Ok, so I'm interested in setting up a small IRC server, to go on my 512 server. It would probably see an average of around 25 users, with a maximum of 50ish. So certainly nothing big.

Towards this end I've been searching for guides or tutorials on setting up simple a simple ircd. However, all the guides I've found are either many years out of date, or are primarily a guide to downloading and building the daemon itself. They then provide a list of config files, with an instruction to "edit them as necessary".

The end result I'm looking for is an IRC server that is secure, which can authenticate me on login and give me op status, and have basic nick registration services. If possible, I'd like to have some kind of bot to save bits of text and recall them later.

Can anybody point me towards a good resource for understanding the config files? For every ircd I've looked at so far, they've been very overwhelming. I'm open to any (stable/secure) ircd.

If configuring, say, Unreal is confusing - you might consider something based on XMPP instead. Administering an ircd along with (as you request) services and an infobot is a challenge.

If you do stick with IRC, try OFTC's branch of Hybrid. The last services I administered were proprietary, but I've heard good things about atheme and Anope (and OFTC's rock, for things like certfp). Infobots are a dime a dozen, Supybot comes with one.

<-- done it, wouldn't again

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Disclaimer: I am no longer employed by Linode; opinions are my own alone.

last year i was in the same situation as you, needed to setup and irc server, but with little or no experience.

I settled of unreal ircd and anope services, also using an eggdrop bot

i used this guide to help me set it up

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Building ... 0772.shtml

i used this guide for setting up the bot

http://www.egghelp.org/setup.htm

although the ircd guide is from 2006, i used it last year and didn't really have a problems, the guide will get up and running with info on what to edit.

the unreal and anope config files already have examples of what each function does.