I’m attempting to fluff up Inform’s ability to interact with npc’s by adding
some new verbs. Specifically, ‘hello’ now causes a VagueGreet action that
will address itself to any character who is in scope (there’s never more
than one in scope … at least not for now).

Here’s the problem: If the player uses the following syntax–

>hello, steve

–Inform thinks this is a list of commands. That is, ‘steve’ is interpreted
as a new action to be performed after VagueGreet, rather than as a noun. The
result is that the player gets to say hello to whoever is in scope, after
which Inform protests, "That’s not a verb I recognise."

I’ve tried adding a grammar line like this:

   * ‘,’ creature        ->Greet

…but it doesn’t work with ‘,’ or with ‘,//’ or with ",". That grammar line
is never matched, as far as I can see. Quite possibly the parser separates
out the chunks that are separated by commas BEFORE it consults the verb
grammar, thus preventing a match.

I don’t mind too much if the name of the character is just discarded. If the
user types ‘hello, sailor’ when in the presence of Pope Benedict XIII, she
can take the result and like it. But I need to suppress the error message
(and without printing a newline).

Suggestions welcome.

–Jim Aikin

okay, i can’t remember this.  i have definitely been away for too long.
 where is the object class in the 6/11 library?

-Zach

I was just wondering about the best way to cater to blind IF players when
you want to include a "map" command in an IF game (which would normally
print some ASCII text of the area explored so far).

Maybe a verbal equivalent would work — or is this too tricky ? It would be
in interesting programming challenge to make it readable, anyway. Here is an
attempt:

You are in a small, round chamber with exits to the north, south and east.
North of here is the Green Room, with exits to the east and west.
West of the Green Room is unexplored.
East of the Green Room is the Brightly Lit Chamber, with exits south and
west.
East and then north from here from is the Brightly Lit Chamber.
South from here is a junction with exits north, south, east and west.
South and west from the junction is unexplored.
East from the junction is the Entry Chamber.

Or there could just be a description of the last ten or so places visited,
and the direction travelled between each one:

You started in the Entry Chamber and went west to the junction, which has
exits to the north, south, east and west.
You went north to the Round Chamber, which has exits to the north, south and
east.
You went east and then north to the Brightly Lit Chamber, which has exits to
the south and west.
You went west to the Green Room, which has exits to the south, east and
west.
You went south to the Round Chamber again, which has exits to the north,
south and east.

Another alternative is to allow "virtual exploration" of the map –
temporarily allow nothing but the compass directions, which are treated as
meta commands. The PC doesn’t actually move, but the player can explore
already-visited locations and get a brief reminder of the room description
and exits (kind of like using arrow keys to explore the map without actually
going anywhere). I guess travel would need to be allowed back along one-way
passages for this to work.

David Fisher

I’ve been wondering why I haven’t seen Emily posting on either
newsgroup in the last several weeks and now I know why. She’s redone
her homepage. Very nice.

It can be accessed at
http://emshort.home.mindspring.com/Site/How%20to%20Play.html

Nice work Emily keep it up ! ! ! !

Hello,

I am seeking beta testers for my IFComp game.

It is z-code (I7), generally sci-fi, relatively short, and primarily
puzzle-based.

I particularly need someone who can test this on some Windows
interpreters, since I don’t have easy access to a Windows machine.

You can email me at: jdc20 /at\ psu /dot\ edu.

Thanks,
-JDC

Hello group.

I am looking for testers for my IF Comp 2006 entry.

The game is an adaption of a classic sword & sorcery story from
the early thirties. It is short, light on puzzles, relying more
on story and conversation. Written in I7 (z-code).

Contact me by email ( tor at ccxvii dot net ) if you’re interested.

Tor

I don’t know if this has been covered before, but I found a bug in Inform
6.30 Library 6/11 S that won’t let you refer to objects as IT if the object
has a pluralname.  So if you LOOK AT READING GLASSES, and then TAKE IT, the
TAKE IT will go to some other object in the game.  Like the desk it’s
sitting on.  Is there a quick fix around this sort of problem, or am I going
to have to go through the entire code eliminating all pluralnames.

