5 ms·

Ask HN: What IRC channels does everyone find interesting?

79 points by chunky1994 14y ago

jaryd 14y ago
irc.smashthestack.org #social, #twits
dfc 14y ago
I used to like #p2p-hackers but the channel is normally quiet now. I miss firing up irssi and seeing lively discussions from the channel.
prezjordan 14y ago
#haskell on freenode is always a very humbling experience. Everyone in there is extremely intelligent and helpful. I've recently learned to stay away from #python. #rubyonrails is okay.
- mattdeboard 14y ago
  I have only been in there a couple times but #haskell is a great channel. #clojure is a very good one as well. amalloy and many others are always around to answer questions.
- shuzchen 14y ago
  oftc has a smaller python channel, and I think freenode has #python-friendly. Less activity, but generally means less noise and fewer trolls.
  - lvh 14y ago
    It's double hash. It's explicitly NOT a PSF Python channel. That, and it was founded by someone notorious for trolling #python and #python-offtopic :)
- the_cat_kittles 14y ago
  I was often on #python about a 2 years ago, what happened? Is it bad now?
  - shuzchen 14y ago
    In general any public channel that reaches a critical mass eventually gets overwhelmed with noise/trolls/elitists. It really just takes a few bad eggs to ruin the experience for everybody. That's just the nature of things though, it's hard to keep a handle on huge channels unless the channel ops are eternally vigilant. I was in #python some time ago, and there were good moments but there were lots of bad moments.
    - lvh 14y ago
      Could you be more specific about the bad experiences? (I'm the Freenode Group Contact for #python,#python-*. If you have constructive criticism to make any of those channels better, I would be in a position to implement them.) I will happily admit that any sufficiently large group will have some bad apples in it, but I certainly hope that we (I'm speaking for the operators of #python) have tried, are trying, and will continue to try, to limit them :) We've tried many things in the past, including crazy ideas like having two channels, but that ended up being counterproductive.
- danellis 14y ago
  If you think #python is bad, you definitely want to stay away from #django.
  - philtar 14y ago
    #django is awesome. Everyone is helpful. Shout out to FunkyBob and mattmcc. Only issue is that there's a bunch of people whose answers could be solved by a quick search but still flood the channel with their questions.
  - porter 13y ago
    #django is super awesome. Those guys helped me go from a banker who sorta knew about for loops to a web app owner with paying customers. You'll find a handful of dedicated people in there that have been around for years and are very helpful.
- tikhonj 14y ago
  I've had a lot of fun in #haskell. One time, I was talking with some people about how annoyed I was with not having a natural number type in Haskell. (Really, wtf?) It's annoying, but clearly not the end of the world--no other language I know has a natural number type either. Can you guess what sort of response a complaint like this would have on another channel? At best, I would get some commiseration. But more likely people would either not care or actually get annoyed with me. I imagine similar reactions even to feature requests and complaints that are less "academic" than natural numbers. So what happened on #haskell? Somebody went off and implemented a nice natural number library[1][2] right then and there--while I was still online, in fact. Pretty cool. [1]: http://jeltsch.wordpress.com/2012/03/20/natural-numbers-in-haskell/ http://jeltsch.wordpress.com/2012/03/20/natural-numbers-in-h... [2]: http://hackage.haskell.org/package/natural-numbers-0.0.0.0 http://hackage.haskell.org/package/natural-numbers-0.0.0.0
