Quick Tour of Chat Service Features

Chat Service offers many features that simplify the administration and management of chat servers and improve the security and reliability of chats across public and private networks.

Server Extensions and the Extensibility Model

Chat Service provides the following server extensions:

Channel Transcription extension. Allows you to transcribe conversations in persistent or dynamic channels on a chat server. For more information about the Channel Transcription extension, see Transcribing Conversations.
Profanity Filter extension. Detects and eliminates inappropriate language in persistent and dynamic channels. You can filter words conveyed through private messages, whispers, invitations, and changes to nicknames and channel names. For more information about the Profanity Filter extension, see Filtering Inappropriate Language.

These extensions were developed using the Chat Server Extensibility Model, which includes an event notification mechanism and an object model that offers programmatic control over Chat Service and the properties of its channels and users. To develop custom server extensions according to this model, you or members of your development staff can use the Chat Server Extensibility Software Development Kit (SDK) provided with Chat Service. For example, you can use the SDK to write an extension that monitors nickname changes or logs specific channel events.

Client Compatibility

Chat Service is fully compatible with many chat clients, including:

mIRC, PIRCH, and other clients that use the Internet Relay Chat (IRC) protocol.
Microsoft® Chat version 2.0, which uses the proprietary Microsoft Internet Chat (MIC) protocol.
Microsoft Chat version 2.1, which uses IRCX, Microsoft's proposed extensions to the standard IRC protocol. For more information on IRCX, see the Internet draft "Extensions to the Internet Relay Chat Protocol (IRCX)."

Easy Administration

Chat Service offers you a choice of three administration tools that you can use to perform various administration tasks. Choose the tool that best meets your needs:

Chat Service Manager. Uses Microsoft Management Console (MMC) to manage Chat Service from a computer on the same local area network. MMC is an administrative utility that you use to manage any application that provides a custom administrative component called a snap-in. Each snap-in allows you to configure and manage a specific service on a Windows NT server, such as Chat Service or Microsoft NNTP Service. Administrators can combine snap-ins to create a custom management tool.

To run Chat Service Manager, from the Start menu, choose Programs, choose Microsoft Exchange Chat Service, and then choose Chat Service Manager. For information on using Chat Service Manager to connect to remote chat servers, see Connecting to a Chat Server.
Chat Web Administrator. Uses Microsoft Internet Explorer version 4.01 or later, or Netscape version 4.0 or later to manage Chat Service from a chat server on the same local area network or on the Internet. The only requirement for using this tool is that the browser is installed on the administrator's computer.

To run the Chat Web Administrator on the local server, from the Start menu, choose Programs, choose Microsoft Exchange Chat Service, and then choose Chat Web Administrator. To run the Chat Web Administrator on a remote chat server, start the browser on the local server and go to the URL http://remote_server_name/chatadm.
Chatcmd. A command-line utility that allows you to manage a Chat Service configuration from a chat server. For a complete description of chatcmd and its command options, see Chatcmd.exe Command Line Utility.

Microsoft Windows NT Server Integration

Microsoft Exchange Chat Service takes advantage of standard Windows NT Server version 4.0 administration tools for performance monitoring and event reporting. When you install Chat Service, the Setup program installs a complete set of performance monitor counters. All Chat Service status and error messages are written to event logs that you can examine in Event Viewer.