Bersirc

Bersirc is a multi-platform open source IRC client currently in development for the Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X operating systems. It utilises the Claro toolkit, which aims to provide an interface to native windowing systems and widgets on all operating systems. Microsoft .NET and Qt toolkit ports are also planned. The current version of Bersirc is 2.2.14.

Bersirc 2.1 was originally to be released under the Qt Public License. The Qt toolkit and licence have since been abandoned, most likely due to pressure from Qt's detractors. Bersirc is now licensed under the GNU Lesser General Public License. The website has provided no other information as to which license the client will eventually be released under, simply saying it is yet to be decided.

The official website has confirmed that Bersirc will eventually include support for mIRC script via a Plugin, something which was a long-standing rumour among Bersirc fans. The site cautions that its implementation will not be completely compatible with mIRC. This appears to be the only internal scripting planned for Bersirc, but the plugin interface will allow third party scripting engines.

The older Delphi client, Bersirc 1.4, was supposed to be continued to be maintained under the name Bersirc 1.5. The original site was also archived by the new owner, including all the old plugins and extensions, but there has been little to none information about the legacy clients future since. Developers stated that the development of the 1.4 client stalled due to the extensive usage of proprietary software components in the original source; the 1.4 client relays on many parts of the Raize Components package, and apart from its proprietary state, newer versions are not backwards compatible with the one used in the client, while older versions are not available anymore.

History

Bersirc was originally developed in Delphi by Jamie Frater in 1999 as a Windows-only IRC client, comparable to HydraIRC and Klient. However, development stagnated due to the developer's growing responsibilities in real life.

The Bersirc source code was subsequently purchased from the original developer on February 10, 2004 by Nicholas Copeland and released as Open Source. The primary developer, Theo Julienne, announced plans to develop the 2.1 branch in C++ with the use of the Qt toolkit, though with the release of the 2.2 branch this was changed to C using Claro Graphics.

See also

*List of IRC clients
*Comparison of IRC clients

External links

*Bersirc website
*Archived copy of Bersirc 1.4 site
*[irc://irc.free2code.net/bersirc Official IRC channel]
*Mailing list
*Jamie Frater's Official Website