mIRC 6.17 released

[Thugilex]

Dear mIRC User,

mIRC version 6.17 has been released friday February 17th, 2006. You are
receiving this e-mail because you have subscribed to the mIRC release
mailing list. The new version of mIRC is available from http://www.mirc.com/
and from all fast mirrors around the world. We have also provided a few
download addresses below.

* Fixes, improvements and new features.

Khaled added support for displaying UTF-8 text as unicode to mIRC. This
works in status, channel, query, and other windows, and in nickname
listboxes, window titlebars, switchbar, and tooltips. The display of UTF-8
can be enabled by default for all windows in the Options/IRC/Messages
dialog, or individually for any window you like via the Fonts dialog. Use
the /font command to open the Fonts dialog. Make sure you select a font that
contains the characters or script (hebrew, arabic, greek, cyrillic,...) you
want to see!

The Fonts dialog also has an "Encode" option that encodes outgoing text in
UTF-8 based on the script/codepage selected for that window. The Encode
feature is selective, ie. it only encodes the parts of an outgoing message
that are not already in UTF-8 format. It also takes into account if the IRC
server is fully UTF-8 enabled or not.

Various other changes:
- mIRC now has a 'check for timed out connections' option in connect/options
dialog. When this is set mIRC pings the server every so often if it hasn't
heard form the server for a while to test your connection.
- Support for initiating passive dcc send/chat connections has been added.
- Changing the default font for a window type now affects all open windows
of the same type immediately.
- Most file dialogs are now resizable.
- You can disable the $decode identifier (and various other "dangerous"
commands) in the Lock options dialog. (The $decode is of course disabled
by default.)
- Lots of SSL things have improved and mIRC now also supports SSL
connections for sockets

This new version has extended support for MP3 id3v2 tags, better invite and
except lists, and heaps of other little thingies and identifiers like
$findfilen/$finddirn, $qt(text)/$noqt(text), $locked and $mouse.key
improvements. Of course also some UTF-8 related idfentifiers like
$utfencode(), $utfdecode() and $isutf() have been added.

In total the versions.txt mentions over 160 changes. Some changes are
obvious, some need getting used to - please take your time to play with them
and see how they work. May we invite you to the Message Board on the website
with all questions you might have? The board offers great help with
everything related to mIRC!

* How to upgrade?

mIRC is distributed in a self-extracting cabinet (mirc617.exe) that helps
you to install mIRC on your PC. Simply download the cabinet and run the
installer. Follow the instructions the installer program gives to you. When
upgrading all your old settings and scripts will stay as they were, if you
want that. Read the questions the installer program asks with care and
nothing can go wrong. You will be chatting with the new mIRC in no time. If
you get stuck or if you want to find out more about a certain feature, just
click on a Help button or browse the Help file and you should find lots of
hints to help you out.

* Where to download?

For the latest download addresses just go to the mIRC website. As a special
service to you we included some links below where mIRC is available already;

Holland ftp://ftp.snt.utwente.nl/pub/software/mirc/mirc617.exe
New Jersey http://www.reverse.net/pub/mirc/mirc617.exe
Turkey http://www.alfabe.org/mirc/mirc617.exe
Quebec http://www.ctech.ca/mirc/mirc617.exe
United Kingdom http://mirc.orion-hosting.co.uk/mirc617.exe
Singapore http://mirc.sphereosoft.net/mirc617.exe
Germany ftp://ftp.freenet.de/pub/mirc.com/mirc617.exe
New York http://mirc.kragoth.com/mirc617.exe
Greece ftp://ftp.physics.auth.gr/pub/unix/irc/mirc/mirc617.exe
Denmark http://www.mr-fister.dk/~mirc/mirc617.exe

On the mIRC websites also the new mIRC FAQ version 59 (mfaq59hp.zip) is
available. The FAQ answers a lot of questions regarding mIRC, IRC, DCC and
the like. It also includes a tutorial on Aliases, Popups and on
'programming' the Tools/Remote section.

* Shareware.

As you might know mIRC is shareware. It can be downloaded freely and
evaluated for 30 days. Assuming you find that you enjoy using mIRC, and you
continue to use it, you have to register your copy. This licenses you to
keep your copy of mIRC and it supports our continued work on mIRC. Khaled
offers a one time registration, which works with all future versions of
mIRC. You will never need to register again.

Thanks for using mIRC, lots of fun on IRC,

[Cult]

Fixed auto-join bug.

[Cult]

most good changes are:

PHP Code:

- UTF-8 support
- Passive DCC support
- Default locking of $decode on the command line, and other "dangerous" commands
- SSL extensions
- COM bug fixes
- ID3v2 tag support in $sound
- Loads 'n loads of bug fixes!