Windows Terminal Chat

A minimal chat room written in modern C++17 on top of Winsock 2 using socket programming and multi-threading. Everything runs in a Windows console and uses ANSI escape sequences for coloured nicknames.

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Quick Preview

Build

MinGW‑w64 / MSYS2

# Server
g++ -std=c++17 -Wall -pthread server.cpp -o server.exe -lws2_32

# Client
g++ -std=c++17 -Wall client.cpp -o client.exe -lws2_32

Run

1. Launch the server in one terminal:

   server.exe

2. Open additional terminals and start as many clients as you would like:

   client.exe

3. Type your messages and watch them pop up in chat. Type #exit to leave the chat

Files

• common.hpp - ANSI helpers and colour picker
• server.cpp - Multithreaded chat server (one thread per client)
• client.cpp - Lightweight terminal client