Java IRC Bot Tutorial

IRC Internet chat channels are used the world over by teams and individuals who want to banter about any given topic or speak with peers about special research topics or game play. Creating a bot, which is a simple form of artificial intelligence, to log on to an IRC chat channel and interact with its participants can be done by using the Java programming language. Using an open source bot allows you to tap into a community of other Java bot programmers to help you with your project.

Instructions

1. Download the PircBot Java .jar archive on the PircBot website (jibble.org/pircbot.php).

2. Extract the PircBot jar files to a directory on your hard drive, such as "c:\mybot\".

3. Launch the application that you use to edit your Java applications and create a new application. Enter the following code to initiate the bot and create a MyBot class that you will reference later on in the application:

   import org.jibble.pircbot.*;

   public class MyBot extends PircBot {

   public MyBot () {

   this.setName("MyBot");

   }

   }

4. Tell the bot to connect to IRC servers and specific channels by following this example of Java code:

   import org.jibble.pircbot.*;

   public class MyBotMain {

   public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {

   MyBot bot = new MyBot();

   bot.setVerbose(true);

   bot.connect("irc.exampleserver.net");

   bot.joinChannel("#pircbot");

   }

   }

5. Compile and run the bot by running the following command from the command line interface that is also connected to the IRC server on which the bot will be ran:

   javac -classpath pircbot.jar;. *.java

   java -classpath pircbot.jar;. MyBotMain

References

• Jibble: PircBot IRC API Resources