Treasures of mIRC

[Trinity]

[font=\"Arial\"]Treasures of mIRC – By Trinity

mIRC scripting is seen as the lowest rung on the larger ladder of computer programming. However, mIRC has a lot of hidden treasures that many scripters do not appreciate until they go onto bigger and better things. A lot of people looking in on mIRC communities scattered throughout the net, ask the question “What can mIRC do for you in life?”

mIRC programming is a school for aspiring computer programmers or general users. mIRC creates bands of ‘scripters’ who learn together and progress through skill levels together. It is hard for anyone who has not been a part of mIRC scripting to understand exactly what I am talking about, because these scripting communities are special and unique.

I started on MSN where mIRC scripts were used for automatic functions and protecting rooms. There were rooms dedicated to helping mIRC users learn to protect their rooms. There rooms had forums, websites and other online bases. The community I joined grew together as one, with people helping each other, and in general, each person in the community got better. It was your job to help as much as you got helped. From there I moved to IRC, where again we met up with larger groups and skill levels improved further. Our community expanded into graphic design, programming such as Visual Basic and Python, Web Design and Online Security. A lot of the community that for six months I lived with, have since stopped mIRC scripting and gone on to bigger and better things. In a sense, our generation have ‘graduated’ from mIRC, like many before us.

From a programming point of view, mIRC has helped me in so many ways. Because the thing that makes learning mIRC so unique - compared to learning languages such as Visual Basic and Python – is that mIRC scripters have the same goal. There is a well-worn path that everyone follows, because everyone has the same goal, which is to make your copy of mIRC a supreme chat tool. There are numerous tools that you need in your chat tool, and there are tutorials and examples for each of them. mIRC is an open source language, and everyone learns from each other’s work.

One of the hardest things for people to do when learning a new language is to find a project to do, so that they can put their skills into practice. The best way to learn is to put your skills to use in real projects. In mIRC this is so simple, because everyone has to create basic things such as Themes, Popups and various standard Dialogs. Then there are sidebars, toolbars, status bars, control panels, mp3’s and hundreds of other things. When programming in any language, you need to have a clear, defined goal, and you need to be able to visualize how it will look and what it will do. This is 100 times easier when you have seen 50 other examples, as is the case in mIRC.

mIRC teaches the basics, the fundamentals of programming. mIRC script has been cleverly designed to employ all the methods and functions of stand alone languages, as well as other extras. For example, mIRC features indentation, IF and WHILE statements, commenting and numerous other things. These are the kind of things that are used across all modern languages, and are essential concepts that need to be understood before continuing in your programming career.

I am currently learning Visual Basic at school. I am the only one in the class who has done any programming in languages other than Visual Basic, but the others have all done Visual Basic for Beginners, or the equivalent courses. However, there a lot of things they don’t understand, and they struggle coding because they haven’t grasped some key concepts. For instance, they all indent their code once they have finished writing it, instead of as they go. If it wasn’t part of the assessment, they wouldn’t indent at all. In mIRC, it auto indents appropriately as you go along, so I automatically indent as I code. The problem is, when they go back to edit their program, or debug, they can’t read it because they haven’t indented properly, or have indented some things and not others.

When I have a difficult program in Python or Visual Basic, I often visualise how I would code it in mIRC. Because there are equivalents to everything in mIRC, most of the time I can easily translate my ideas into whatever language I am working in. This is because mIRC script is powerful, yet simple and clear.

Anyone who asks what mIRC can do for you in practical application, think of all the conventions, concepts and programming fundamentals that mIRC teaches you. Think of the idea of sharing code, the idea of helping each other and being part of a programming community. mIRC is an extremely valuable tool for teaching people about coding, open-source and online community. There are many treasures in the mIRC scripting language and the people that are associated with it. If you get the opportunity, take the time to explore this unique world and you will be forever enriched and your skills will be enhanced.
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[Josh]

Wow, very well put and I can relate to just about every single thing said in this <img src=\'http://www.killanet.net/forum3/public/s ... /smile.gif\' class=\'bbc_emoticon\' alt=\':)\' />