sharp-chat/Protocol.md

Sock Chat Protocol Information

The protocol operates on a websocket in text mode. Messages sent between the client and server are a series of concatenated strings delimited by the vertical tab character, represented in most languages by the escape sequence \t and defined in ASCII as 0x09. The first string in this concatenation must be the packet identifier, sent as an integer. The packet identifiers are as follows.

Some instructions are specific to newer revisions of the protocol and some instructions behave differently in newer revisions, all versions are documented but it is recommended you use the latest one. If a packet is marked as deprecated and you only aim to implement the latest version, you may omit it in your implementation as it will never be sent.

The current stable version of the protocol is Version 1.

Client

These are the packets sent from the client to the server.

Packet 0: Ping

Used to prevent the client from closing the session due to inactivity.

Version 1
int	User ID

Packet 1: Authentication

Takes a variable number of parameters that are fed into the authentication script associated with the chat.

Version 1
...any	Any amount of data required to complete authentication

Packet 2: Message

Informs the server that the user has sent a message.

Required commands for Version 1 are described lower in the document.

Version 1
int	User ID
...string	Message text, additional packet parameters should be glued on the server using \t

Server

These are the packets sent from the server to the client.

Packet 0: Pong

Response to client packet 0: Ping.

Version 1
string	The literal string pong

Packet 1: Join/Auth

While authenticated this packet indicates that a new user has joined the server/channel. Before authentication this packet serves as a response to client packet 1: Authentication.

Successful authentication response

Informs the client that authentication has succeeded.

Version 1
string	Literal string y for yes
int	Session User ID
string	Username
string	CSS username color
permissions (string)	User permissions, documented below
string	Default channel the user will join following this packet

Failed authentication response

Informs the client that authentication has failed.

Version 1
string	Literal string n for no
string	Reason for failure. authfail: Authentication data is invalid. userfail: Username in use. sockfail: A connection has already been started (used to cap maximum connections to 5 in SharpChat). joinfail: User attempting to authenticate is banned.
int	If joinfail; A timestamp (documented below) indicating the length of the ban

User joining

Informs the client that a user has joined.

Version 1
int	Timestamp, documented below of when the user joined
int	User ID
string	Username
string	CSS username color
permissions (string)	User permissions, documented below
int	Sequence ID

Packet 2: Chat message

Informs the client that a chat message has been received.

Version 1
int	Timestamp, documented below of when the message was received by the server
int	User ID. If -1 this message is an informational message from the server and the next field takes on a special form.
string	Message, sanitised by the server If this is an informational message this field is formatted as follows and concatenated by the form feed character \f, respresented in ASCII by 0x0C. Bot message formats are described lower in the document. int Message type. 0 for a normal informational message. 1 for an error. string An id of a string in the legacy language files. ...string Any number of parameters used to format the language string.
int	Sequence ID
message flags	Message flags, documented below

Packet 3: User disconnect

Informs the client that a user has disconnected.

Version 1
int	User ID
string	Username
string	One of four disconnect reasons. leave: The user gracefully left, e.g. "x logged out". timeout: The user lost connection unexpectedly, e.g. "x timed out". kick: The user has been kicked, e.g. "x has been kicked". flood: The user has been kicked for exceeding the flood protection limit, e.g. "x has been kicked for spam".
int	Timestamp, documented below of when the user disconnected
int	Sequence ID

Packet 4: Channel event

This packet informs the user about channel related updates. The only consistent parameter across sub-packets is the first one described as follows.

Version 1
int	Channel information update event ID. 0: A channel has been created. 1: A channel has been updated. 2: A channel has been deleted.

Sub-packet 0: Channel creation

Informs the client that a channel has been created.

Version 1
string	The name of the new channel
bool	Indicates whether the channel is password protected
bool	Indicates whether the channel is temporary, meaning the channel will be deleted after the last person departs

Sub-packet 1: Channel update

Informs the client that details of a channel has changed.

Version 1
string	The old/current name of the channel
string	The new name of the channel
bool	Indicates whether the channel is password protected
bool	Indicates whether the channel is temporary, meaning the channel will be deleted after the last person departs

Sub-packet 2: Channel deletion

Informs the client that a channel has been deleted

Version 1
string	The name of the channel that has been deleted

Packet 5: Channel switching

This packet informs the client about channel switching.

Version 1
int	Channel information update event ID. 0: A user joined the channel. Sent to all users in said channel. 1: A user left the channel. Sent to all users in said channel. 2: The client is to forcibly join a channel.

