[MUD-Dev] Re: Prepositions and parsing

[clawrenc at cup.hp.com]

In <9705181718.80s6 at ami-cg.GraySage.Edmonton.AB.CA>, on 05/18/97 
   at 10:21 AM, cg at ami-cg.graysage.edmonton.ab.ca (Chris Gray) said:

>[Chris L:]

>:>That leaves what to do with ambiguous forms, and maybe just
>:>not allowing them is enough?
>:
>:Which is why I can't do this.

>OK, your requirements demand you allow that kind of complex input,
>and accept attempts at it from less-than-perfect English typers (most
>of us!) In previous notes we have discussed ways in which the
>computer can attempt to figure out what it was the player wanted it
>to do. This will likely often not be what the player intended the
>computer try to do. So, are you planning on supporting any general
>"undo" command? I do realise this is virtually impossible in a
>multi-player environment. The reason I ask is that I, as a player,
>would much rather have the computer refuse to do something
>potentially ambiguous, instead of going ahead without my confirmation
>and doing something that I had not intended it do. I would of course
>be happy with a system setting that told it my preference.

Not quite.  There are simple sides to the problem here:

  1) Statements which are not ambiguous 

  2) Statements which are grammatically ambiguous

  3) Statements which are ambiguous in the current MUD context

#3 is of course a subset of #2.

What I need to be able to do is to distinguish between #3 and #2, such
that I process #3 type statements as if they were unambiguous (which
they are contextually if not gramatically), and abort processing on
what is left of #2 type statements.

--
J C Lawrence                           Internet: claw at null.net
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