[MUD-Dev] Event handling (was: request for comments)

[JC Lawrence]

On Fri, 9 Jan 1998 15:00:37 PST8PDT 
Vadim Tkachenko<vadimt at 4cs.com> wrote:

> But once again, I emphasize, the difference is between treating
> everything as EVENTS and PROCESSES.

Note: "event" is actually a very poor term for what we are describing
here.  They really aren't events, but I'm unsure of a better name for
them.  

What is the difference between your model of a "process", and a paced
series of events such as one that:

  1) Dig portion of Panama Canal
  2) Log new event to dig portion of Panama Canal in X time.
  3) Exit

Where little tiny events are chained thru time to create the apparency
of an ongoing process?  (You could consider each #1 above as say the
moving of one shovel of dirt).
  
> No, as a process - even in case when, say, your limb got cut off -
> there's an open wound, which may not kill you immediately, but,
> nevertheless, real soon unless you move your ...

Certainly.  You create an event chain (as above) which iteratively saps
the character's strength and vitality.  Should that process happen to
kill the character (strength == 0?) then this will be noticed by the
normal methods of the character object (probably in the accessor for
the strength attribute) and processed from there.

--
J C Lawrence                               Internet: claw at null.net
                                           Internet: coder at ibm.net
----------(*)                        Internet: jc.lawrence at sun.com
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