Sub-packet 0: Channel join

Informs the client that a user has joined the channel.

Version 1
int	User ID
string	Username
string	CSS username color
int	Sequence ID

Sub-packet 1: Channel departure

Informs the client that a user has left the channel.

Version 1
int	User ID
int	Sequence ID

Sub-packet 2: Forced channel switch

Informs the client that it has been forcibly switched to a different channel.

Version 1
string	The name of the channel that the user has been switched to

Packet 6: Message deletion

Informs the client that a message has been deleted.

Version 1
int	Sequence ID of the deleted message

Packet 7: Context information

Informs the client about the context of a channel before the client was present.

Version 1
int	Context event ID. 0: Users present in the current channel. 1: A message already in the channel, occurs more than once per channel. 2: Channels on the server.

Sub-packet 0: Existing users

Informs the client about users already present in the channel.

Version 1
int	Amount of users present in the channel
Context User	An amount of repetitions of this object based on the number in the previous param, the object is described below

Context User object

Version 1
int	User ID
string	Username
string	CSS username color
permissions (string)	User permissions, documented below
bool	Whether the user should be visible in the users list

Sub-packet 1: Existing message

Informs the client about an existing message in a channel.

Version 1
int	Timestamp, documented below
int	User ID
string	Username
string	CSS username color
permissions (string)	User permissions, documented below
string	Message text, functions the same as described in Packet 2: Chat message
int	Sequence ID
bool	Whether the client should notify the user about this message
message flags	Message flags, documented below

Sub-packet 2: Channels

Informs the client about the channels on the server.

Version 1
int	Amount of channels on the channel
Context Channel	An amount of repetitions of this object based on the number in the previous param, the object is described below

Context Channel object

Version 1
string	Channel name
bool	Indicates whether the channel is password protected
bool	Indicates whether the channel is temporary, meaning the channel will be deleted after the last person departs

Packet 8: Context clearing

Informs the client that the context has been cleared.

Version 1
int	Number indicating what has been cleared. 0: The message list has been cleared. 1: The user list has been cleared. 2: The channel list has been cleared. 3: Both the message and user listing have been cleared. 4: The message, user and channel listing have all been cleared.

Packet 9: Forced disconnect

Informs the client that they have either been banned or kicked from the server.

Version 1
bool	0: The client has been kicked, can reconnect immediately. 1: The client has been banned, can reconnect after the timestamp (documented below) in the next param has expired.
int	A timestamp (documented below) containing the ban expiration date and time

Packet 10: User update

Informs that another user's details have been updated.

Version 1
int	User ID of the affected user
string	New username
string	New CSS username color
permissions (string)	User permissions, documented below

Timestamps

Timestamps in Sock Chat are seconds elapsed since a certain date. Under Sock Chat V1 timestamps are regular Unix Epoch timestamps where 0 is 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC.

User Permission String

The User Permission String consists out of five (5) parts concatenated by a space operator, indentified in most languages as the escape sequence and defined as the ASCII character 0x20. In the original specification it appeared as if custom permission flags were possible, these have always gone completely unused and should thus be avoided. The parts are as follows:

• An integer indicating the hierarchy of the user, this is used to determine whether a user has access to certain channels or is able to act out moderator actions upon certain users (lower can't affect higher).
• A boolean indicating whether the user has the ability to kick people.
• A boolean indicating whether the user has access to the logs, this should be zero unless the client has direct access to the message history without a connection the actual chat.
• A boolean indicating whether the user is able to change their nick/display name.
• An integer ranging from 0 to 2 indicating whether the user can create channels
  • 0: User cannot create channels.
  • 1: User can create channels, but only temporary ones. These usually disappear after the last user left.
  • 2: User can create permanent channels.

Message Flags

The Message Flags alter how a message should be displayed to the client, these are all boolean values. I'm not entirely sure if these allowed for custom flags, but much like the custom flags in the User Permission String, these have gone unused and should thus, also, be avoided. The parts are as follows:

• Username should appear using a bold font.
• Username should appear using a cursive font.
• Username should appear underlined.
• A colon : should be displayed between the username and the message.
• The message was sent privately, directly to the current user.

As an example, the most common message flagset is 10010.

Bot Messages

Formatting IDs sent by user -1 in Version 1 of the protocol.

