Forums General Discussion mIRC app for iPads and Android Tablets

Are there any plans in the future to develop a mIRC app for iPads and Android Tablets. I have both and use them almost exclusively now. However, when I need to log into mIRC (usually every day). I have to use my desktop or laptop.

It would so much easier to have an app for it

No.

https://forums.mirc.com/ubbthreads.php/ubb/showflat/Number/1109/page/1#Post1109

There are more than enough other IRC apps for your tablets.

Some decent iPad IRC apps are:
Colloquy: http://itunes.apple.com/de/app/colloquy-irc-client/id302000478?mt=8
LimeChat: http://itunes.apple.com/de/app/limechat-irc-client/id298766460?mt=8
Rooms: http://itunes.apple.com/de/app/rooms-dein-iphone-irc-chat/id288282245?mt=8

I don't know about decent Android IRC apps, but I'm sure you find some by yourself.

Furthermore, you are asking for an IRC app, not an "mIRC" app. An mIRC port to iOS would have no similarities to mIRC on Windows whatsoever (well, besides the fact that it would let you chat on IRC servers, which is definitely not a unique feature of mIRC).

It could be that he wants the scripting language... which would not make much sense on a mobile device in my eyes.

Pretty sure iPad apps wouldn't be allowed to do that anyway.

If Apple allowed it, it'd have to be a severely nerfed version of the scripting language.

iOS allows scripting and interpreted code-- EXCEPT: you are not allowed to DOWNLOAD executable code. In other words, you could have a scripting language, but you could not allow your users to share their scripts with others. Yes, definitely severely limited.

There are other reasons it would be limited of course-- the lack of proper windowing APIs, as I alluded to before, and the fact that iOS is not a truly multitasking OS, so hitting your home button would disconnect you from IRC. Not really useful to run scripts on a client that can't even run in the background.

FYI Android likely has neither of these restrictions, so it could be done there-- but again, there are no plans to port mIRC to other OS's. Plenty of things would have to change, including the UI, which is one of the major features that makes the client "mIRC". You want "a scriptable IRC client for Android/iOS", you don't want "mIRC for Android/iOS". mIRC wouldn't even really be mIRC outside of Windows, period.

And the lack of a transparent file system. I don't think they'd allow scripts that allow users to access the file system, so most file and directory related stuff would go out the window too.

I agree - it'd be way too different on iOS to be called mIRC, and would be a pointless endeavour.

Android is a hell of a lot more flexible and could incorporate a lot of the features that mIRC has, but mIRC has taken Khaled so many years to write... it just wouldn't be feasible for one person to develop both. Statistics indicate that many Android users are less willing to purchase apps too, sticking to free versions or pirating paid ones, so Khaled probably wouldn't see a very big return for the effort.

I'm not too sure about the FS stuff. They *should* allow scripts to access the FS using whatever public APIs the interpreter can use. You can store data inside of ~/Documents, for instance, so theoretically you could put scripts and script data there (there are also other directories, but I assume Documents is accessible when plugging the iPhone into your machine).

And yes, the restrictiveness of Android/iOS isn't really all that relevant. In either case, Khaled would have to rewrite nearly every single line of code and port over some API changes and UI differences. It would take years for one person to do this properly, all for what would be a pretty low payout, and he wouldn't be able to juggle this with maintaining mIRC on Windows. You aren't going to see this happening.

I have never seen an app that shows any kind of file structure. Apps can clearly access the file system, but the file system is never made visible to the user from what I can see. Apple's "it just works" mantra says that users shouldn't have to worry about such complex things as the file system.



Agreed.

http://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#...emOverview.html

"<Application_Home>/Documents/
Use this directory to store critical user documents and app data files. Critical data is any data that cannot be recreated by your app, such as user-generated content.
The contents of this directory can be made available to the user through file sharing. The contents of this directory are backed up by iTunes."

I guess very limited file handling commands could manipulate files in that directory only then.

Indeed:

"To keep the system simple, users of iOS devices do not have direct access to the file system and apps are expected to follow this convention."

But you *do* have read write access to portions of the FS, so it's not *that* bad.

Their are plenty of extension scripts for Firefox, Chrome, etc. They don't have direct access to the file system either. You ever asked yourself why? You should do some research, Hixxy. Go look at the following link.

http://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#.../uid/TP40005316

I suggest you then look at this also to further explain what Core Data is.

http://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#...gyOverview.html

What does a file system have anything to do with IRC anyhow?

Mirc be a good idea for other operative systems, than Windows ever, technology advances and devices are the most used mobiles, hope they board the train of the future mirc programmers.

Regards.

PS: i`m spanish user.

Because mIRC has features and scripting language features that access the file system, and the OP was talking about creating mIRC for the iPad.

The reasons why apps can't access the file system aren't important; just that they can't.

I'm sure there are lots of other things mIRC would be unable to do on an iPad, that was just one that sprang to mind.

To expand on hixxy's point:

mIRC is not mIRC without the scripting capabilities. And if it's not "mIRC", it doesn't need to be made by Khaled. Go download one of the other existing hundred IRC clients out there-- that's what mIRC would be without scripting. I've said this a bunch of times before, so a lot of this might sound repetitive.

If mIRC were to be redesigned for a tablet/non-windows OS, you would basically lose every feature that defines mIRC:

- A completely different UI (mIRC's UI exists explicitly because of a Windows specific UI known as MDI)

- No or limited scripting support

- A completely fragmented scripting ecosystem. Many existing scripts will not work on these devices, and there will be confusion as to what is iPad compatible, what is Android compatible, etc.

- Specific windows integration (dlls, COM, agents, file dialogs, MDI/multi window support)

What are you left with? A window with a nicklist and a buffer that lets you send text to an IRC channel or user. How is that special? Answer: it's not. Those apps already exist. Go get them.

By the way, you can access a filesystem in iOS, it's just limited to appdata for the application.

Alright, so no mIRC for iPad.

I found TurboIRC for free, so I've used that a bit. But I'd like to move on to a pay client, something better. It seems to me it's either LimeChat for iOS or Colloquy for iOS.

Has anyone had experience with both? Which should I go with? (the price difference aside)

thanks

I beleive there is a way of running mIRC on an Android tablet which I will be trailing tonight.

You can run a Windows emulator on Android. However from what I can see Emulator does not really appear to be the correct word, more like VM.

So a good modern Android tablet will easily surpass the systems requirments to run winXP *emulator*. From there just install and run mIRC inside XP.

It's a bit of a fath but gives you mIRC access locally on your Android tablet.