Eggdrop

Eggdrop is a popular IRC bot. It was originally written in December of 1993 by Robey Pointer, working with Jamie Rishaw, for the Efnet channel #gayteen. Eggdrop started out as an efficient substitute for cEvin, Jamie's IRC bot which was reaching limitations due to its script based design.

Eggdrop is written in the C programming language, and features an interface for scripts that allows the user to enhance the functionality of the bot. The language used in the script interface is Tcl.

In its time, the eggdrop has become one of the most popular IRC bots. Many of the bots that are run by normal IRC users (as opposed to the bots run by IRC Operators, which are usually the network services like ChanServ and NickServ) are eggdrops.

Due to its popularity, the eggdrop has a plethora of different scripts available for inclusion, most of them written by users. The additional features provided include such things as trivia games, file distribution mechanisms (usually via the DCC protocol) and random insults of other users on the channel.

It also features such uses as a botnet, which allows one to link multiple IRC bots together to act in a coordinated fashion, i.e., sharing information about users, performing actions when other bots die (shut down), and setting a ban on a person in each channel synchronously. People connected to any bot on the botnet via DCC CHAT or telnet are also able to communicate with each other within the botnet on various channels (channel 0, the default, is referred to as the "party line"), in a sort of miniature IRC.

Support

The official Eggdrop help channel on IRC is #eggdrop on Undernet. On DALnet and IRCnet support is available in #eggdrop. On QuakeNet support is available in #eggdrop.support. Eggdrop help is also available on EFnet and freenode in the channel #egghelp. (The EFNet channel #eggdrop is not currently [Apr 2005] a help channel, and has not been for some time, if ever.)

There is also a help channel for Tcl programming, and the Eggdrop specific extensions to Tcl on most major networks called #tcl.

Authors

Developers and Contributors (in alphabetical order):

• arthur2 (Jerome Carre)
  
• BarkerJr (Bryon Eldridge)
  
• Beldin (Darrin Smith)
  
• Ben (Ben Dover)
  
• bhab (Kelsey Hudson)
  
• ButchBub (Scott Taylor)
  
• Cybah (Jonathan Miles)
  
• darko`` (Darko Ilic)
  
• david (David Newhall II)
  
• drummer (Dobos Lorant)
  
• Dude (Matthew Stiefel)
  
• dw (Per Johansson)
  
• Ernst (Ernesto Baschny)
  
• Eugene (Michael Ortmann)
  
• Eule (Axel Franke)
  
• Fabian (Fabian Knittel)
  
• FireEgl (Philip Moore)
  
• gavroche (Jamie Rishaw)
  
• G`Quann (Florian Sander)
  
• guppy (Jeff Fisher)
  
• Ian (Ian Campbell)
  
• ITE (Federico Mennite)
  
• Jason (Jason Ede)
  
• Johoho (Wiktor Wodecki)
  
• KingKurly (Gregory Kubaryk)
  
• Kirben (Travis Howell)
  
• Kirk (Ian Kaney)
  
• lordares (Bryan Drewery)
  
• Lucas (Lucas Nussbaum)
  
• nakee (Ely Levy)
  
• poptix (Matthew Hallacy)
  
• Raistlin (Jason Slagle)
  
• RebuM (Martin Matuska)
  
• robey (Robey Pointer)
  
• rtc (Peter 'Rattacresh' Backes)
  
• SegFault (Ryan Butler)
  
• Shaun (Shaun Braun)
  
• slennox (Shayne Lennox)
  
• stdarg
  
• Sup (Teemu Hjelt)
  
• supers (Kevin Lamothe)
  
• TaKeDa (Dariusz Kulinski)
  
• TheGhost (James Simmons)
  
• TheUnknown
  
• toot (Toby Verrall)
  
• Tothwolf
  
• Wcc (Will Buckner)

See also

• Internet Relay Chat
• IRC bot
• EnergyMech

External links

• About Eggdrop
• List of Eggdrop Contributors
• Official Eggdrop Site (Eggheads Development Team)
• Slennox's Eggdrop Page - Eggdrop Help, Scripts and More
• Eggdrop and Tcl information and resources. Features a concise guide to Eggdrop and a botnet you can join
• Archive of the first Eggdrop user manual (circa 1994)