Informational
String	Description	Arguments
say	Just echoes the arguments in a message.	The message.
silence	Informs the client that they have been silenced.
unsil	Informs the client that they are no longer silenced.
silok	Informs the client that they have successfully silenced another user.	The username of the silenced user.
usilok	Informs the client that they have successfully removed the silencing from another user.	The username of the unsilenced user.
flwarn	Informs the client that they are risking being kicking for flood protection (spam).
unban	Informs the client that they have successfully removed the ban from a user or ip address.
banlist	Provides a list with banned users and IP addresses.	Sets of "<a href="javascript:void(0);" onclick="Chat.SendMessageWrapper('/unban '+ this.innerHTML);">{0}</a>" where {0} is the username of the banned user or the banned IP address. The set is separated by ", "
who	Provides a list of users currently online.	Sets of "<a href="javascript:void(0);" onclick="UI.InsertChatText(this.innerHTML);">{0}</a>" where {0} is the username of a user. The current online user is highlighted with " style="font-weight: bold;"" before the closing > of the opening <a> tag. The set is separated by ", "
whochan	Provides a list of users currently online in a specific channel.	Sets of "<a href="javascript:void(0);" onclick="UI.InsertChatText(this.innerHTML);">{0}</a>" where {0} is the username of a user. The current online user is highlighted with " style="font-weight: bold;"" before the closing > of the opening <a> tag. The set is separated by ", "
join	Informs the client that a user connected with the server.	The username of said user.
jchan	Informs the client that a user moved into the channel.	The username of said user.
leave	Informs the client that a user disconnected from the server.	The username of said user.
lchan	Informs the client that a user moved out of the channel.	The username of said user.
kick	Informs the client that a user has disconnect because they got kicked.	The username of said user.
flood	Informs the client that a user has disconnect because they got kicked for flood protection.	The username of said user.
nick	Informs the client that a user has changed their nickname.	The first argument is the previous username of said user, the second argument is their new username.
crchan	Informs the client that they have successfully created a channel.	The name of the channel.
delchan	Informs the client that they have successfully deleted a channel.	The name of the channel.
cpwdchan	Informs the client that they have successfully changed the password of the channel.
cprivchan	Informs the client that they have successfully changed the hierarchy level required for the channel.
ipaddr	Shows the IP address of another user.	First argument is the username, second argument is the IP address.
Error
String	Description	Arguments
generr	Generic fallback error.
silerr	Informs the client that the user they tried to silence had already been silenced.
usilerr	Informs the client that the user whose silence they tried to revoke hasn't been silenced.
silperr	Informs the client that they are not allowed to silence that user.
usilperr	Informs the client that they are not allowed to remove the silence from that user.
silself	Informs the client that they cannot silence themselves.
delerr	Informs the client that they are not allowed to delete a message.
notban	Informs the client that a username or IP address is not banned.	The provided username or IP address.
whoerr	Informs the client that they do not have access to the channel they specified for the /who command.	The provided channel name.
cmdna	Tells the client they're not allowed to use a command.	First argument is the name of the command.
nocmd	Tells the client the command they tried to run does not exist.	First argument is the name of the command.
cmderr	Tells the client that they formatted the last command incorrectly.
usernf	Tells the client that the user they requested was not found on the server.	The requested username.
kickna	Tells the client that they are not allowed to kick a given user.	Username of the user they tried to kick.
samechan	Tells the client that they are already in the channel they are trying to switch to.	The name of the channel.
ipchan	Tells the client that they aren't allowed to switch to the provided channel.	The name of the channel.
nochan	Tells the client that the channel they tried to switch to does not exist.	The name of the channel.
nopwchan	Tells the client that the channel they tried to switch to requires a password.	The name of the channel.
ipwchan	Tells the client that the password to tried to switch to the channel to was invalid.	The name of the channel.
inchan	Informs the client that the channel name contained invalid characters.
nischan	Tells the client that a channel with that name already exists.	The name of the channel.
ndchan	Tells the client that they're not allowed to delete that channel.	The name of the channel.
namchan	Tells the client that they're not allowed to edit that channel.	The name of the channel.
nameinuse	Tells the client that the nickname they tried to use is already being used by someone else.	The name.
rankerr	Tells the client that they're not allowed to do something to a user because they have a higher hierarchy than them.

Commands

Actions sent through messages prefixed with / in Version 1 of the protocol. Arguments are described as [name], optional arguments as [name?].

