I had to do some Googling around yesterday to find out how to use IRC. I thought some basic instructions might be useful on the http://wiki.centos.org/irc page. Here is a draft for your consideration: ===== IRC Instructions for Beginners If you have not used IRC before, this guide will help you get started. You will need an IRC client. If you are already using Firefox, an easy possibility is to install the ChatZilla add-on. To do this in Firefox, go to the Tools menu, then select Add-ons. Search for ChatZilla, then click the Install button. Once ChatZilla is installed, you can open it from Firefox by going to the Tools menu, then clicking ChatZilla. A new window opens for ChatZilla. Once you have your IRC client is open, go to irc://freenode/ (ChatZilla provides a link to freenode for you to click on). To change your nickname, type /nick yournickname in the input box and press Enter. To register your nickname, type /msg NickServ yourpassword youremailaddress and press Enter. NickServ will send an email back to the given email address, containing a message in the format /msg NickServ VERIFY REGISTER yournickname yourtoken. Copy and paste this message into the IRC client input box, and press Enter. Your nickname is now registered, and no one else can use it. Once you have your nickname registered, type /join #centos to join the #centos chat. If you quit your IRC client and later want to reconnect with irc://freenode/, you will need to type /msg NickServ identify yourpassword before you can rejoin #centos. =====