Hi Family, Come chat with your fellow Cook list cousins! It's every Sunday from 2 to 4 p.m.Central Time. It matters not what server you are on or where you live in the world. Instructions are below to show you how to get into our chat room or any other genealogy chat room on IRC. Ellie IRC is Internet Relay Chat = It is a system of talking to people in "real time". You type to each other on a screen where everybody that is on the channel can see all the stuff typed.. mIRC is an IRC browser just like Netscape or Explorer, only it is for "chatting". IRC.ROOTSWEB.COM is the name of the server where the IIGS (International Internet Genealogy Society) chats. The port number is part of the server info. All channels start with a # sign.The channel you want is #cooksearchers. Here is total info: In order to get to chat you need to first have an IRC browser. You can obtain a good one from http://www.mirc.com (its shareware). After installing it, when you access it you will come up with a window showing irc servers. You need to add the server, irc.rootsweb.com, on port 6667. Then click on "CONNECT TO SERVER". A new window will open and you'll have to wait about a minute for the connection to take. After you get the welcome message (that you're connected), type "/list" (without the quotes) and hit enter. You will be presented with a new window showing all the open channels on that server. Double click on #cooksearchers and you'll be joining it. If you select #genealogy channel, you'll get some chat help from all the friendly people there. If no channels are showing, it means none are open - try again later. Or, if you're opening the channel, just type /open #cooksearchers and you'll have started the channel. For a schedule of all the different iigs irc meetings, check out: http://www.iigs.org/cgi/ircthemes/ircthemes You'll be suprised at the variety of chats available to you.