Thanks for the help – D

I am trying to loose my heroine in a swamp and count down until she sinks.
( dead cruel or what? )
I have defined four areas so far.
Section Bodmin Moor.

Bodmin moor is a room. The description is "Wind tortured trees lean in all
directions, you hear water trickling wherever you walk." East is a Deep
Marsh. West is a deep bog. South is a Small Marsh. North is a is a Wide Bog.

When the player enters Bodmin Moor:

change the time of day to 3:13 PM.

The Bmarsh is a region.Deep Marsh, Deep Bog, Small Marsh, Wide Bog are in
Bmarsh.
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

OK so far, but I want to count down only when the player is in the area of
Bmarsh. I have tried

if in Bmarsh at 3:17 PM:

say "Your feet are sinking deeper and deeper into the bog."

, but I cannot seem to get the syntax right.

Any help thankfully received.

jackdaw

I’ve just uploaded this to ifarchive/incoming. It should eventually move
into the TADS 3 contributions directory.

Changes with this release:
=================
The relation.t module has been broken out into separate modules and a
relation.tl library file has been added to make inclusion easy.
——————–
Added base class RelationBase from which RelationSet and RelationObject
derive.
——————–
Renamed the function/method arguments "result" and "results" to "matrix" in
the library code.
——————–
Added the following new methods to RelationSet:

* isIdentical(otherSet) returns true if this relation set
 is to be considered identical to otherSet; otherwise
 returns nil.

* equals(otherSet) returns true if this relation set
 is to be considered equal to the otherSet; otherwise
 returns nil.

* isSubsetOf(otherSet) returns true if this relation set
 is a subset of the otherSet; otherwise returns nil.

* isSupersetOf(otherSet) returns true if this relaiton set
 is a superset of the otherSet; otherwise returns nil.

* hasMember([parms]) returns true if the relation is a member
 of this relation set; otherwise returns nil.
——————–
Added the following new methods to RelationObject:

* isIdentical(otherRelation) returns true if this relation
 is to be considered identical to otherRelation; otherwise
 returns nil.

* equals(otherRelation) returns true if this relation set
 is to be considered equal to the otherRelation; otherwise
 returns nil.

* isMemberOf(parms, relationSet) returns true if this relation
 is a member of relationSet; otherwise returns nil.

* getMembershipList([parms]) returns a list of all relation sets
 for which the parameter list forms a relation.
——————–
The documentation has been restructured and updated to reflect the changes.

–Kevin

I’m trying to figure out why the following code doesn’t work.  What I’m
trying to accomplish is shooting with a bow and arrow.  The code
assumes the bow is the shooting implement, but I want the code to be
friendly enough to assume the arrow might be typed instead.  What I get
instead is affirmation of my inability to program my way out of a paper
bag.

Any help would be most, most, most appreciated!

Thanks!

Sean

==================================================================
Bit o’ Code =========================================================
==================================================================

Understand "Shoot [something held] at/against/on/onto [something]" as
shooting it at.
Shooting it at is an action applying to two things.
Check shooting it at:
        if the bow is not carried by the player, say "You’ve got nothing to
shoot with.";
        if the noun is an arrow, try shooting the fiberglass bow at the second
noun;[*******]
        if the second noun is a person, say "You’re pretty sure [second noun]
wouldn’t appreciate your humor."

==================================================================
Error Reports ========================================================
==================================================================

Problem. In the sentence ‘if the noun is an arrow, try shooting the
fiberglass bow at the second noun’  , I was expecting that ‘if the noun
is an arrow, try shooting the fiberglass bow’ would be the name of a
rule, but I couldn’t make sense of it in any context.

Problem. You wrote ‘if the noun is an arrow, try shooting the
fiberglass bow at the second noun’  , but ‘second noun’ seems to be the
name of some quantity, whereas I was expecting to find a time there.