General ICQ-Chat network FAQ

[TNTease]

Some answers to some general questions regarding the network.

Q:   I have seen some very long Quit messages.  How long can the quit messages be?
A:   We did not immediately set the length on the quit messages, but we found a few chatters were setting extremely long quit messages (like SPEECHES!), so we agreed it was necessary to lower the character limit on them.  Currently quit messages have been set to 100 characters. A 'character' is any letter, number, symbol or space.

Q:   How long can nicknames be?
A:   Nicknames are set to a maximum of 15 characters.
Nicknames can contain any letters, numbers or any of these symbols:  [ ] \ ^ -

Q:   Do you have other rooms here?
A:   Yes, we have quite a few rooms here.
With most connections, you can type /list for a list of all the available rooms here, and click on your choice from that list.  There may be some clients that do not allow this command, but you should be able to use it in both mIRC (including PnPlus script) and through the website entrance.  You can type it in the edit box where you normally type to chat.

Q:   Do you have any Trivia or Games rooms?
A:   Yes we have #icq-trivia and #Uno game channels with game bots in them.

Q:   How do I join another room?
A:   If you know the name of the room, use /join #roomname (Example: /join #looking_for_love).
If you don't know the room name, see the information above on getting a list of the rooms.

Q:  How many nicks can be grouped to an account?
A:   seven

If you have other questions, feel free to ask!

[TNTease]

Q: How long is my nickname registered for?
A: Nick Registration expires 60 days after you register the nickname/account, or 60 days after the last time you identified, whichever one is most recent.
[for info on how to Register and Identify for your nickname, here's how:  http://icq-chat.com/forums/index.php?topic=198.0 ]

Q: How long does the registration on a Channel last?
A: Channel registration expires 60 days after the most recent visit by someone from the channel Access List. 

Q: How many channels can I own?
A: You can be owner in up to 10 channels.

Q: How can I add someone to the access list in my room?
A: Registered chatters can be added to a channel's access list by giving them "flags", which regulate what they have access to in the channel.  Only Registered nicknames can be added to the access list.
Type /chanserv help flags for information on what the flags do.
Type /chanserv help flags #channel to view the access list and the assigned flags for your channel.
To add someone to the channel access list, the command is
/chanserv flags #channel nickname +flags

Q: What are the usual settings for the access levels (Founder, SOP, AOP, VOP)?
A: These are the usual settings for the most common access levels, although you can set whatever flags you want:
Founder = +AFORafhioqrstv 
AOP = +AOhiortv
SOP = +AOafhiorstv
VOP = +AV
HOP = +AHVhtv

Q: How do I remove someone's access in my channel?
A: To remove someone from the access list in your channel, type /chanserv flags #channel nickname -*
(the -* means remove all the flags)

Other notes:
#channel should be replaced in these commands with the particular name of your channel.
/chanserv can usually be replaced with /cs (although some IRC client programs will not recognize this very short form)

[TNTease]

Q:  My friend quit and the message said "(Ping timeout: 121 seconds)" - what does that mean?
A:  It's called a "pingout" or "pinging out" --- The server repeatedly "pings" your connection to be sure it's still there, sort of like the way a submarine uses sonar to "ping" to see if there is some obstruction in their way (or another submarine).  Your computer normally answers quickly to verify that it's still connected.  Sometimes your computer is slow to answer, or for some reason the server doesn't receive the answer fast enough, so the server thinks you're no longer connected and it drops the connection.  This is why the message says "Ping timeout".  It happens to most everyone once in a while. No big deal usually.

[TNTease]

Q: How do I stop the youtube links from opening the videos?
A: You can turn off the setting that automatically opens the links, includin automatically playing the videos.  To turn the video pop up off, on the top left hand corner, click the setting cog/wheel, then scroll down to chat messages and the last option should say show inline image preview, untick that and it will stop the inages/videos from automatically opening/playing.