[culinary-robot]

I've spent over 20 years on IRC and im still on every day. Two years ago, I felt the community could use more client options, so I created Halloy. It has since become my primary spare-time project, and I love seeing people enjoy IRC.

[airstrike]

And we're all thankful you did, for various reasons ;-)

[sho_hn]

On IRC since 1997 - even still in the first channel I joined!

Writing an IRC client is really a fun and rewarding exercise.

I also more or less started my career as a software engineer by maintaining a mildly popular Linux one, at the time.

Some things I learned ...

- A lot about shipping to real users and their pain points, since the devs are naturally accessible by IRC and you get to meet directly

- A whole lot about what makes a successful technology

- Equally much about tech warts, as IRC suffers from a fair number misguided early decisions and many years without functioning governance

- How incredibly rewarding it is to work on products that users directly "live their lives" in and that can help facilitate anything they do - it taught me to look out for jobs that have similar substrate-like qualities

Good luck with your project, I'm glad to see the cycle of renewal continue.