General Usage

Welcome! If you are here, it means you are presently using the web's finest, online chat service. This online chat program includes features such as multiple subrooms, customization, audio, emoticons, private messaging, profanity filtering, and many more! As of this writing, IPC is available in English, Spanish, French, Arabic and Hebrew. This page will provide a brief summary of many of the features that you presently have access to.

To log in, simply enter your username/handle in the text box located at the bottom portion of the applet. Certain restrictions are imposed on usernames, and they must be 15 letters or less in length.

To communicate in the chat room, you merely need to type text into the little text box towards the bottom of the applet, and press Enter to send your message. Your message will appear in the content (larger) box above it when it is received by our server. Others may then read what you have typed, and respond to you. If you wish to get another user's attention, simply type in their name somewhere within the message that you are sending them. Their message will appear in a different color, and a sound will be played.

You will notice various buttons and checkboxes on the left hand side of the chat room. These allow you to logout, request help (as you have already figured out), float/dock the chat room, turn on/off audio, turn on/off the timestamp and turn on/off the autoscroll feature.

Certain chat rooms may have different features, or different layouts, depending upon how they have been configured.

If you wish to exit the chat room at any time, simply click the Logout button. On some systems after logging out you will automatically be taken to another website, on others, you will have the option of logging back in again.

Graphic Emoticons

Emoticons are textual representations of emotions, for conveying feelings in an atmosphere where it would be difficult to express them otherwise. Certain text emoticons are recognized by IPC and will automatically be translated into their graphic counterpart. To your right is a list of the presently recognized emoticons. Simply type in the text you see in the second column, and the graphic (shown in the third column) will appear in the chat room instead. Your chat room operator may have added additional emoticons, or possible removed some of the emoticons listed to the right.
Happy :)
Happy 8)
Tongue :p
Sad :(
Angry :<
Closed Eyes Kiss ;()
Fear :0
Kiss :()
Laugh lol
Smirk :/
Smug :|
Surprised :O
Wink ;)

Audio Emoticons

*beep*
*belch*
*bird*
*bleep*
*burp*
*choochoo*
*evil*
*grr*
*harp*
*meow*
*slap*
*welcome*
*whip*
Audio Emoticons work similar to graphic emoticons, except instead of displaying an image, they play a sound for all to hear! To your left is a list of the default audio emoticons in IPC. Your chat room operator may have added additional audio emoticons, or removed emoticons listed to the left.

Font Size

You may change the size of your font by accessing the right-click content menu. To do so, right click on the content area (the area where messages are displayed) and a small menu will appear. Select "Font Size" to show the font selections allowing you to change your font size. Available options are Very Small, Small, Medium, Large, and Very Large. On certain systems, the Very Small font is identical to the Small font. After a font selection is made, the content area is reset.

Text Color

You may change the color of your text by clicking on the Colors button on the front of the applet, or by accessing it via the right-click content menu. After clicking on "Colors", a small popup dialog will appears allowing you to change (using scrollbars) the red, green, and blue values of your text. The current text color will be shown in the text portion to the right of the scroll bars. Adjust the red, green, and blue scroll bars to suit your preference, then click "Ok".

Commands

IPC recognizes various commands. A complete list of commands presently recognized by IPC are shown on the right. You will notice that these commands are IRC-like in nature. Macros allow you to quickly perform some of these functions by reducing keystrokes.

Do not use brackets. Brackets are shown for demonstration purposes only.

Private messages appear in a unique color to be easily differentiated from messages intended for the (public) chat room.
/a Macro for /action
/action [verb/action] Perform an action
/beepall Beep on all messages
/clign Clear Ignore List
/clrurl Clear URL List
/cls Clear Screen
/create [subroom] [password] Create Subroom
/i Macro for /ignore
/ignore Show Ignore List
/ignore [username] Ignore User
/info IPC Info
/join [subroom] [password] Join Subroom
/leave Leave Subroom
/listen [username] Do not Ignore User
/m Macro for /msg
/mm Macro for /mmsg
/n Macro for /nick
/mmsg [message] Send Multiple Private Messages
/msg [username] [message] Send Private Message
/nick [alias] Change Alias/Handle
/p Macro for /msg
/visual Toggle Visual Notifications
/whereis [username] What Room is [username] in?
/whoami Who Are You?

URL Addresses

URL's, such as http://allindiansite.com or www.allindiansite.com, or even mailto:username@somedomain.tld may be entered into the chat at any time to share with, and communicate to others. Once a URL is sent to the chat room, it is automatically added to the URL list at the bottom of the chat room. Any user who wishes to then visit that URL, simply needs to select it from the URL List. The URL List may be disabled on certain systems.

Subrooms

The chat application you are using is capable of hosting multiple subrooms. Subrooms are shown in the list on the lower right hand side of the applet, just below the user list. Depending on how your chat room has been configured by it's owner, you may create, join, and leave subrooms. Subrooms may be password protected as well to accomodate privacy. There is no limit on the amount of subrooms that may be created, however; subrooms are automatically removed when they are empty.

Some systems may automatically place you in your own unique subroom. The subroom will have the same name as your username. Often times this is used for technical-support solutions.

To create a new subroom, type /create [subroom_name]. Subroom names are subject to the same limitations as usernames. They must be between 1 and 15 characters, and may not contain spaces. You will automatically be placed in a subroom that you create. If you wish to password protect the subroom you have created, type /create [subroom_name] [subroom_password]. All users wishing to join your subroom will be required to enter the password you have chosen. Passwords are subject to the same limitations as subroom names.

