I've been asked, recently, about our BNC and proxy policy. As far as I'm concerned, I don't have a problem with anything used purely for maintaining a connection to IRC, as long as it isn't being used for abuse.  Unfortunately, TOR proxies were used to evade bans, so they are automatically g-lined upon connection now.  BNCs, however, allow individual identification of users, so channel ops can ban them if necessary.  However, if someone starts using a BNC for abuse, or to evade any kind of ban, then I will g-line that BNC until the issue is resolved.

I'm also happy to add a higher connection limit for BNCs which have an abuse policy (Geekbouncer is a good example of this).

Feel free to chat to me in #moofspeak or drop me a line via the Contact link above if you have any questions.

We now have finalised our switch from UnrealIRCd and Anope to Inspircd and Atheme.  As you may or may not be aware, UnrealIRCd was found, some months after we switched (thankfully) to have malicious code allowing anyone connected to an UnrealIRCd-based network to execute shell commands on the server!  As well, Atheme is a far better coded and more stable services package and in its latest guise, not only has all the important features of Anope, but many more options for channel customisation, which a number of our channel owners considered important.  The icing on the cake is, thanks to jdhore, who is one of our network admins, being an Atheme coder, the transition was quick, smooth and issue-less.

We have now done some server musical chairs, including the addition of two new servers thanks to mac-mini and eggy, whom I'd also like to welcome as opers. Special thanks goes to Mac-mini, who has, for a long time, been helpful in pre-testing the IRCd software on our test networks and giving feedback.

Thanks to everyone for being patient during the transition, especially as a couple of network bugs and an unstable server were sorted out.

Hey Moofspeak users,

You've probably seen that we switched our IRC services package on Saturday and
you're probably thinking: "OK, that's cool, what does that mean to me?". Well,
that's what this document is here for. Let's start with things that have changed:

* No more usermode or channelmode +r. +r now sets your channel registered users
only. Atheme sanely handles the fact that your channel is registered and doesn't
need a stupid mode. Take that! Damn modes!

* No more needing to enter a pointless channel password or description when you
register a channel. All you need to do now is: /cs register #channel . Isn't
that much easier?

* No more /cs access. ACCESS is a confusing, annoying command for managing
channel access levels. You'll still have "/cs aop add" and such, but now there
is a flags system that's super powerful, super easy-to-use and generally really
good. The different flags are a bit too complex to list here, so i'll just say,
see: "/cs help flags" for more details about them. You'll really like them, I
promise.

* You don't need a botserv bot to do fantasy commands (like !kick user) anymore.
ChanServ can do fantasy command and any chanserv command is a fantasy command,
for example, you can do: "!set secure on" to set channel secure mode on. How
cool is that? You can also address ChanServ (or your BotServ bot) directly by
hilighting its nick, like: "ChanServ, set secure on" and that'll work too.

* There is no more "/cs set successor". If you give people in your channel AOP
and FLAGS and such, they will be setup automatically as possible successors.
When your nick expires, it will look for the most active person with "status"
(like AOP/SOP) or FLAGS set on them, and attempt to give them the channel. If
you don't have anyone with status in your channel, then the channel will simply
be dropped when your nick expires.

Well that's about it for changes. A lot is quite intuitive and the same as Anope
(our previous services package). Onto the new features!:

* Identifying to NickServ. There are now so many ways to identify to nickserv
that here's a subsection to cover them all (Sorry about using | as a "marker", i
couldn't think of a better character to use):

    | - /ns identify <password> (as per usual)

    | - /ns identify <main-nick> <password> - Allows you to identify to your
    account even if you have another nick logged in. All the methods below allow
    this, but they're all quite different from the classic you know. This
    additional option is nice because it means you don't have to GHOST your nick
    when you get pinged off or something.

    | - SASL - SASL is a super-secure way to authenticate to services that your
    client will handle for you (depending on the IRC client or if you have a script)
    that happens before you join any channels and requires no intervention. A
    list of clients supporting this can be found here:
    http://adipose.attenuate.org/~stephen/ircd-seven/sasl/README.txt

    | - CertFP - If you connect to the network via SSL, and you setup a SSL
    fingerprint in your IRC client, you can use that to authenticate you to
    NickServ automagically. It is difficult to explain, so please see: "/ns help
    cert" or http://www.oftc.net/oftc/NickServ/CertFP for more details.

* If you need additional help, in /ns help, /cs help and when you request help
for a unknown command, it displays the network helpchannel.

* ALIS is a new service which allows you to look for a channel (like /list), but
it allows you to actually search and narrow down by specific parameters, see:
"/msg alis help list" for more information.

* Atheme supports multiple founders. If you set flags +* (/cs flags nick +*) and
then the +F flag (/cs flags nick +F) on a user, they will become a founder with
the same abilities as the person who created the channel. There is a limit of 4
founders per channel. You can obviously remove founders with "/cs flags nick
-F". It's also important to mention to trust whoever you add as a founder,
because at that point, if you created a channel, another founder can remove your
flags and essentially kick you out of the channel you created. The opers will be
able to help you with this, but it's better to be safe than sorry.

There are also many subtle changes and small new features too numerous to list
here, but they will make your life a lot easier and make MoofSpeak a lot easier
to work with.

As usual and as i've said in all my Global messages, if there are any
questions, comments or concerns about the new Services, feel free to ask in
#moofspeak .

Thanks for bearing with me and reading this whole document. Enjoy Atheme. :)

Hello Moofspeak users,

As you may already be aware, we recently upgraded Moofspeak's IRCd to InspIRCd from
UnrealIRCd. This is a very good change for us for many reasons including
more stability, more features for users, more features for opers and a few more
features and changes for channel owners/ops. That's what this news post is for.

