[MUD-Dev] Current Projects

[David Bennett]

Morning,

Alex Stewart wrote:
>  * What kind of software are you working on? (MUD driver, MUD client
etc?)

MUD world I guess.  I run Discworld mud, based on the Discworld books for
Terry Pratchett.  I initialy started it in late 1991.  It runs currently
using Mudos and I started on the very earliest released version of lpmud
3.0.  I started writing my own mud because I was very disappointed in the
architechture and design of most (free) muds I had seen out there, once I
opened up the lid anyway.  I decided on using an lpmud because I liked the
dynamic updating features it had to offer.

http://discworld.imaginary.com

>  * Why?
>  * What are its features?

Many and varied, Discworld is now a relatively successful mud and we have
survived many things.  Including a few deliberate sabotage attempts and
loosing a place to actually run the mud for up to 3 or 4 months at a time.
Now we own the machine we run on and everything is a lot happier :)

I would say the main features of Discworld is a surprisingly unmangled
object heirachy (considering the amount of time we have been running), a
consistant world theme and some quite nice output post processing.

>  * What does it do (will it do) differently than other things do?
>  * Any neat concepts involved?
>  * Any boring concepts being used in neat ways?

I was surprised by how effective fairly simple post processing of output
text could be.  Discworld handles output messages with specific trigger
sequences in them to allow messages to be printed in a neater fashion.  For
example, two messages of: 'Frog waves to Bing.'  and 'Gumboot waves to
Bing.'
Would end up being post processed and be seen as: 'Frog and Gumboot wave to
Bing.'  Also can get messages like: 'Frog and Gumboot wave to Green and
Blue.'

This does mean that all messages seen in the game are up to two seconds
delayed, but people do not appear to notice this much.  The messages which
are printed in response to commands and forced to be printed on the spot,
so it is only distant messages that get potentialy delayed and therefor it
is not
as noticable.

I have not seen any other places which do this sort of post processing?  I
could be wrong though :)  I did it initally to handle the problems with:
   Frog leaves west.
   Gumboot leaves west. 
   Hairy blob leaves west.

Which can be pretty spammy if following someone.
   Frog, Gumboot and Hairy blob leaves west.
is much neater :)

I am also currently working on an online mud magazine, which I have done
one issue of so far.  The second one is due out in two days, so I am
feverishly finishing it all off.
http://www.imaginary.com/ImaginaryRealities

May your days be long and ice cream filled,
David.