Lobby chat via IRC?

Cyntrox · January 05, 2008, 09:04:50 PM

I just came up with this idea. How about using a free, public IRC server for hosting the PS lobby chat? The only way I can see it differ from other, "normal" lobby chats is that it'd be hard to limit the members of the channel to people who are playing PS - but is that really a drawback? One could just log onto IRC to check if there's anyone online!

What do you think?

Westfall · January 05, 2008, 09:20:02 PM

Its not a bad idea. I would hate to have to keep minimizing to see what was going on in the lobby.

Cyntrox · January 05, 2008, 09:24:53 PM

Minimizing? Why would you have to do that? If this is supported, PS would come with a built-in IRC client, so that it's part of the lobby interface. That rises the question, though: Is it possible to use basic socket commands in UT? Because as far as I know, that's all you need.

LennardF1989 · January 05, 2008, 09:48:02 PM

Ultimately, we can create a standalone app for server browsing and such.

Though, America's Army has an IRC system (Unreal Engine 2.5). But I think it's mostly harcoded, but as far as I understand, you can use C++ code within UnrealScript.

Cyntrox · January 05, 2008, 09:52:29 PM

Well, if you can use C++ it should be perfectly possible, and not very hard. I recommend reading RFC 2812 and 2810 for information on the IRC protocol. Making a simple client shouldn't be a problem :)

Farley4Fan · January 05, 2008, 09:53:30 PM

That sounds pretty good.

LennardF1989 · January 05, 2008, 09:57:12 PM

It seems Unreal Tournament (original, see UBrowser) has a full IRC chat. Looking through code now to see if it's hardcoded or not.

LennardF1989 · January 05, 2008, 10:02:09 PM

I see, it seems it all based upon an external website (textarea is actually based upon a regular webpage). I'm not sure if UT3 can open websites, but if soo, we might still have a global chat.

LennardF1989 · January 05, 2008, 10:05:00 PM

I'm afraid Ut3 no longer has support for opening webpages.

Cyntrox · January 05, 2008, 10:05:29 PM

But why communicate with a webpage that communicates with an IRC server if you can communicate directly with the IRC server?

And if you can use C++, pretty much everything is possible... Hell, you could even code a limited HTTP client capable of loading the particular text area without any big trouble. Or just copy it from some open-source browser.

LennardF1989 · January 05, 2008, 10:07:30 PM

Quote from: Cyntrox on January 05, 2008, 10:05:29 PM
But why communicate with a webpage that communicates with an IRC server if you can communicate directly with the IRC server?

And if you can use C++, pretty much everything is possible... Hell, you could even code a limited HTTP client capable of loading the particular text area without any big trouble. Or just copy it from some open-source browser.

Thats how the original Unreal Tournament did it (as far as I can see from the code) and I'm not sure about C++ code.

Edit: You guys are lucky bastards :P

http://64.233.183.104/search?q=cache:P1UR0Y3YDZQJ:www.experts-exchange.com/Programming/Game/3D_Prog./Q_21265193.html+C%2B%2B+in+UnrealScript&hl=nl&ct=clnk&cd=9&gl=nl

Unreal Engine automaticly looks for a DLL correspndending to a package, so say we would call a native function from a package called ProjectStealth, it would look for ProjectStealth.dll.

neth · January 05, 2008, 10:24:12 PM

there could be rules. If you play - change your nick to...

Overstatement · January 05, 2008, 10:24:54 PM

False hope for the win!

It's a mod, deal with it.

Cyntrox · January 05, 2008, 10:29:56 PM

Quote from: Overstatement on January 05, 2008, 10:24:54 PM
False hope for the win!

It's a mod, deal with it.

What do you mean? I see nothing hindering it, and it's not a lot of work.

LennardF1989 · January 05, 2008, 10:31:37 PM

It's impossible without public sources, sorry.

Trying something else ;)