  - manish_gill 13y ago
    Heh. That, more than anything, makes me want to learn Haskell. :)
- Twisol 13y ago
  #haskell is fantastic. I typically just idle there, but every time I tab over to see what people are talking about, it's something on-topic and (more importantly) interesting. And like you say, everyone there is really helpful.
georgemcbay 14y ago
+hack and +Amiga! (later #hack and #Amiga!) on the only irc2 network and later efnet (after the split) circa 1990-1995 ... haven't connected to an IRC channel in a very, very long time.
- eru 14y ago
  #nethack on freenode is also worth attending. Though probably not very related to #hack.
  - georgemcbay 14y ago
    Quite different, though I did also enjoy playing nethack a lot back in those days.
Kaivo 14y ago
Recently, I found #archlinux to be very interesting as long as it concerns Arch.
- klodolph 14y ago
  Really? Whenever I've been there people have been very rude, pedantic, sarcastic, and in general acting like /b/ rejects. Maybe I've been unlucky?
  - D9u 14y ago
    It's not only you. The same applies to the #freebsd channels.
  - Kaivo 14y ago
    Maybe it's only I who's been lucky. I think on every channel it depends when you go there. I haven't spent that much time there anyway but the little time I spent was useful and interesting.
johndarrah 14y ago
In addition to the usual open source freenode channels, I often go to #baot on irc.rizon.net
quanticle 14y ago
##proggit on Freenode is a pretty good channel.
- oneEarthling 14y ago
  :|
- shuzchen 14y ago
  eh, prepared to be trolled to no end in ##proggit. Also, the ops there are elitists and do whatever they want without consideration of the members wishes.
BudVVeezer 14y ago
#llvm on OFTC
bifrost 14y ago
EFNet: #unix, #freebsd, #metal GIMPNet: #dnalounge FreeNode: #startups, #bhyve, #postgresql, and if you're interested in the adventures of derpyhackerspacedrama try out #noisebridge. I've noticed that there are WAY more channels that attempt to take themselves seriously (and fail on the seriousness or accuracy quota) on FreeNode so stay alert. EFNet is generally the best chat network :)
D9u 14y ago
I used to frequent #anapnea, but after it shut down I lost all my data on the sever, and the newly resurrected anapnea seems to be less interesting the few times I've accessed it, so I haven't gone back. It seems that most of the *nix related channels have been over run by 12 year old "h4x0rz." The best channels are "Invite Only," and I'm not allowed to share their addresses.
- mh- 14y ago
  The best channels are "Invite Only," and I'm not allowed to share their addresses. thought i was OG since i'd been on EFnet since before the Split, but this guy is in channels that are obscure. we've probably never heard of them.
  - wink 14y ago
    Think I've only ever been in one invite-only channel and that's not a technical one. So far I've probably had luck with choosing my channels in the last 12 years, nearly all official or semi-official project channels have been inviting and helpful. Recent examples include #clojure #leiningen and #topaz on Freenode.
mindcrime 14y ago
Freenode: #fogcutter #startups #fedora #centos #trilug #ai #swig #machinelearning #grails #opencog
- moneyrich 14y ago
