rust-irc/README.md

# irc [![Build Status](https://travis-ci.org/aatxe/irc.svg?branch=master)](https://travis-ci.org/aatxe/irc) [![Crates.io](https://img.shields.io/crates/v/irc.svg)](https://crates.io/crates/irc) #
A robust, thread-safe IRC library in Rust. The client portion is compliant with
[RFC 2812](http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2812), [IRCv3.1](http://ircv3.net/irc/3.1.html),
[IRCv3.2](http://ircv3.net/irc/3.2.html), and includes some additional, common features. It also
features automatic reconnection in unstable networking conditions, flexibility allowing easy unit
testing, and a number of useful built-in features for building a powerful client quickly. The
server portion is still a work in progress. You can find up-to-date, ready-to-use documentation
online [here](http://aatxe.github.io/irc/irc/). The documentation is generated with the default
features. These are, however, strictly optional and can be disabled accordingly.

## Getting Started ##

To start using this library with cargo, you can simply add `irc = "*"` to your dependencies to your
Cargo.toml file. You'll likely want to take a look at some of the examples, as well as the
documentation. You'll also be able to find a small template to get a feel for the library.

## Getting Started by Example ##

```rust
extern crate irc;

use irc::client::prelude::*;

fn main() {
    let server = IrcServer::new("config.json").unwrap();
    server.identify().unwrap();
    for message in server.iter() {
        // Do message processing.
    }
}
```

It may not seem like much, but all it takes to get started with an IRC connection is the stub
above. In just a few lines, you can be connected to a server and procesisng IRC messages as you
wish. The library is built with flexibility in mind. If you need to work on multiple threads,
simply clone the server and have at it. We'll take care of the rest.

## Configuration ##

Like the rest of the IRC crate, configuration is built with flexibility in mind. You can easily
create `Config` objects programmatically and choose your own methods for handling any saving or
loading of configuration required. However, for convenience, we've also included the option of
loading JSON files with `rust-serialize` to write configurations. All the fields are optional, and
thus any of them can be omitted (though, omitting a nickname or server will cause the program to
fail for obvious reasons). That being said, here's an example of a complete configuration:

```json
{
  "owners": [],
  "nickname": "user",
  "nick_password": "password",
  "alt_nicks": ["user_", "user__"],
  "username": "user",
  "realname": "Test User",
  "server": "chat.freenode.net",
  "port": 6697,
  "password": "",
  "use_ssl": true,
  "encoding": "UTF-8",
  "channels": ["#rust", "#haskell"],
  "umodes": "+RB-x",
  "user_info": "I'm a test user for the Rust IRC crate.",
  "ping_time": 180,
  "ping_timeout": 10,
  "options": {
    "key": "value",
    "note": "anything you want can be in here!",
    "and": "you can use it to build your own additional configuration options.",
  }
}

```

## Contributing ##
Contributions to this library would be immensely appreciated. It should be noted that as this is a
public domain project, any contributions will thus be released into the public domain as well.