So, onward with the new stuff:

* Channel Mode +g - This channelmode allows channel ops and above to set a
bad-word list specific to the channel that this mode is set in. It uses "glob"
matching and an example of what you would do to use it (block the words "Ford"
and "Opel") is:
/mode #channel +g *Ford*
/mode #channel +g *Opel*

* User Mode +g - This usermode is quite cool. If you set it on yourself (/mode
nick +g), when someone attempts to PM/query you, you'll get a message like: "*
cmoski is messaging you and you have umode +g. Use /accept +cmoski to allow."
When you do the /accept command, cmoski will be allowed to PM you. :)

* Temporary/timed Bans - This command allows channel ops to set a temporary ban on a
user without having to remember to remove it themselves. The syntax is pretty
simple: "/tban #channel 5h cmoski!*@*" would set a 5 hour ban on cmoski.

* Kick No Rejoin - When you kick a user from your channel and the user comes
back in 1 second automatically because of a rejoin-on-kick script is quite
annoying, right? Well, in inspircd, you can set /mode +J <seconds> and when a
user is kicked, they won't be able to rejoin for however many seconds you
specified.

* Invite Timers - This one is pretty simple. Say you want to invite someone to
your channel, but you want that invite to only last for 5 minutes. You can do
that now in InspIRCd like: "/invite cmoski #channel 5m" and it'll invite
cmoski (picking on cmoski again) to #channel, but only if he joins it within 5
minutes.

* Extended Bans - In UnrealIRCd, we had simple extended bans, mainly quiet
extbans (~q), gecos/realname extbans (~r) and nickchange extbans (~n).
InspIRCd has all these and a *TON* more. It'd take me too long to document
them all in this news post (and it'd make the post really damn long), but you
can see the full list at: http://wiki.inspircd.org/1.2/Extbans . The syntax
has changed a bit (please read that link to see the new syntax) and quiet
extbans are now known as mutebans (m, not ~q now).

* Flood Control - Possibly the most noticable change to channel owners/ops is
that the channel flood control settings are completely different on InspIRCd.
The upshot of this is that they're now a lot easier to understand and use.
Message flood protection is on channelmode +f, nick change flood protection is
on channelmode +F, and join flood protection is on channelmode +j. The syntax
for all of these is: lines:seconds (like: /mode +f 7:10) (or joins:seconds or
nickchanges:seconds).

There are quite a few more new channelmodes and usermodes and user commands, so
instead of making a 600 line long news post, i'm just going to link to the
InspIRCd documentation for that stuff (if you're browsing the wiki yourself and
can't tell, we use InspIRCd 1.2 on Moofspeak currently):

http://wiki.inspircd.org/1.2/Channel_Modes
http://wiki.inspircd.org/1.2/User_Modes
http://wiki.inspircd.org/Commands
http://wiki.inspircd.org/1.2/Modules

We have many/most modules enabled, but obviously users don't have access to the
stuff that looks to be oper-only.

If there are any questions about any of the new stuff or anything related to the
IRC network or the IRCd switch, please feel free to ask in #moofspeak.

Enjoy and thanks for using Moofspeak. :)

Thanks to jdhore for writing this guide.

There are a number of things we frequently get asked about, such as g-lines and vhosts.  I hope this post will make things more clear. 

G-Lines: A g-line is a global network ban.  Compared to a channel ban, it prevents people from connecting to the network from an address or number of addresses rather than just one channel.  They are set in a number of cases, but primarily because a person (or bot) is causing trouble on the network.   They aren't set just because someone is causing trouble in a channel, as that's an issue for the channel ops.  Even if someone keeps changing IP addresses, or their nick or username to evade the ban, it's up to the channel ops to set a sufficient ban or bans to prevent them joining the channel again.  We don't hand out g-lines by request.  If you're a channel op and need help setting bans, feel free to ask and we can give suggestions.

If, when you try and connect to moofspeak, you are thrown off with a message that you are banned from the network, and you specifically know that you haven't directly been banned by an oper for abuse, please use the Contact link above. If the message is something like: Blacklisted Proxy found.  "Visit http://rbl.efnet.org/?i=76.225.31.34 for info." then please visit the url linked to solve the problem before contacting us.  We can't remove the g-line until after the blacklist entry is removed, as the proxy checker will just ban you again the next time you connect.

If you are g-lined directly by an oper, most of the time it's not permanent. WAIT OUT THE G-LINE. Whatever you do, DO NOT evade the g-line.  You WILL then be g-lined for a longer period.  If you continually evade, you will be permanently banned and possibly your ISP or host contacted with an abuse report.  Let me say again, WAIT OUT THE G-LINE. Get your hand off your dick and take responsibility for your actions.

Vhosts: I usually check the requests queue about once every day or two and some of the other opers do too.  If you're really desperate to have your request activated ASAP, say something like "Currawong, can you please activate my vhost?" in #moofspeak (if I'm there) and I'll see the highlight on my name sooner or later. You can do this with other opers as well, not just me.

Some vhosts will not be approved.  Examples of those are: apple.com, apple.de etc. or, without the permission of the web site owner, the domain of any site whose official channel resides on our network. This is to prevent people masquerading as being staff from a site when they are not in reality and was requested by some site owners.

Mibbit web chat: If you wish to use Mibbit to chat on Moofspeak, please use one of the links provided on this site, or provided by the web sites whose channels reside here.  The widget on mibbit.com is now banned due to abuse, as people were using it to avoid channel bans and g-lines, since it uses the same widget.mibbit.com hostmask. If you are a channel owner and wish to have your own custom link such as the ones on this site, please contact me on IRC or via the Contact link on this site and I'll make one.