Name	Action	Expected bot messages
/afk [reason?]	Marks the current user as afk, the first 5 characters from the user string are prefixed uppercase to the current username prefixed by &lt; and suffixed by &gt;_ resulting in a username that looks like <AWAY>_flash if /afk away is ran by the user flash. If no reason is specified "AFK" is used.
/nick [name?]	Temporarily changes the user's nickname prefixed with ~. If the user's original name or no argument at all is specified the command returns the user's name to its original state without the prefix.	cmdna: Not allowed to change own nickname. nameinuse: Someone else is using the username. nick: Username has changed.
/msg [username] [message] /whisper [username] [message]	Sends a private message to another user.	cmderr: Missing username and/or message arguments. usernf: User not found.
/me [message] /action [message]	Sends a message but with flags 11000 instead of the regular 10010, used to describe an action.
/who [channel?]	If no argument is specified it'll return all users on the server, if a channel is specified it'll return all users in that channel.	nochan: The given channel does not exist. whoerr: The user does not have access to the channel. whochan: Listing of users in a channel. who: Listing of users.
/delete [channel name or message id]	If the argument is entirely numeric this function acts as an alias for /delmsg, otherwise /delchan.
/join [channel] [password?]	Switches the current user to a different channel.	nochan: The given channel does not exist. ipchan: The user does not have access to the channel. ipwchan: The provided password was invalid. nopwchan: A password is required to enter the given channel.
/create [hierarchy?] [name]	Creates a new channel.	cmdna: Not allowed to create channels. cmderr: Command isn't formatted correctly. rankerr: Tried to set channel hierarchy higher than own. inchan: Given name contained invalid characters. nischan: A channel with the given name already exists. crchan: Successfully created channel.
/delchan [name]	Deletes an existing channel.	cmderr: Command isn't formatted correctly. nochan: No channel with the given name exists. ndchan: Not allowed to delete this channel. delchan: Deleted channel.
/password [password?] /pwd [password?]	Changes the password for a channel. Specify no argument to remove the password.	cmdna: Not allowed to change the password. cpwdchan: Success.
/privilege [hierarchy] /rank [hierarchy] /priv [hierarchy]	Changes what user hierarchy is required to enter a channel.	cmdna: Not allowed to change hierarchy. rankerr: Missing rank argument or trying to set hierarchy to one higher than their own. cprivchan: Success.
/say [message]	Broadcasts a message as the server to all users in all channels.	cmdna: Not allowed to broadcast. say: Broadcast message.
/delmsg [message id]	Deletes a message.	cmdna: Not allowed to delete messages. cmderr: Invalid arguments. delerr: The message does not exist, or the user's hierarchy is lower than the sender.
/kick [user] [time?]	Kicks a user from the server. If no time is specified the kick expires immediately.	cmdna: Not allowed to kick users. usernf: User not found. kickna: Sender is trying to kick themselves, someone with a higher hierarchy or someone that's already banned. cmderr: Provided time is invalid.
/ban [user] [time?]	Kicks a user and IP address from the server. If no time is specified the kick will never expire.	cmdna: Not allowed to kick users. usernf: User not found. kickna: Sender is trying to kick themselves, someone with a higher hierarchy or someone that's already banned. cmderr: Provided time is invalid.
/unban [user] /pardon [user]	Revokes the ban of a user.	cmdna: Not allowed to revoke user bans. notban: User is not banned. unban: Success.
/unbanip [user] /pardonip [user]	Revokes the ban of an ip address.	cmdna: Not allowed to revoke ip bans. notban: IP address is not banned. unban: Success.
/bans /banned	Retrieves the list of banned users and ip addresses.	cmdna: Not allowed to revoke ip bans. banlist: List of bans.
/silence [username] [time?]	Silences a user. If the time argument is not specified the silence is indefinite.	cmdna: Not allowed to silence users. usernf: User not found. silself: Tried to silence self. silperr: Tried to silence user of higher hierarchy. silerr: User is already silenced. cmderr: Time isn't formatted correctly. silence: Informs the user they have been silenced. silok: Tells the sender that the user has been silenced.
/unsilence [username]	Revokes a silence.	cmdna: Not allowed to revoke silences. usernf: User not found. usilperr: Tried to revoke silence of user of higher hierarchy. usilerr: User isn't silenced. unsil: Informs the user that their silence has been revoked. usilok: Tells the sender that the user's silence has been revoked.
/ip [username] /whois [username]	Gets a user's IP address.	cmdna: Not allowed to view IP addresses. usernf: User not found. ipaddr: IP address of user.