  hey you mispelled #swag
Mandatum 14y ago
#2600 on irc.2600.net can be pretty good
dsl 14y ago
Freenode: #go-nuts #metasploit #phabricator #puppet #riak
alexeston 14y ago
#laravel-offtopic on Freenode is full of awesome (and intelligent) people. It's an offtopic chat for the Laravel PHP framework, however the offtopic can contain a variety of languages - usually we talk pretty much everything, from Python to Go, C++ to CSS (and weird life, or rather the no-life related topics). As far as trolls go, I personally haven't seen any yet.
jstrate 14y ago
#clojure on freenode
niggler 14y ago
#node.js on freenode is pretty solid and, for such an active channel with many noobs, essentially troll-free.
- tomphoolery 14y ago
  This has always fascinated me. I love hanging out in #node.js because I almost never see trolls lurking.
Daegalus 14y ago
#haskell #dart #go-nuts #phabricator #redis #postgresql #grails #clojure #rust Pretty much a good chunk of open-source and language channels. always something to learn there. Especially the Functional programming channels like Haskell and Clojure I use ot idle in #nodejs and #javascript, but that got septic pretty fast. I also idle in #litecoin because I actively mine litecoins and feathercoins.
- VeejayRampay 14y ago
  #go-nuts is a great experience. I've been on IRC for many many years for dozens of different technologies and those first few years when everyone is just centered on the technology itself, where the egos are still in check are just a joy. #go-nuts is just like that, helpful and healthy people, a sane pace for everyone, none of the inbred humor that older channels tend to promote, just simple flow and sharing of information.
sgringwe 14y ago
#elementary-dev, #vala
flebron 14y ago
I idle and answer/ask on FreeNode's ##math. #haskell is also pretty chill, people are always willing to explain stuff. Yes, this includes monads for the kth time, forall k >= 1 :).
moneyrich 14y ago
#node #python had a good day at work bashing php in #node and suggesting 'rewrite it in php' to everyones questions. 3 php flame wars with 2-3 ppl in on it
eqyiel 14y ago
#emacs, there are lots of really smart people there.
kyrias 14y ago
#xkcd@foonetic
davidw 14y ago
#startups on free node, plus a rotating list depending on what I'm working on.
hijinks 14y ago
+1 for #linux-support on Efnet.
gurraman 14y ago
#erlang on Freenode. They're friendly and knowledgable folk.
atoponce 14y ago
I'm surprised no one mentioned #bitcoin-market on Freenode.
lucb1e 14y ago
I'm very surprised how popular Freenode is. Any idea how come?
- VeejayRampay 14y ago
  freenode is and has been for long the natural go-to network for anything programming-related. As to the reasons I wouldn't know, most likely mass dynamics :)
the1 14y ago
on freenode, #swhack ##math #rest #bitcoin ##ats
mvkel 14y ago
Reading this list, I'm honestly blown away that the IRC culture has evolved from "RTFM" Pretty cool that there are people willing to "waste" their time explaining stuff now. Is this just a product of there being large masses of programmers out there before, where it was pretty specialized a decade ago?
joshbaptiste 14y ago
Freenode: #bash #python #go-nuts #awk
MrXxXxXxXhue 13y ago
#/g/tracker on p2p-net Bunch of great funny guise on there
gary4gar 13y ago
I find these interesting: #archlinux #rvm #wordpress #jquery #rubyonrails #ruby Lastly, don't venture in #cakephp. you will get trolled or be called a n00b for not knowing some silly cake specific stuff.
middle8media 13y ago
#meteor is a very helpful community.

