Intro
Welcome to Redbrick!
This is a brief introduction to some of the more common services available to you now that you have a Redbrick account. For more detailed tutorials on the services mentioned, simply follow the links provided, or visit the Helpdesk page!
Chat
One of the most common ways for Redbrick members to stay in touch is through Chat, or IRC (Internet Relay Chat). IRC basically lets you chat with a lot of different people at the same time.
To begin using chat, simply type 'chat' into your terminal. There are lots of different chatrooms, or "channels" on Redbrick, the default one being #lobby. There is also a WebChat client available, so you can talk to your friends on Redbrick through your browser. www.redbrick.dcu.ie/chat/
You can get more info about chat and its different commands and features by visiting the IRC page.
When you join Redbrick, you get your own email account, your address being <username>@redbrick.dcu.ie.
By default, your mail will be forwarded to your DCU account, so that you won't miss any mails. To turn this off, type "noforward" in your terminal.
Redbrick has a variety of different ways in which you can read and send mail. By typing "email" in your terminal, you can use the Mutt client to check your mail, but there are also two clients available if you'd prefer to read email in your browser.
Redbrick now has two Web-based email clients, SquirrelMail and RoundCube. These can be accessed by pointing your browser at webmail.redbrick.dcu.ie.
Newsgroups
The Redbrick Newsgroups (the boards) are a place for our members to exchange views, seek help or generally rant about anything they want. The default news reader on Redbrick is called slrn. To start it simply type "news" or "slrn" into your terminal. With slrn you can read and post to all of the Redbrick Newsgroups plus some Intersocs Newsgroups.
The boards can also be read using Thunderbird.
Redbrick Software
RedBrick has a vast array of software installed on the system that was written by our members. As you gain more experience using your account, you will come across a lot of the programs out there.
One of the most used of these programs is rbusers. If you type "rbusers" into your terminal, you will see a list of users currently logged on. Hey is a way for Redbrick users to send instant messages to each other's terminals. Heys are heavily customisable and there are lots of different ways to use it. See the tutorial for more information. The list of user written software is endless and you will come across loads of them on your travels.
Unix
Redbrick's operating system of choice is UNIX. Our primary server, (murphy), is running the Ubuntu Linux operating system and our secondary server runs Debian (carbon and deathray). In the Windows point and click world, don't let a command line usage put you off. Once you get comfortable you'll be amazed how much you can accomplish in a command line Unix environment. A standard user only need a very basic knowledge to gain usage from their Redbrick account. For a starting point and a guide to some of the more common commands, see the introduction to Unix.
More
For a list of the main features at any time, type "help" into your terminal. Remember that you can always ask the Redbrick Helpdesk questions if you have any problems or need assistance. Once you are comfortable with the general setup of your account and the system take a look at the other tutorials to learn a little more and improve your use of Redbrick.
Good luck, and enjoy your Redbrick experience!