1. Information update: These are the latest (v0.87) versions of TCP and serial-line Homer. Pick the one that's suitable for you (serial is for straight modem use only; if you use SLIP, get the TCP version). The serial version requires that you have access to an IRC client via your unix account. The TCP version requires no IRC client, but needs MacTCP. If you're using the serial version and this is your first time using Homer, read the Serial Version Instructions at the bottom of this document. You won't get very far without reading them. Homer REQUIRES System 7. NOTE: If you have a problem the first time you run Homer 0.87, try deleting the Homer Prefs file (in your Preferences folder in your System Folder) and running again. Homer will not run on little Macs (like the Pluses), but it almost does. It should be working Real Soon Now. Feel free to try it, though. :) BUG NOTE: if Homer happens to bomb your machine and you use Macsbug, please type "sc6" in Macsbug. This will display the list of most recently-called subroutines before the crash. So if Homer bombs and you send me a bug report, please include the type of machine you're using, what you were doing when the bomb happened, and if possible, the output of Macsbug when you type sc6 when the bomb occurs. This will help me squash the little beastie more quickly. Send praise, gripes, suggestions, and promiscuous wimmen to tob@zaphod.ee.pitt.edu. Happy IRCing! Tob 2. Revision List: What's New in 0.87: 1. Lots of little fixes. 2. You don't see nickname changes and logoff messages from Homer users that you don't care about. "/homer list" still works though. 3. You can capture channel text to files. Check out the new File menu options, they should be self-explanatory. 4. The new floating Users window. Hopefully it'll be pretty self-explanatory. Double-click on a name to make it be the new "msg to:" name. When the "Priv" button is depressed, any text you type gets sent as a private message to whoever you've selected (by double-clicking). You can also select a user to send messages to by clicking on the "msg to:" white box and typing in a name. You can shift-click to select a whole group of names and perform an action on them. Holding down the shift key while using the Op button will de-op the person(s) selected. 5. Probably a whole new slew of bugs are around now. 6. I haven't touched DCC, so it's about the same as before. What's New in 0.86: 1. There's a new Actions menu. You can disconnect from your server at any time and then reconnect. Do this more than twice and you will bomb. Try it, it's fun. I have no idea why. 2. A whole bunch of bugs are gone. New ones have taken their place. 3. DCC send works, but is quirky. Don't try sending more than one file at once, unless you're very brave and/or want to be mentioned in the list of brave Homer souls on the startup screen. If you send a file to someone using ircII, the file will complete long before the DCC status window says you will complete. This is because ircII isn't sending me the proper data-received values, or I'm not reading them properly, or something. Should be an easy one to fix. In any event, the file gets sent okay. 4. It remembers what channels you were on when you last quit, and will auto-rejoin them for you when you run the next time. Don't want it to join channels at startup time? Get rid of 'em before you quit. 5. Kick finally works. If you get kicked, the window for that channel will go bye-bye. You can also see other people get kicked properly now too. 6. Most importantly, the arty startup screen is gone, and the cow is back. You even get a version number now. Rejoice. What's New in 0.83: * Uses less memory * Doesn't report memory bug when losing net connection * Hopefully actions will work correctly now (0.82-only bug) * Doesn't flash grey when redrawing the screen * Nice bye-bye on cmd-q in serial version * Fixed a big bug in parts of msgs going to weird places (0.82-only bug) * Remembers window positions What's New in 0.82: * Cmd-p remembers your last 20 input lines * The page up/page down/home/end keys work now * Oodles of things to make Homer more stable * Oodles of stuff that I added to make version 0.78 and didn't document. What's New in 0.72: * Fixed a glitch in /mode * Working on getting DCC to work at receiving files correctly * Inserted MacBinary read/write code What's New in 0.71 (8/17) (mostly just bug fixes): * Any leading spaces or : characters got lopped off of input lines. * Your full signoff text is now sent, not just the first word. * Checks continuously for TCP connection now and will quit if the connection is lost (instead of just bombing, like before). * Fixed a cosmetic bug that sometimes appeared when /msgs were sent. * Dumb terminal window doesn't appear in TCP version anymore. * /links command's output is parsed correctly. * "/who" no longer lists everyone on IRC. * Can type "/quit" from command line now. * Fixed a bug in TCP version that caused window-switching, joining, and "/who *" commands to screw up on occasion. * DCC for TCP isn't working yet, but it's getting there - Homer can now detect when a /dcc send has been sent by someone else, and is at least polite enough to automatically reply to the send request and immediately drop the connection so that the person isn't waiting forever. Known bugs: 3. Serial Version Instructions To run Homer, you need: 1. A modem or some sort of serial line To run it, do the following: 1. Boot the program, check out the incredible About... box, then select the appropriate options for the Communications Options dialog box. 2. The "Dumb Terminal" window on your screen is a dumb terminal. Use this to log in to your unix account. Note I said DUMB - it's not a VT100, so don't be tryin' to do VT100-y things, you'll just get screen gerb. 3. When you're to the point in unix where you normally type "irc" (or whatever you type to start IRC), select "Start IRC Session" from the Actions menu. Several points have to be made about this command: a. DON'T START IRC YOURSELF. Homer issues its own IRC-starting command, using a few important command-line options. b. Along these lines, in order for Homer to launch IRC, it has to know how to start it. Right now it assumes that typing "irc" will fire up your IRC client. If that's not the case, create an alias so that you CAN type "irc" to fire up IRC. 4. Now you're greeted with the console screen. The terminal screen has gone away and you're left alone in the world. Go to the File menu and select "Join Channel...". You'll be prompted for a name of a channel, and there you go. By the way, the console screen is just a dumping ground of sorts for miscellaneous IRC information. You can also use the Console Options dialog to make other information go to the console instead of to channels. 5. Now you'll be greeted with the astonishingly beautiful Homer IRC screen, and you're ready to go. The bottom area (where you type) is standard TextEdit, so you can cut/copy/paste and whatnot. I also made ctrl-U clear what's in there, since ctrl-U clears the current text in my IRC client. The upper part of the screen is NOT TextEdit, so you can't select any of that text. 6. You can have up to 10 channels on at once, just by selecting "Join Channel..." as needed. To leave a channel, just close that channel's window. 7. When you're done, don't quit IRC yourself. Instead, select "Close IRC Session" from the Actions menu, and you'll be back to your friendly unix prompt.