IRC Protocol

Repartee implements comprehensive IRC protocol support covering RFC 2812 and a wide range of IRCv3 extensions, all negotiated automatically at connection time.

Core Protocol

The core IRC layer handles all standard protocol operations defined in RFC 2812:

• Connection registration -- NICK, USER, PASS, and capability negotiation
• Channel operations -- JOIN, PART, KICK, INVITE, TOPIC, MODE, ban lists
• Messaging -- PRIVMSG, NOTICE to channels and users
• Server queries -- MOTD, LUSERS, VERSION, STATS, INFO, ADMIN, TIME, LINKS
• User queries -- WHO, WHOIS, WHOWAS, NAMES, LIST
• CTCP -- VERSION, PING, TIME, ACTION, and custom CTCP queries

IRCv3 Capabilities

Repartee negotiates IRCv3 capabilities during connection via CAP LS/REQ/ACK. The following capabilities are requested when the server supports them:

The ratified +typing client tag rides on TAGMSG over message-tags, so it needs no capability of its own.

First-Class Bouncer Support (Soju & Lurker)

Repartee treats modern IRCv3 bouncers — Soju and Lurker — as first-class citizens:

• Control connections & auto-discovery -- Set bouncer_control = true (or /server add ... -bouncer-control) to negotiate soju.im/bouncer-networks, list all upstream networks, and automatically spawn child connections for each configured network. Manage networks live with /bouncer (list, refresh, connect, add, change, delete).
• Explicit & legacy network binding -- Bind directly to a bouncer network ID with bouncer_network_id (BOUNCER BIND <id>) or keep existing username/PASS network selectors (user/net@client). Autojoin is suppressed on bound connections so the bouncer restores its joined channels cleanly.
• Conversation discovery & server-owned history -- Discovers active channels and queries via CHATHISTORY TARGETS, pages scrollback on demand, and keeps bouncer history server-owned (without duplicating messages into local SQLite logs).
• Read-marker sync -- Negotiates draft/read-marker and soju.im/read (MARKREAD) so read state stays synchronized across Repartee's TUI, web frontend, and other bouncer clients.
• Bouncer commands -- Search server-side history with /bsearch (soju.im/search or CHATHISTORY BETWEEN/AROUND), manage conversation pin/mute/block metadata with /bmeta, manage TLS client certificates with /bcert, authenticate upstream accounts with /auth and /account, and upload files up to 64 MiB via bouncer FILEHOST with /upload.

Server History & Multiline

When a server or bouncer (soju, lurker, ergo, …) advertises draft/chathistory, Repartee pulls history over the wire: scroll a channel toward the top to page older messages (CHATHISTORY BEFORE), open an empty bouncer query to load its recent backlog, and after a reconnect the gap since your last message is filled automatically (CHATHISTORY AFTER/LATEST). Direct IRC connections fold history into the local SQLite backlog, while bouncer-backed connections keep history server-owned in memory. History is de-duplicated by msgid and rendered quietly (no notification spam).

draft/multiline lets a pasted or composed multi-line message travel as a single logical message — framed as one BATCH, reassembled on the other side, and E2E-safe so an encrypted block stays one RPE2E unit. In the TUI, Alt+Enter inserts a line break. See the IRCv3 Support reference for the full behaviour.

Typing Indicators

Repartee implements the ratified IRCv3 +typing client tag, so you can see who is actively composing a message in the current channel or query — shown as a status-line item in the TUI and a matching indicator in the web UI (alice and bob are typing…).

Notifications are throttled to one every 3 seconds and expire on their own (6 s after an active, 30 s after a paused), so a peer who disappears mid-sentence never leaves a stuck indicator. Sending the message retracts it. A /me draft counts as typing; a /command draft does not. Typing frames are charged against the normal flood budget, and a TAGMSG never opens a buffer, lands in your log, or bumps an unread counter.

SASL Authentication

Repartee supports six SASL mechanisms for authenticating with IRC services and bouncers:

• EXTERNAL -- TLS client certificate authentication (client_cert_path PEM chain + key)
• ECDSA-NIST256P-CHALLENGE -- NIST P-256 public-key challenge-response
• SCRAM-SHA-512, SCRAM-SHA-256, SCRAM-SHA-1 -- salted challenge-response authentication with server signature verification and no plaintext password transmission
• PLAIN -- username and password authentication
• OAUTHBEARER -- RFC 7628 OAuth 2.0 bearer token authentication (explicit opt-in via sasl_mechanism = "OAUTHBEARER" for OAuth-enabled bouncers)

WHOX Support

WHOX (extended WHO) is auto-detected when the server advertises it via ISUPPORT. Repartee uses WHOX queries to populate account names and full user@host information for nick entries, providing richer user data in the nick list and enabling account-based features like extbans.

Full parity on ircu-family and IRCnet servers. /who — and the nick-list metadata the automatic join-time WHO feeds — understands the SID/UID-aware replies these ircds send, so away state, account names, ident and real hostnames populate correctly there instead of coming back blank. Repartee picks the right field selector per server lineage, disambiguates the reply layout by argument count, and strips IRCnet's extra SID token so it no longer renders glued to the realname. Plain WHO (352) updates nick entries too, so even servers without WHOX get away state and real hostnames.

Extban

Repartee supports the $a:account extended ban type, which bans users by their services account name rather than by hostmask. This is more reliable than hostmask bans since accounts persist across reconnections and host changes.

Use the /ban -a shorthand to quickly set an account-based ban on a user in the current channel.

DCC CHAT

Repartee supports direct peer-to-peer chat connections via the DCC CHAT protocol:

• Active and passive modes -- initiate direct connections or use reverse (passive) DCC for users behind NAT
• =nick buffer convention -- DCC chats appear as =Alice in the buffer list, matching irssi behavior
• Auto IP detection -- from the IRC socket, with manual override via /set dcc.own_ip
• Auto-accept masks -- configure trusted hostmasks to automatically accept DCC requests
• Tab-completable commands -- /dcc chat, /dcc close, /dcc list, /dcc reject

Flood Protection

Repartee includes built-in flood protection to prevent being disconnected for sending too many messages too quickly. Outgoing messages are rate-limited to comply with server-side flood thresholds (including provider SAFERATE ISUPPORT limits), with automatic queuing and draining.

Netsplit Detection

Netsplit events (server-to-server link failures) are automatically detected and displayed as collapsed, human-readable summaries rather than flooding your channel with individual QUIT and JOIN messages. This uses the IRCv3 batch capability when available, with pattern-based heuristic detection as a fallback.

Multi-Network Support

Repartee supports connecting to multiple IRC networks simultaneously. Add multiple [servers.*] sections to your config file and each network gets its own connection, set of channel buffers, and independent state. All connections share a single event loop for efficient resource usage.