zchat

I've been using Zmud for quite some time now, and with alot of triggers it is getting slow, I'd love to port to a software that promises to process them faster, however until this is done, its not possible:
1) zchat. some muds have unreliable built in communications, mana cost, unavailable in magically immune rooms, etc. My mud happens to be among them. In any mud you may want to say something to your friend not for wizard ears, who could be snooping you. What is needed is the ability to connect to some IP and exchange messages. This also opens ability to send signal codes. Joe chats to you: '!!do unlock door with key'. its not appearing on MUD, so you can go away from keyboard, and teammate can make you do something, if needed. if wizard snoops you, it looks like you did it yourself. Since 90% (or more?) pc world is using zmud, zchat protocol compatibility would be very appreciated.
2) macros. ehhhh, macros only definable to function keys and a couple ctrl-letter keys, ctr+s, and something? whats up with that, I want to define my macros to keys I am comfortable with, not those developer wants me to use. It even doesn't allow to use all f-keys, i use f6 on zmud alot, and here it is 'reserved' for window switching. I play only 1 mud anyway, I don't need to switch. Urgh.
3) statusbar. I was never a graph bar fan, but I do need to keep a eye on some values stored in variables as text. In zmud you define a statusbar, which can include variable values, very simple, very intuitive. Eg. WIMPY: @wimpy TEAM: @team shows
something like WIMPY: very hurt TEAM: three people (and updates if variables change). Didn't find anything resembling it here.
There is more but I can live without that, those 3 are critical for a port. Thanks for reading.

Thanks for the suggestions. I'll cover them point-by-point ...

Zchat

This is on the "to do" list. You are not the only person to suggest this, and the zchat protocol is well-documented. Good idea.

User-defined keyboard macros

This is also on my "to do" list. I agree that defining your own keyboard combinations would be very helpful.

Statusbar

You can program the status line now. There are a couple of ways. The simple one is to make a trigger (eg. I did one matching on "Exits: *" which displayed the current exits on the status line). One of the trigger options is "send to status line".

For more complex cases you can set up triggers that match on various things and set variables (using world.setvariable) and then set the status line (using world.setstatus) - using the script language.

Thus you could track team points etc. in that way.

/world.setstatus, hmm yes, it works. I only have half line for it, and my statusline doesn't fit in, a possiblity to have separate line just for that would be nice, but this is nitpicking and not critical.
Now then, lets see what else confuses me. Of all the things, I/O I guess. This client desperately needs button support. I can call a script only from alias or macro. alias and macro are cute and i'm sure years ago people mudding from vt100 terminals used those alot on tiny fugue, but this is GUI client. The advantage of buttons over existing options is pretty obvious, you don't have to remember exact script name to call, and you won't hit the wrong fkey in the heat of battle. Also, buttons can be multistate, that has quite alot of uses. Zmud has all that, and even allows to put picture on button for easy recognizing what button does, but does not stop there, it has this #YESNO which opens in the middle of screen another set of buttons, sort of a dialog. You press one, it closes. This has ton of uses, for example, choosing a speedwalking route. Also in zmud is present the option to open dialog and query user for a variable value, or the option to set it from command line variablename = value, that simple. What I am supposed to do here, when in the heat of battle when a second makes a difference between victory and defeat, and I need to update a variable holding enemy name my scripts will use for attacking, type in /world.SetVariable "enemy", "joe", or maybe press ctrl+shitf+7, then click on variable to modify (from a long list), then click on edit, change it, and click ok twice, while not seeing what is going on mud while i am doing it?
This client has alot of promise but I/O needs polishing.
Ohh, and I noticed "Arrow keys wrap history" from input options only add empty line before wrapping around history. I'd really like to disable wrapping at all, if I press down and run out of commands, I want to stay with empty line no matter how many times I press down.

Special buttons are easy enough I suppose. Personally I like to keep my hands on the keyboard and not reach for the mouse all the time, but I see what you are saying.



What I would do is make an alias that calls a simple script that does the setvariable. Thus you would type, say:


enemy joe


Or you could make it more generic, with an alias like this:


Match on: * = *


Then the script could set any variable to any value. Thus you have exactly what you described in zMud.



Looks like a bug - it is not supposed to wrap with that unchecked.

Thanks for the suggestions - work on the next version will be commencing soon, and hopefully some of these ideas will appear. :)

Chat capability now in version 3.37 onwards.

Now there is an "info bar" which you can make coloured lines in. There is a Health Bar plugin which shows the general idea of doing that.

And for buttons (if youre so inclined, personally I agree with you nick, Hands on keyboard), you can now (3.41 onwards) use Hyperlinks as buttons. I havent looked at the command yet, but Im sure whoever wants buttons can figure it out.