I am using weechat now for all my IRC communication. With BitlBee server I am also proxying my Jabber, Twitter and Facebook communication to my weechat. Everything in one place and over ssh.

Weechat is awesome. I like it for its split screen feature, very nice default shortcuts and flexible configuration. To start with it I highly recommend its quick start guide and the user's guide then.

The most important keys are ALT+A (last activity cycle) and F5-F8 (window/buffer switches). There are many configuration options. I would suggest the "weechat.look.buffer_notify_default" setting to message not to flood your activity list and "/buffer notify highlight" on "talky" channels.

There are also many plugins from which I suggest notification and url plugins. The latter are shortening URLs which is very handy when you split vertically. My favourite aliases are:

ww => /away -all $1; /nick -all lzap-$1

When I go away, e.g. /ww lunch

bb => /away -all; /nick -all lzap

When I am back.

gkk => /query -server fn #katello

Go to katello channel on the freenode server. Etc.

Apart from internal IRC servers within our company you can reach me on FreeNode channels #katello, #pulp, #candlepin and #theforeman (nick "lzap"). I am idling on Jabber (both jabber.cz and google.com) and Facebook chat (lukas.zapletal) as well.

Weechat rocks.