79 points by chunky1994 14y ago

jaryd 14y ago

irc.smashthestack.org #social, #twits

dfc 14y ago

I used to like #p2p-hackers but the channel is normally quiet now. I miss firing up irssi and seeing lively discussions from the channel.

prezjordan 14y ago

#haskell on freenode is always a very humbling experience. Everyone in there is extremely intelligent and helpful. I've recently learned to stay away from #python. #rubyonrails is okay.

mattdeboard 14y ago
I have only been in there a couple times but #haskell is a great channel. #clojure is a very good one as well. amalloy and many others are always around to answer questions.
shuzchen 14y ago
oftc has a smaller python channel, and I think freenode has #python-friendly. Less activity, but generally means less noise and fewer trolls.
- lvh 14y ago
  It's double hash. It's explicitly NOT a PSF Python channel. That, and it was founded by someone notorious for trolling #python and #python-offtopic :)
the_cat_kittles 14y ago
I was often on #python about a 2 years ago, what happened? Is it bad now?
- shuzchen 14y ago
  In general any public channel that reaches a critical mass eventually gets overwhelmed with noise/trolls/elitists. It really just takes a few bad eggs to ruin the experience for everybody. That's just the nature of things though, it's hard to keep a handle on huge channels unless the channel ops are eternally vigilant. I was in #python some time ago, and there were good moments but there were lots of bad moments.
  - lvh 14y ago
    Could you be more specific about the bad experiences? (I'm the Freenode Group Contact for #python,#python-*. If you have constructive criticism to make any of those channels better, I would be in a position to implement them.) I will happily admit that any sufficiently large group will have some bad apples in it, but I certainly hope that we (I'm speaking for the operators of #python) have tried, are trying, and will continue to try, to limit them :) We've tried many things in the past, including crazy ideas like having two channels, but that ended up being counterproductive.
danellis 14y ago
If you think #python is bad, you definitely want to stay away from #django.
- philtar 14y ago
  #django is awesome. Everyone is helpful. Shout out to FunkyBob and mattmcc. Only issue is that there's a bunch of people whose answers could be solved by a quick search but still flood the channel with their questions.
- porter 13y ago
  #django is super awesome. Those guys helped me go from a banker who sorta knew about for loops to a web app owner with paying customers. You'll find a handful of dedicated people in there that have been around for years and are very helpful.
tikhonj 14y ago
I've had a lot of fun in #haskell. One time, I was talking with some people about how annoyed I was with not having a natural number type in Haskell. (Really, wtf?) It's annoying, but clearly not the end of the world--no other language I know has a natural number type either. Can you guess what sort of response a complaint like this would have on another channel? At best, I would get some commiseration. But more likely people would either not care or actually get annoyed with me. I imagine similar reactions even to feature requests and complaints that are less "academic" than natural numbers. So what happened on #haskell? Somebody went off and implemented a nice natural number library[1][2] right then and there--while I was still online, in fact. Pretty cool. [1]: http://jeltsch.wordpress.com/2012/03/20/natural-numbers-in-haskell/ http://jeltsch.wordpress.com/2012/03/20/natural-numbers-in-h... [2]: http://hackage.haskell.org/package/natural-numbers-0.0.0.0 http://hackage.haskell.org/package/natural-numbers-0.0.0.0
- manish_gill 13y ago
  Heh. That, more than anything, makes me want to learn Haskell. :)
Twisol 13y ago
#haskell is fantastic. I typically just idle there, but every time I tab over to see what people are talking about, it's something on-topic and (more importantly) interesting. And like you say, everyone there is really helpful.

georgemcbay 14y ago

+hack and +Amiga! (later #hack and #Amiga!) on the only irc2 network and later efnet (after the split) circa 1990-1995 ... haven't connected to an IRC channel in a very, very long time.

eru 14y ago
#nethack on freenode is also worth attending. Though probably not very related to #hack.
- georgemcbay 14y ago
  Quite different, though I did also enjoy playing nethack a lot back in those days.

Kaivo 14y ago

Recently, I found #archlinux to be very interesting as long as it concerns Arch.

klodolph 14y ago
Really? Whenever I've been there people have been very rude, pedantic, sarcastic, and in general acting like /b/ rejects. Maybe I've been unlucky?
- D9u 14y ago
  It's not only you. The same applies to the #freebsd channels.
- Kaivo 14y ago
  Maybe it's only I who's been lucky. I think on every channel it depends when you go there. I haven't spent that much time there anyway but the little time I spent was useful and interesting.

johndarrah 14y ago

In addition to the usual open source freenode channels, I often go to #baot on irc.rizon.net

quanticle 14y ago

##proggit on Freenode is a pretty good channel.

oneEarthling 14y ago
:|
shuzchen 14y ago
eh, prepared to be trolled to no end in ##proggit. Also, the ops there are elitists and do whatever they want without consideration of the members wishes.

BudVVeezer 14y ago

#llvm on OFTC

bifrost 14y ago

EFNet: #unix, #freebsd, #metal GIMPNet: #dnalounge FreeNode: #startups, #bhyve, #postgresql, and if you're interested in the adventures of derpyhackerspacedrama try out #noisebridge. I've noticed that there are WAY more channels that attempt to take themselves seriously (and fail on the seriousness or accuracy quota) on FreeNode so stay alert. EFNet is generally the best chat network :)

D9u 14y ago

I used to frequent #anapnea, but after it shut down I lost all my data on the sever, and the newly resurrected anapnea seems to be less interesting the few times I've accessed it, so I haven't gone back. It seems that most of the *nix related channels have been over run by 12 year old "h4x0rz." The best channels are "Invite Only," and I'm not allowed to share their addresses.

