" than leaf admins and opers. It's generally not a good idea to try to win an argument with the people who are providing your connectivity to the IRC network. For that matter, it's generally not a good idea to try to win any argument at all. If you do have a serious problem with another oper, and can't resolve it directly with him/her, go to your admin about it. Your admin can then approach the issue with the other oper's admin, and if that goes nowhere, with their uplink admin. This is a quick way to make enemies, so make sure it's important to you before doing it.

Attitude and Perspective
The fact is, this is IRC. It's a chat network - a social gathering. Don't build your self image based on what other people think of you, on or off IRC. If you come on IRC because it's more important to you than blood, you should probably invest some money in counseling. Don't get all emotional over what happens on here.

katsklaw · Guru Joined: 28 Jun 2004 Posts: 1029

1> The net annoucements forum was designed so admins can spam their network. That's it's purpose. You are not the only one that finds that forum annoying, but like the others, you are welcome to not read it. There is a "mark all forums as read" link on the main community page. Simply read the topics you *are* interested then click that link and everyone will be happy.

Also the ability for posters to modify their own thread was just added a few weeks ago and it's still very new, as well as not everyone knows about it yet. It will take some time for you to see a difference.

2> I haven't seen this on any OS. Perhaps it's a local cookie issue?

3> agreed.

4> agreed. While much of the oper guide is still valid, alot of it really isn't since IRC has changed alot in the last 11 years since that tutorial was written.

Interacting With Users and Other Operators:

While many people think IRCops are PR admins, they really aren't. IRCops are Operators for the irc daemon, hence the term IRCop. That is their main function and always has been. Opers don't need additional cmds and access to be friendly. So I dissagree with you .. opers #1 priority is the server and the stability of the network .. not interacting with users. HOWEVER, I do agree that there is no reason for opers to be rude.

Attitude and Perspective

I disagree here too. There is nothing wrong with having a hobby that you totally emerse yourself in so long as the hobby doesn't cause harm to yourself or others. IRC is a free way to occupy time and there is nothing wrong with that.

IRC to many disabled people is their *ONLY* way to communicate with the world en masse and saying they need counseling is not only politically incorrect, it's down right rude. Only professionally licensed therapists should recommend counseling, not some random IRC user that happens to think it's weird.

Xaphan · Newbie Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Posts: 60

As you might have read -- that last speil was actually copy/pasted from another website. I didn't personally write it, however parts of it are correct. [If you think about times when people caused havoc on IRC, it's usually because they're so emotionally evolved, or because they are bored - Either way...]

Why is the operators main task the server? really, that's the server administrators job, not the remainder of the staff. Why can't opers be helpful? Why can't opers actually have something to their name except a raw message letting people know that they're an irc operator? -- After all, it is why many networks out there have #Help registered by an operator, is it not?

RE: #2 - 3 different systems. 3 different operating systems. 3 different internet connections. - Home, Work, Brother's. *Shrugs*.

katsklaw · Guru Joined: 28 Jun 2004 Posts: 1029

Xaphan · Newbie Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Posts: 60

Not saying that an operator has to be in a help channel and help users --- all the time. What i am saying, for the newer network administrators - limited flow of traffic - couild be useful to be HELPFUL to new users, rather than sitting there and ignoring their questions.... or as the former efnet operator mentioned -- spend an hour or two of your spare time helping!

On the smaller networks, not EVERYBODY knows EVERYTHING about the network -- and it's usually the operators that know MORE than anyone else. This is why it is a good idea for operators to help users on a network; rather than "I don't know, ask "So and So"." [if you get my point?]

You were a newbie once. So was I. I remember asking questions -- Some silly -- But I always got answered, and with operators answering my questions, they were USUALLY a little more polite and understanding than the average joe who really couldn't give two shits whether you stayed on the network or not.

--- maybe I am stuck in the darkages....

katsklaw · Guru Joined: 28 Jun 2004 Posts: 1029

Xaphan · Newbie Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Posts: 60

I think I've found the problem with my logins -- We've just changed off of Day light savings time -- and SearchIRC doesn't allow an automatic change-back, so SearchIRC thought I was an hour ahead of myself.

We'll see over the next week or so whether it was the problem or not. Hopefully it was Very Happy

katsklaw · Guru Joined: 28 Jun 2004 Posts: 1029

Jason · Posted: Apr 13, 2008 8:56am Post subject:

I just installed the new phpbb3 for a new site and I'm really digging the new features. I don't have any immediate plans, but I do plan on eventually upgrading this forum to using it. The problem is that the table structure is being used by IRCImages for logins and the control panel, so any changes need to be tested to make sure neither are broken as a result.

All of this, assuming there is a decent upgrade path and that I don't need to much to convert from 2 to 3 in terms of importing users/forums/posts

Xaphan · Newbie Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Posts: 60

Yeah. Some of PHPBB3 is nice, some of it is annoying.... some if it is too different from 2.x for someone upgrading to just go "click click, upgraded!".... takes a level headed person to nat it out it seems.

Have noticed a large amount of bloat in it too. You should look into some other forum software before you make a definate on 3.x Smile

Just my 2c.