IRCParser

A ruby 1.9.x parser for IRC messages which includes commands, errors and replies classese according to the IRC RFCs definitions.

This library does not deal at all with networking.

Goals

In every irc library I've seen people implement the various irc messages again and again.

IRCParser tackles that boring task so the hard work in making the RFC compliant IRC messages can be shared across projects.

Anatomy of an IRC message

All irc messages have the same structure:

[optional prefix] COMMAND_NAME [optional_param [optional_param2, ...]] [optional postfix]

• The prefix always denotes a server or user name, and starts with ':'.
• The params are completely optional. IRCParser gives all params apropriate names reflecting those found on the RFCs.
• The postfix is the last parameter. IRCParser sometimes aliases the postfix to something more readable for some messages (e.g. 'body' for PRIVMSG). The only kind of parameters which can embed spaces are the postfixes.

Parsing Messages

The parser can be run so it returns the raw components of an irc message ([prefix, command, *params]), or an specific class for each kind of message constructed from those parts.

The parser is quite strict so it will expect the IRC delimiters in all messages to parse (i.e. all messages must end with '\r\n').

  require 'irc_parser'

  # returns prefix, command, params. Notice final \r\n
  IRCParser.parse_raw(":Angel PRIVMSG Wiz :Hello are you receiving this message?\r\n")

  # => ["Angel", "PRIVMSG", ["Wiz", "Hello are you receiving this message ?"]]

To get a subclass of IRCParser::Message instead of an array of components:

  require 'irc_parser/messages'
  msg = IRCParser.parse(":Angel PRIVMSG Wiz :Hello are you receiving this message?\r\n")
  #<struct Struct::IRCPrivMsg prefix="Angel", target="Wiz", postfix="Hello are you receiving this message?">

  msg.identifier # => "PRIVMSG"
  msg.to_sym     # => :priv_msg
  msg.prefix     # => "Angel"
  msg.params     # => ["Wiz", "Hello are you receiving this message?"]
  msg.from       # => "Angel"
  msg.target     # => "Wiz"
  msg.body       # => "Hello are you receiving this message?"

Generating Messages

  msg = IRCParser::Messages::PrivMsg.new
  msg.from   = "Wiz"
  msg.target = "Angel"
  msg.body   = "Hello World!"
  msg.to_s   # => ":Wiz PRIVMSG Angel :Hello World!\r\n"

There is also a shortcut:

  require 'irc_parser/messages'
  IRCParser.message(:privmsg) do |m|
    m.from   = "Wiz"
    m.target = "Angel"
    m.body   = "Hello World!"
  end.to_s # => ":Wiz PRIVMSG Angel :Hello World!\r\n"

TODO

• Documentation!
• It would be nice to add support for parsing/generating extended mirc messages.
• Most severs/clients do not implement the messages exactly as defined on the RFCs (sometimes http://www.mirc.net/raws/ was used as reference). So, some messages may require adjustments to be usable in the wild.
• 1459 compliant, with some of the messages updated to the rfc 2812. Fixes/updates are warmly welcome!

AUTHORS

A lot of projects where reviewed while implementing this library. I may or may not have stolen something from one of these, although off course I'm the only one to blame for the contents of this gem. If I forget about anyone please ping me so I can include you here.

• Ragel parser and other portions where taken from irk (brodock/irk)