[MUD-Dev] Text Parsing

[Ben Greear]

Chris Gray wrote:
> 
> [Ben Greear:]
> 
> [My second follow-up to this message, after another few hours of thought.]
> 
> > For instance, which of these would you chose to type:
> > get the sword from the second bag
> > get sword 2.bag
> > ge sw 2.bag
> 
> I don't think I really like the second form, since it does't allow me to
> type the "from". It would probably be fine if it just skipped it,
> as long as it doesn't get upset if I put it in. The reason I want to be
> able to put it in is that I am used to using it in natural speech. In fact,
> if I say to someone "get the sword", and they don't know what sword I'm
> talking about, I'll likely say "get the sword *from the bag*", stressing
> the "from the bag". Not being able to do that in the game would be
> an annoyance.

Perhaps.  However, a text based game is inherrently not real, and interfacing
with it is no where near the same as interfacing with another human or any
other entity.  I assume outright that a new paradigm must be learnt by the
players.  An oft quoted phrase is, 'Optimize for the common case.'  Since
when entering a command to the server, all you really want to do is convey
an action, what does grammar, or any other rule imposed from our outside
communications, really add to the interface?

Look at the verbage in the commands.  Consider typing skills, and see which
one looks more efficient or more understandable.  I agree that the second 
and third might take some getting used to...but I think a competent human
could pick up the syntax in 5-10 minutes of useful help pages or discourse
with another player...

> The use of the object indices here is another issue. Having them available
> for disambiguation is good, but I much prefer adjectives. Again, in real
> life, if I had a pair of swords in a bag, and told someone
> "get the second sword from the bag", they wouldn't know which one I meant,
> since the positions are not clear. Instead, I would describe the sword
> using adjectives (e.g. the rusty one). Not being able to do that in the
> game would also be annoying, simply because it is the natural thing an
> English speaker would do.

How do you know all the keywords for a given object (how do you know,
as the programmer, which is rusty?)  When you start depending too heavily
on correctly built worlds/objects, you are liable to get into situations
where an innocent mistake in building makes it almost impossible to interact
with an entity.


--
Ben Greear (greear at cyberhighway.net)  http://www.primenet.com/~greear 
Author of ScryMUD:  mud.primenet.com 4444        (Released under GPL)
http://www.primenet.com/~greear/ScryMUD/scry.html


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