mh- 14y ago
The best channels are "Invite Only," and I'm not allowed to share their addresses. thought i was OG since i'd been on EFnet since before the Split, but this guy is in channels that are obscure. we've probably never heard of them.
- wink 14y ago
  Think I've only ever been in one invite-only channel and that's not a technical one. So far I've probably had luck with choosing my channels in the last 12 years, nearly all official or semi-official project channels have been inviting and helpful. Recent examples include #clojure #leiningen and #topaz on Freenode.

mindcrime 14y ago

Freenode: #fogcutter #startups #fedora #centos #trilug #ai #swig #machinelearning #grails #opencog

moneyrich 14y ago
hey you mispelled #swag

Mandatum 14y ago

#2600 on irc.2600.net can be pretty good

dsl 14y ago

Freenode: #go-nuts #metasploit #phabricator #puppet #riak

alexeston 14y ago

#laravel-offtopic on Freenode is full of awesome (and intelligent) people. It's an offtopic chat for the Laravel PHP framework, however the offtopic can contain a variety of languages - usually we talk pretty much everything, from Python to Go, C++ to CSS (and weird life, or rather the no-life related topics). As far as trolls go, I personally haven't seen any yet.

jstrate 14y ago

#clojure on freenode

niggler 14y ago

#node.js on freenode is pretty solid and, for such an active channel with many noobs, essentially troll-free.

tomphoolery 14y ago
This has always fascinated me. I love hanging out in #node.js because I almost never see trolls lurking.

Daegalus 14y ago

#haskell #dart #go-nuts #phabricator #redis #postgresql #grails #clojure #rust Pretty much a good chunk of open-source and language channels. always something to learn there. Especially the Functional programming channels like Haskell and Clojure I use ot idle in #nodejs and #javascript, but that got septic pretty fast. I also idle in #litecoin because I actively mine litecoins and feathercoins.

VeejayRampay 14y ago
#go-nuts is a great experience. I've been on IRC for many many years for dozens of different technologies and those first few years when everyone is just centered on the technology itself, where the egos are still in check are just a joy. #go-nuts is just like that, helpful and healthy people, a sane pace for everyone, none of the inbred humor that older channels tend to promote, just simple flow and sharing of information.

sgringwe 14y ago

#elementary-dev, #vala

flebron 14y ago

I idle and answer/ask on FreeNode's ##math. #haskell is also pretty chill, people are always willing to explain stuff. Yes, this includes monads for the kth time, forall k >= 1 :).

moneyrich 14y ago

#node #python had a good day at work bashing php in #node and suggesting 'rewrite it in php' to everyones questions. 3 php flame wars with 2-3 ppl in on it

eqyiel 14y ago

#emacs, there are lots of really smart people there.

kyrias 14y ago

#xkcd@foonetic

davidw 14y ago

#startups on free node, plus a rotating list depending on what I'm working on.

hijinks 14y ago

+1 for #linux-support on Efnet.

gurraman 14y ago

#erlang on Freenode. They're friendly and knowledgable folk.

atoponce 14y ago

I'm surprised no one mentioned #bitcoin-market on Freenode.

lucb1e 14y ago

I'm very surprised how popular Freenode is. Any idea how come?

VeejayRampay 14y ago
freenode is and has been for long the natural go-to network for anything programming-related. As to the reasons I wouldn't know, most likely mass dynamics :)

the1 14y ago

on freenode, #swhack ##math #rest #bitcoin ##ats

mvkel 14y ago

Reading this list, I'm honestly blown away that the IRC culture has evolved from "RTFM" Pretty cool that there are people willing to "waste" their time explaining stuff now. Is this just a product of there being large masses of programmers out there before, where it was pretty specialized a decade ago?

joshbaptiste 14y ago

Freenode: #bash #python #go-nuts #awk

MrXxXxXxXhue 13y ago

#/g/tracker on p2p-net Bunch of great funny guise on there

gary4gar 13y ago

I find these interesting: #archlinux #rvm #wordpress #jquery #rubyonrails #ruby Lastly, don't venture in #cakephp. you will get trolled or be called a n00b for not knowing some silly cake specific stuff.

middle8media 13y ago

#meteor is a very helpful community.