Newbie Chat 1

[Mikell1432]

Ok i am a pretty much a newbie, I am intrested in creating a chat program to run on my local network at school. I hardly know where to start? can anyone through me some clues?

 

[maluk]

May I suggest that you use C/C++ for this? Ok. Good. I do hope you have a background in C/C++ programming.

Being a newbie in TCP/IP or network programming or socket programming and wanting to creat a chat programming seems to be a daunting task at first. But really, once you learn the basics of network programming it would be a cinch.

It is plain to see that you should learn network programming (assuming you know C/C++). It would be the heart of your chat program. Below is a link to some helpful sites regarding this:

Beej's Guide to Network Programming

http://www.ecst.csuchico.edu/~beej/guide/net/

BSD Sockets: A Quick And Dirty Primer

http://world.std.com/~jimf/papers/sockets/sockets.html

Network Programming from EarthWeb

http://www.codeguru.com/network/index.shtml

An Introduction to Socket Programming

http://www.uwo.ca/its/doc/courses/notes/socket/

Socket Programming in C

http://pont.net/socket/

Socket Programming FAQ

http://www.ibrado.com/sock-faq/

Above are some of the useful sites I have used. You could get more by typing "Socket Programming" in Google or Yahoo or whichever search tool you use.

Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings, they did it by
killing all those who opposed them.

- janvier -

 

[Mikell1432]

sadly i know very little about C or C++. Do you have any sites that would get me there?

 

[sedj]

so what language were you thinking of developing this chat program in ?

 

[Mikell1432]

Well i know visual basic. I could use that, but i was planning on not making it visual at all (small scale dos version version or something). It would, however, be useful for me to know some more languages.

 

[sedj]

well, to be fair, for Socket programming, either C/C++ or Java spring to mind. C/C++ Socket programming is a bast**d if you don't know the language, with Java it is still difficult, but probably not as much as C/C++.

To be fair, writing the kind of application you wish, even if not visual is going to be a MAMMOTH task in these languages if you dont know them - maybe a task for someone who has 6-12 months knowledge of these languages at least ...

Why not check out

http://www.download.com,

or look at some other 'bought' software or freeware - its going to be a lot easier than learning a decent langage (sorry VB !!!) and then writing your own.

Good Luck with whatever your choice - and remember if you choose C or Java, we're here at the forums to help you on your way !

Ben

 

[alireza6384]

Hi
would anyone help in writng a chat program with c ?
Yours,
Alireza

 

[manarth]

Well, I think the posts above are already pretty helpful!

Seriously, no-one's going to hold your hand through the software development process, but if you're stuck, you could explain the problem and perhaps someone will suggest a solution.

The links given by Maluk point to some good learning resources. Another idea would be to find an open source chat client, and examine how it's written.

Remember, a chat client has to connect to something - it can't just float around on it's own. What servers do you need to connect to? ICQ? AIM? MSN? Looking at their respective clients may help the dev process.

<marc> i wonder what will happen if i press this...[ul][li]please tell us if our suggestion has helped[/li][li]need some help? faq581-3339[/li][/ul]

 

[bcastner]

Windows, including XP, includes a LAN chat facility natively.

1 start, search, &quot;winchat&quot; (or find in Windows, System 32 directory)
2 right click and select send to desktop (for easy opening)
3 run the program
4 choose dial button at the top
5 choose the computer of the person on the network who you wish to talk to.
6 both users must agree to connect to each other to talk.