[MUD-Dev] Re: Graphic design, client questions

[Caliban Tiresias Darklock]

-----Original Message-----
From: Jo Dillon <emily at thelonious.new.ox.ac.uk>
To: mud-dev at kanga.nu <mud-dev at kanga.nu>
Date: Thursday, December 17, 1998 10:03 AM
Subject: [MUD-Dev] Re: Graphic design, client questions


>Caliban Tiresias Darklock (caliban at darklock.com) spake thusly:
>>
>> Not really. HTTP is run over a telnet connection. (Really, it is. So is
FTP.
>> So is IRC. Damn near every major protocol on the 'net is founded on
telnet.
>> Telnet *is* the internet.)
>
>  Hmm. a) surely you mean TCP/IP? Telnet is a protocol on top of TCP/IP;
>it just so happens that you can use a telnet client to talk to ftp,
>http and so forth servers, but that doesn't mean they really speak telnet.

They don't speak the options, certainly, but they do run over a telnet
connection. While I have not read *all* of the RFCs in question, and don't
feel like looking them up to confirm exactly where and what they explicitly
say, many of them (I am tempted to say all, but I have to admit the
possibility that one or more of them does not explicitly say this) actually
say up front that they are constructed over a telnet connection -- with all
the IAC negotiation that implies.

Conversely, most MUD servers and clients say they run on telnet when they
don't. They shit little green apples if you try to negotiate options, when
they OUGHT to at least deny the request.

So basically, what I'm saying is that a lot of things that are running on
telnet connections don't say they are, and a lot of things that aren't do. I
*know* FTP and IRC say "telnet" right in the RFC. I am reasonably sure HTTP
does, as well, but I haven't been able to find it in a vgrep.

>b) What about the bits of the net that talk UDP? NFS, Sun RPC (which
>NFS is based on) and so forth?


They're certainly significant, but they're still just bits. ;)

Seriously, boiling the internet down to one protocol is an exercise in
futility. There are always significant parts which don't fit into that
reduction. This is one of them. We certainly can't just chuck UDP out the
window, but we can rather safely ignore it in many cases. Not all. Certainly
not all.

>> Most clients operate in line mode, or even multiple line mode. Using "raw
>> telnet" is considered a rough equivalent to the tortures of hell by most
MUD
>> players.
>
>  Of course, the Windows 95 Telnet client only does character mode (at
least
>as far as I can discern)...

Yep, that's true. Typing "telnet" at the prompt of just about any major
operating system gets you a raw character mode connection until you specify
otherwise; on UNIX systems, this is usually an option, while on Windows you
have to go get a better client. Nobody has ever accused Windows of having
really cool built-in apps. According to the DOJ, if Windows *had* really
cool built-in apps, that would be an anti-competitive practice anyway.

>  Why not write a cross-platform client in something like wxWindows?

I am not a fan of cross-platform, but this is basically prejudice. A user
interface guru once said that if you want a Windows app, build a Windows
app, and Windows users will like it. If you want a Mac app, build a Mac app,
and Mac users will like it. If you try to do both at once, you will really
not be doing either, and it will just make both groups unhappy.

Adobe has sort of blown this argument away with PhotoShop (which looks and
acts very much the same on both Windows and Mac platforms), but there are
other considerations there which MUD developers can't normally take
advantage of. Like a tremendous installed base of users who *want* the exact
same thing on all platforms, the distinction of being THE household name of
the industry, and a lot of users who never use any other application in the
first place.

>  Java is /easier/ to set up as an applet.

But you have to set it up *every* time, because you never know if the user
has set it up before. You could use a cookie, but cookies are supposed to be
Bad for some reason which always escapes me. And besides, users can refuse
or delete or modify cookies. ;)

I'm tempted to get into a language war here, because I absolutely hate Java.
But instead, I'll allow that it may not be a *total* piece of garbage -- I
just don't find that it suits my needs, ever. As a developer, as a user, it
doesn't matter. Java has never been a reliable or acceptable solution for a
native app in my experience. YMMV.

| Caliban Tiresias Darklock            caliban at darklock.com
| Darklock Communications          http://www.darklock.com/
| U L T I M A T E   U N I V E R S E   I S   N O T   D E A D
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