To leave a subroom, type /leave. You will then be brought back to the main chat room. If the subroom you leave is empty, it will be removed from the system.

To join an existing subroom, type /join [subroom_name]. If the subroom is password protected, you will need to supply the password (not neccesary for system operators) by typing: /join [subroom_name] [subroom_password].

All users within the entire chat are listed in the Main Room (which may have been renamed by your chat operator), however; when inside a room, only users within that room will be listed on the user list. To determine where another user is (what subroom he/she is in) simply double click on that users name in the user list, or type /whereis [username].

Private Messages

To send private messages, use the /msg command. I.e., to send the private message Hello, there to the user Timmy, you would type:

/msg Timmy Hello, there
Private messages are shown in a seperate color within the display to be easily differentiated.

You may also initiate a private message session with another user by double clicking on his/her name. Once doing so, a popup dialog will appear for you to communicate with the other user in privately. The recipient will receive all messages in the main content area until he/she also double clicks on your name. To close a private message session, simply click the X in the upper-right hand portion of the window.

You may send private messages to multiple recipients by employing the use of the user list in combination with the /mmsg command. To do so, select the users you wish to send a private message to by clicking on their names on the user list. Each user's name will become highlighted. Then, in the input box, type /mmsg [message]. Each highlighted user will receive the private message. To send a private message to just one user, you can either use the /mmsg command, or you may use the /msg [username] [message] command.

Profanity Filter

Your chat room may have filters in place to ensure that certain words (such as profanity) are not allowed. You may receive a warning message such as "Please refrain from using profanity" if you use an illegal word in a chat room that censors profanity. If you receive this warning, you can easily go back and edit your message by using the Message Scrollback feature.

Autoscroll

Autoscroll is the feature that ensures you are always looking at the most recent events in the chat room. Sometimes you may wish to look back upon previous messages entered into the chatroom. Without being annoyed by autoscroll, you can optionally turn on/off this feature by using the checkbox on the left hand side of the chat room.

Timestamp

You may turn the timestamp on by clicking the appropriate checkbox on the left hand side of the chat room. When this feature is turned on, all incoming messages will be displayed with the time that they were received. This time is relative to your own computer, and the timezone in which it resides.

Float & Dock

Click the float button to load the chat room into a seperate window. This feature allows you to surf the web while you chat. When you wish to return the chatroom to it's home page, simply use the arrow buttons on your browser to return to the page from where you floated the chat room, then click "Dock"

Message Scrollback

Scrollback allows you to scroll back through the previous messages you have entered into the chatroom. To use this feature, simply press the Up and Down arrow buttons in the blue box where you type messages. Often times, we make typos, or we are censored by IPC's profanity filtering. This feature makes it easy to simply go back and edit the message that you have just typed.

Active (Online) Administration

IPC Administrators have at their disposal various access control privileges. These functions are accessed from the "Administration" link at the upper left hand corner of the chat room, or from within the chatroom itself. You must login first with your IPC email/username & password. To the right is a list of functions available to users granted administrative privileges..

The slash '/' commands are available to users who have been assigned administrative privileges using our online user editor, which is available to Professional accounts only.

URL's should be fully qualified URL's. I.e., use http://www.myurl.com as opposed to just www.myurl.com

The /kick command may also be used by users who have created their own subrooms using the /create command.

Add Web Address /url [url] Add URL to URL List
Force Web Address /forceurl [url] Display URL in all Client Windows
Kick User /kick [username] Force Logout for User
Disable User /kill [username] Logout & Shutdown User
Ban User /ban [username] Ban & Disable User
Ban by IP /banip [IP] Ban IP Address (???.???.???.???)
Query User /query [username] Query User IP Address
Clear Ban List /clrban Clear entire Ban List
Speak /speak [phrase] System User Chat

Connection Difficulties

If you are having difficulties getting online one of our chat clients, this check-list may help you determine exactly what the problem is, and how to resolve it. The majority of our users have no trouble at all connecting.

Ensure that your computer is capable of running our software. Chances are most likely that your computer can run our chat software. Often times; however; users may disable a specific feature on their web browser that may cause problems. Ensure the following features are enabled on your computer's web browser:

* Javaª

If you are running a version of a Microsoft Windows ª and see only a broken link icon, you will need to download a copy of the Javaª Virtual Machine in order to run our application. You may download Javaª Support for your browser from one of the following links below:

* Microsoft Virtual Machine (for MSIE)
* Sun Javaª Plugin (for Netscape, Opera, MSIE, etc..)

Older versions of Netscape (on certain platforms) such as v4.08, and v4.7x may not run our software. We strongly recommending upgrading to a newer version of Netscape (v6.xx or better) if this is the case. Certain browsers running on Macintosh platforms are not capable of running our software due to problems outside of our control. As WebTV does not support Javaª, WebTV users will not be able to access our chat rooms.

Users behind firewalls may need to inform their local IT/network administrator to allow TCP connections on ports 9000-9009 at client.invisionchat.com.

AOL Members: Some users have reported that the built-in AOL browser has difficulty connecting to our service, or does not load colors/emoticons properly. To resolve this, minimize your AOL connection, and use the Internet Explorer browser that came with your computer to access our chat rooms.