CujoChat: Internet Chat for Magic Cap!

The first step of setting up CujoChat is letting it know about your service provider (ISP). Your ISP must support dial-up PPP, and also auto-detect PPP connections. CujoChat does not support login negotiation, but it does fully support PAP and CHAP authentication. Many ISPs these days support direct PPP with authentication, so CujoChat should work for most people.

You also need to pick a nickname to use on IRC, usually referred to as a "nick." Nicks must be unique among all IRC users, so if you choose something like "bob," chances are it's taken and you will have to choose a different one. IRC users tend to be extremely creative with their nicks, so don't be afraid of picking something too wacky.

Setup steps

This list of steps mostly deals with the CujoChat setup scene, so here's a picture of the scene to help you follow along. Better yet, follow along on your communicator!

1. Install CujoChat! Download the package from this site and install it on your communicator.

2. Go downtown and tap the CujoChat building.

3. Tap the "setup" button in the bottom right corner of the scene.

4. Select which hardware you want to use, built-in modem or external modem, by tapping the "hardware" choice box. The external modem driver works with many popular modems, including Ricochet, Supra, and U.S. Robotics.

5. Fill in the phone number for your ISP's dial-up line. Be sure to fill in the area code so Magic Cap knows to dial it if your dialing location is in another area code. If you need the modem to dial an exact string, such as "777" for Ricochet modems, prepend the number with a double quote (like "777).

6. Fill in the DNS server number for your ISP. This should be a number in the format of xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx. If you don't know this number, call your ISP and ask them for it.

7. If your ISP requires PPP authentication, fill in the login and password for your account in the appropriate fields, or leave them "none" otherwise.

8. Now it's time to pick an IRC server. There are lots and lots of servers around, but the trick is finding one that is not full, crashed, or just won't let you on. There is a most excellent IRC server list web page that should help you find a server. Try to pick one that is geographically close to you since that might speed up your connection. If you log in and it gives you a cryptic message like "authorization failed" and/or just disconnects (you see CujoChat's "it's dead" message), pick another server and try again.

   NOTE: All of these servers are internetworked, so if you are using one server and another user is on a different server, you will still be able to talk to each other transparently. Peachy!

9. Be sure that the remote port number is set properly. This is usually 6667 for most servers, but some might be different. Unless you specifically know otherwise, the port number will be 6667, so this is CujoChat's default.

10. Fill in your neato nick.

11. Fill in your real name. This will be given to other IRC users that request information about you (using the "whois" command). This doesn't need to be your real name, but I usually put in in.

That's it! You should be set up to go now. Go back to CujoChat's main scene, tap the "open link" button, and see if it works.

In case it doesn't work the first time

If you get an error message about the hardware not connecting to the remote host, this means that the modem could not connect to your ISP's dial-up line. If you are using the external modem driver, it could also mean that your modem and the driver are not getting along well, so try again with the built-in modem to check that.

If you see an error message about the link server, this means that PPP could not get running. Check your PPP login and password if your service provider needs authentication. If your ISP requires a login script or something, CujoChat doesn't support that, so you're out of luck for the time being. Sorry!

DNS errors are caused by either a bogus host name for the IRC server or the DNS server getting cranky. If you're sure that the host name is okay, try again and the DNS server might decide to work. This is a common problem with some ISPs that have flakey DNS.

Errors after the connection, for example getting the "it's dead" message and/or seeing stuff like "no authorization" are problems related to the IRC server. Pick another one from the list and try again.