Just a bit of musing

[Jon A. Lambert]

> Ok, so if a particular RPG running under the server doesn't have combat,
> then the various displays you talked about relating to combat status would
> not be present? Is this done by sending a Java program to the client, so
> that it controls what is in the display, and that program will vary
> depending on the needs of the RPG? Or, can all you need be done with
> straight push's and fetch's, without needed code in the client?

I mean RPG in the style of the commercially available paper & pencil variety
games.  I have yet to encounter one that did not have a combat system.
This type of display would be suitable for AD&D, Rolemaster, Warhammer,
Rifts, Battletech, StarTrek, Vampyre, Werewolf, T&T, Gurps, Wraith, 
The Morrow Project, Legacy, Champions, High Fantasy, CyberPunk,
and C&S to name a just a few. =)
Actually the player display and metered controls could be used in a non
combat environment.  I don't see anything in the display that precludes it.
The metered controls are not hardwired. They could represent anything the
mud wished to provide and in any order (eg. hit pts, gold, mana, wizard pts,
RP points, fame points, hunger, logon time, storage used, etc.)
The character line drawing kind of assumes the player has a body that they
can adorn with various items, descriptive text, etc.

Yes the program sent to the client handles all the display and is configurable
by the mud "contextually" and fetchs needed are to load the client and its controls.  
Typically this is only done once.

> 
> Sounds do-able, but you're gonna have trouble with security firewalls!
> 
> With a custom MUD protocol, the players only have to convice the sysadmin
> to allow that port through. Lots of folks are disallowing Java through
> firewalls. Also, aren't some systems now disallowing a script in the
> browser from making any other network connections? Some allow back to
> the same address the page came from, however. If you're aiming for home
> PC's running Internet Explorer, then it probably doesn't matter, unless
> the individual user is cautious and doesn't allow ActiveX (is that the
> right name?) programs to run locally. I know I wouldn't, unless I could
> physically write-protect my hard-drive! (But then, I'm known to be
> paranoid about such things!)

No I won't.  Some users will.  That is their loss I guess.  I should point 
out that there are millions of "browser only" users out there.  Almost every 
other page you hit these days seems to contain some flavor of Java, ActiveX
or what not.  If people weren't accepting this, I doubt anyone would be writing it. 
I am also working on a remote builder/program editor in a similar vein.  I do
have some security concerns on my end.
Nothing that can't be overcome though :-)