doomemacs/modules/app/irc/README.org

#+TITLE: :app irc

This module turns adds an IRC client to Emacs ([[https://github.com/jorgenschaefer/circe][~circe~)]] with native notifications ([[https://github.com/eqyiel/circe-notifications][circe-notifications]]).

* Table of Contents :TOC:
- [[#dependencies][Dependencies]]
- [[#configure][Configure]]
  - [[#pass-the-unix-password-manager][Pass: the unix password manager]]
  - [[#emacs-auth-source-api][Emacs' auth-source API]]

* Dependencies
This module has no dependencies, besides =gnutls-cli= or =openssl= for secure connections.

* Configure
Use the ~:irc~ setting to configure IRC servers. Its second argument (a plist) takes the same arguments as ~circe-network-options~.

#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp :tangle no
(set! :irc "chat.freenode.net"
    `(:tls t
      :nick "doom"
      :sasl-username "myusername"
      :sasl-password "mypassword"
      :channels ("#emacs")))
#+END_SRC

*It is a obviously a bad idea to store auth-details in plaintext,* so here are some ways to avoid that:

** Pass: the unix password manager
[[https://www.passwordstore.org/][Pass]] is my tool of choice. I use it to manage my passwords. If you activate the [[/modules/tools/password-store/README.org][:tools password-store]] module you get an elisp API through which to access your password store.

~:irc~'s plist can use functions instead of strings. ~+pass-get-user~ and ~+pass-get-secret~ can help here:

#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp :tangle no
(set! :irc "chat.freenode.net"
    `(:tls t
      :nick "doom"
      :sasl-username ,(+pass-get-user   "irc/freenode.net")
      :sasl-password ,(+pass-get-secret "irc/freenode.net")
      :channels ("#emacs")))
#+END_SRC

But wait, there's more! This stores your password in a public variable which could be accessed or appear in backtraces. Not good! So we go a step further:

#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp :tangle no
(set! :irc "chat.freenode.net"
    `(:tls t
      :nick "doom"
      :sasl-username ,(+pass-get-user "irc/freenode.net")
      :sasl-password (lambda (&rest _) (+pass-get-secret "irc/freenode.net"))
      :channels ("#emacs")))
#+END_SRC

And you're good to go!

** Emacs' auth-source API
~auth-source~ is built into Emacs. As suggested [[https://github.com/jorgenschaefer/circe/wiki/Configuration#safer-password-management][in the circe wiki]], you can store (and retrieve) encrypted passwords with it.

#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp :tangle no
(setq auth-sources '("~/.authinfo.gpg"))

(defun my-fetch-password (&rest params)
  (require 'auth-source)
  (let ((match (car (apply #'auth-source-search params))))
    (if match
        (let ((secret (plist-get match :secret)))
          (if (functionp secret)
              (funcall secret)
            secret))
      (error "Password not found for %S" params))))

(defun my-nickserv-password (server)
  (my-fetch-password :user "forcer" :host "irc.freenode.net"))

(set! :irc "chat.freenode.net"
    '(:tls t
      :nick "doom"
      :sasl-password my-nickserver-password
      :channels ("#emacs")))
#+END_SRC