Guppy IRC

A tiny embeddable IRC client, using the open-source sockethub service.

Use

To use guppy-irc you must include a few .js files and define the guppy widget:

  <link rel="stylesheet" href="guppy-irc.css" />
  ...
  <guppy-irc id="myGuppy"
             data-title="Welcome to Guppy IRC"
             data-width="640"
             data-height="380"
             data-server="<irc_server>"
             data-channel="<#irc_channel>"
             data-nick="guppy"
             data-enable-nick-change="<true|false>"
             data-enable-history="<true|false>"
             data-enable-user-list="<true|false>"
             data-display-name="Guppy Example User"
             data-password=""
             data-autoconnect="<true|false>"
             data-sockethub-host="<sockethub_hostname>"
             data-sockethub-port="<port_number>"
             data-sockethub-tls="<true|false>"
             data-sockethub-path="/<uri_path>"
             data-sockethub-secret="<register_string>" />

  ...
  <script src="sockethub-client.js"></script>
  <script src="guppy-irc.js"></script>
  ...

You can assign already defined elements to pieces of the UI by assigning the elements with special div names.

The naming convention takes the ID you've assigned to your guppy widget (in the above case myGuppy) and adds the component suffix. For example

<footer id="myGuppy-controls"></footer>

List of valid suffixes:

• -controls - This includes the input to write messages and send button.

• -user-list - This is the side-bar list of users.

• -info - This contains the input to change nickname and the send button.

Dependencies

Guppy IRC uses Sockethub for IRC connectivity, and therefore has the following dependencies:

• sockethub-client.js

• A running Sockethub instance.

Features

• Fully customizable behavior via data attributes on the HTML widget. All rendered elements contain unique CSS class names for complete skinnability.

• Chat history saved into localStorage so you don't loose your context upon page reload.

• Uses Sockethub's persisting connection feature, meaning a page refresh does not disconnect you and you can continue where you left off. (If you browse away from the page, and you have no sessions using the connect, it will eventually time-out after 60 seconds max).

• Can embed more than one widget on a page without clashes.

• Basic nick-changing ability

• Keeps a running tab of users in a room (see below for current limitations)

Missing

• Currently the room you join is hard-coded in the widget data attributes and you cannot change/add rooms within the widget. It's possible to do this with Sockethub, but Guppy IRC is meant to be very simple and the interface does not make sense of multiple rooms. Feel free to extend!

• User lists currently have some limitations due to an incomplete node-irc module. So when you refresh you can loose your user list, and can't ask for an update. This should hopefully be fixed soon.

Status

Guppy IRC currently has basic functionality. You can connect to a channel, and send/receive messages. The UI is intentially bare-bones and meant to be stylized and customized as an embedded IRC widget.

Also, the Sockethub IRC platform is still under heavy development, as it becomes more stable and feature-rich so should Guppy.

Example

Live demo

You can try out Guppy IRC, which is connecting to a public sockethub instance and automatically connects to the #sockethub channel, here:

http://silverbucket.github.io/guppy-irc/example/

Run your own demo

To get the Guppy IRC example up and running, do the following.

$ git clone https://github.com/silverbucket/guppy-irc.git
$ cd guppy-irc
$ git submodule update --init
$ python -M SimpleHTTPServer 8000

Then browse to localhost:8000/example, you should see the example load in your browser.

CSS Elements

The following is a list of all the css elements for a guppy-irc widget. Allowing you to create your own theme css files.

parent container

.guppy-irc-container - parent container of widget contents.

title

• .guppy-irc-title-container - div containing title

• .guppy-irc-title - actual title element (an h1 tag)

info

• .guppy-irc-info-container - contains information text, nickname information

nickname

• .guppy-irc-nick-change-input-container

• .guppy-irc-nick-change-input

• .guppy-irc-nick-change-submit-container

• .guppy-irc-nick-change-submit

middle area container

• .gupper-irc-middle-container

messages

• .guppy-irc-messages-container - container of all messages

• .guppy-irc-message-line - a single message line

• .guppy-irc-message-nick - the nick of a message

• .guppy-irc-message-nick-decorator - the decorator (ie. : separator) of the nick -> text

history

Previous messages will maintain their classes but be inserted into the history container.

• .guppy-irc-messages-history-container

- messages addressed to you

The same assignments as above except only added to elements where the text contains your IRC nick.

• .guppy-irc-message-line-to-me

• .guppy-irc-message-nick-to-me

• .guppy-irc-message-nick-decorator-to-me

• .guppy-irc-message-nick-to-me

user list

• .guppy-irc-user-list-container

• .guppy-irc-user-list-entry

controls

The various inputs, buttons, etc.

• .guppy-irc-controls-container - contains all controls

• .guppy-irc-message-input-container - the input container

• .guppy-irc-message-input - input form element

• .guppy-irc-message-submit-button-container - send buttong container

• .guppy-irc-message-submit-button - submit button element (not functional yet)

system messages

When Guppy needs to speak, it prints out messages in the message container.

• .guppy-irc-error-line - line containing error message

• .guppy-irc-status-line - line containing status message

Multiple widgets per-page

NOTE: Each widget's id tag also serves as it's own namespaced set of CSS rules, allowing you to stylize multiple consoles on the same page differently.

So, while .guppy-irc-message-container applies to any Guppy widget, .guppy-irc-myGuppy-message-container applies only to the Guppy widget instance with that id tag value of myGuppy.

credits

Developed by Nick Jennings

Sponsored by NLNET