# Internet Relay Chat (IRC)
If IRC is your go-to for discussions and help on dev topics, there are several IRC channels on Freenode dedicated to IPFS, and it’s a great place for live chat:
- Use #ipfs on irc.freenode.org for general IPFS usage and community chat.
- Use #ipfs-dev on irc.freenode.org for discussing implementation details, especially if you are contributing code to IPFS.
# IRC and the forums
For longer-lived discussions and for support, please use the discussion forums at https://discuss.ipfs.io (opens new window) instead of IRC! It’s easy for complex discussions to get lost in a sea of new messages on IRC, and posting longer discussions and support requests on the forums help future visitors, too.
# Getting started with IRC
If you’re new to IRC, there are lots of mobile and desktop clients for working with it. Here are a few to get you started:
- IRCCloud (opens new window) on the web and desktop
- Textual (opens new window) or Adium (opens new window) on macOS
- mIRC (opens new window) or HexChat (opens new window) on Windows
- XChat (opens new window) or Irssi (opens new window) on Linux