diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index 625c3f0..93233d9 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 /gobot
 *.[568]
 _obj/
+_test/
 *.swp
 *~
 *.out
diff --git a/irc/Makefile b/irc/Makefile
index 08e7382..813442c 100644
--- a/irc/Makefile
+++ b/irc/Makefile
@@ -7,8 +7,8 @@ include $(GOROOT)/src/Make.$(GOARCH)
 TARG=irc
 GOFILES=\
 	connection.go\
-    commands.go\
-    handlers.go\
-    nickchan.go
+	commands.go\
+	handlers.go\
+	nickchan.go
 
 include $(GOROOT)/src/Make.pkg
diff --git a/irc/irc_test.go b/irc/irc_test.go
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..eba9ca6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/irc/irc_test.go
@@ -0,0 +1,15 @@
+package irc
+
+import (
+	"testing"
+)
+
+// Not really sure what or how to test something that basically requires a
+// connection to an IRC server to function, but we need some tests or when this
+// is present in the go package tree builds fail hard :-(
+func TestIRC(t *testing.T) {
+	if c := New("test", "test", "Testing IRC"); c == nil {
+		t.FailNow()
+	}
+}
+