Microsoft Comic Chat is now open source
Image: Primary Microsoft announced on 2026-07-16 the open-source release of Microsoft Comic Chat, a chat client that turned IRC conversations into comic panels.
The company said the source code is now available on GitHub for exploration, study, and experimentation. Microsoft described Comic Chat as a client that automatically converted Internet Relay Chat conversations into comic panels with illustrated characters, speech bubbles, and expressions, and helped introduce the Comic Sans font.
The software was conceived by David Kurlander in the Microsoft Research Virtual Worlds Group and developed starting in 1995. It was released in 1996 with Internet Explorer 3 and later bundled with Windows 98 in 24 languages. Microsoft said the release preserves a piece of software history and gives the community a chance to explore and build upon it.
Alongside original code snapshots, the company included AI-powered modernization attempts showing the 1990s C++ and MFC code building with current Visual Studio tools and running on modern Windows systems. Microsoft said these are worked examples rather than polished re-releases.
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