When comparing HydraIRC vs Kiwi IRC, the Slant community recommends HydraIRC for most people. In the question“What are the best IRC clients for Windows?” HydraIRC is ranked 13th while Kiwi IRC is ranked 17th. The most important reason people chose HydraIRC is:
Source code available [here](http://svn.hydrairc.com/hydrairc/).
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Free and open source
Source code available here.
Pro Functionality can be extended via plugins
Pro Good identity manager
Pro Feature rich
Pro Beautiful interface
Kiwi's default interface is aesthetically modern, while keeping a classic two-column layout with chat window on the left and nicklist on the right. Unlike many other interfaces, a considerable amount of effort has been spent on making it easy on the eyes.
The interface offers common customization options including time format changes, choice of system messages and choice of laying out channels in a tabbed or list manner.
Pro Free and open source
Kiwi IRC web client is available for free licensed under GPL with source available on GitHub.
Pro Embeddable
Code can be generated that allows embedding the IRC client within a website.
Pro Available in multiple languages
Kiwi's front-end is available in more than 20 languages including Polish, Romanian and Russian.
Cons
Con Development stopped
Latest version of HydraIRC was released in 2008.
Con No scripting support
Con Notifications don't time out
Notifications pop-ups have to be closed manually each time, they don't disappear on their own after a set amount of time.