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Posted by

Linda Sweden (164 posts)

Date

Thu 14 Nov 2002 08:37 PM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

Well, it is Christmas soon, after all. ;)

Anyhow, since the discussion (or, at least, my own posts) lead me to consider the differences between MUSHclient and the client most of my MUSHing acquaintances prefer, namely SimpleMU, I decided to take a closer look at the current features of the latter.

Having done so, I came up with a list of a few features that for me probably would mean that if I was picking my client today, I'd pick SimpleMU over MUSHclient. Several of these I have also seen mentioned when MUSHers talk about why they prefer SimpleMU or why they picked it over MUSHclient.

Certainly, I don't think that all clients should be copies of each other ... but some these features do fall (at least in my mind) under the heading 'what every good mu* client should have'.

To those features I count:

'Spawned Windows' for any type of messages (channel/chat, pages, ooc conversations, messages via puppets, etc) that you want to separate out.

A 'mail editor' that allows several mails per world to be written out in their entirety (including with whatever commands are needed to start & send the mails) and saved for later sending. Sure, one could do this in notepad (unless one runs over the length allowed) after a fashion, but for me this is one thing that is important enough to deserve a dedicated feature.

Not quite in the 'must have' category are these:

Minimize to tray option. Third-party programs can do this, but none of the free that I have found do a good job, and on the whole I've found that it works best when integrated into the program you want to minimize. But, if anyone can suggest a solid, bug-free and free third-party program that does the job, I'd be happy with that too.

A Thesaurus as well as a Spell Checker. Actually, that's one feature alone that made me seriously consider SimpleMU, because I use one fairly consistently when I RP. If the license for the current Spell Checker could be upgraded to include a Thesuarus I think it would be appreciated by a lot of MUSHers.

Posted by

Loki (44 posts)

Date

Reply #1 on Fri 15 Nov 2002 02:20 AM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

I would agree to the Thesaurus

The Spawning windows can be done with scripts
and/or triggers. and as far as the mail system,
how would this be possible with so many different
systems out there. Mushclient supports so many more
Features then simpleMU. I really can't see how anyone
can make a Comparison. I mean the only real competition
that Nick has is Zugg if you really want to call it
competition. Even that is like comparing Windows 2k
and windows ME(ZMud bieng ME). SimpleMU would be a
Commodore in comparison. In fact I thing Gmud32 kicks
the pants off of SimpleMU anyday.

-LºKi_
Founder
Endless Dreams
www.edmud.net
edmud.net port 9000

Posted by

Shadowfyr USA (1,774 posts)

Date

Reply #2 on Fri 15 Nov 2002 03:38 PM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

Sorry, but I can't agree with the 'you can spawn windows' from scripts theory. As I said, you only have two options, notepad windows, which are almost totally useless or a browser windows, which is like borrowing the Exxon Valdize (complete with drunk pilot) to delivery a single loaf of bread. It may get you there, but the environmental damage in terms of possible bugs, overhead, potential crashes and memory leaks is way to high. lol

Besides, some of these things have come to be seen as 'common' features in clients. It is a bad idea to ignore things people start expecting to see.

main {
__if (Schrodinger_Cat is Alive or version >= "XP"){
____if version = "Vista" then Performance /= Number_of_Cores;
____call Functional_Code();}
__else
____call Crash_Windows();}

Posted by

Linda Sweden (164 posts)

Date

Reply #3 on Fri 15 Nov 2002 04:34 PM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

As far as the mail handler goes, SimpleMU allows for some 7 or 8 (I just glanced quickly at how it was setup) different ways of configuring it, to allow for the most common MUSH and, I think, MUD mailers. And, seeing how standard PennMUSH @mail today doesn't include any sort of editing, I think PennMUSHes in particular would appreciate a client interface. If it could also preview (since basic Penn @mail sends as soon as you enter text, it doesn't have the option to add a bit at a time and then preview) that would be even better.

And I do disagree that SimpleMU isn't 'competition' (if one wants to call it that); it is by far the most commonly mentioned and recommended client on the MUSHes where I play. ZMud, in general, is not particularely popular.

But in any case, I agree with Shadowfyr: some of these features now fall under what people expect to find in a client.

Posted by

Nick Gammon Australia (18,770 posts)

bio Forum Administrator

Date

Reply #4 on Fri 15 Nov 2002 07:12 PM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

I'll have to bring myself up to speed on how MUSH mailers work. In principle it sounds easy enough to do, maybe in a plugin ;P.

Can you quickly describe the sort of things you would expect it to do?

- Nick Gammon

www.gammon.com.au, www.mushclient.com

Posted by

Linda Sweden (164 posts)

Date

Reply #5 on Fri 15 Nov 2002 09:11 PM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

Taking a look at how SimpleMU's mail interface works might be easiest, but I'll try to explain the features of it that I like. :)

Basically, it opens up a window which looks like a regular form with a field for subject, a field for recipient(s) and a field for the text itself.

It can also be configured (per world) to use the proper method +mail/@mail, -<text>, --/@sent, etc) of sending this information to the MU* to create a regular mail message.

It also appears to allow for saving of several completely pre-made messages for later sending.

What it doesn't allow for (as far as I could see when I gave it a quick try), but which I wouldn't mind seeing, is a way of previewing the message (that is, with any %r's and %t's and so on evaluated).

And, of course, allowing spell-checking to work within the mailer would be needed, I think.

Posted by

Irzadi (7 posts)

Date

Reply #6 on Fri 29 Nov 2002 07:49 PM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

How about more macroable-keys ?

In my favorite MUD I need *lots* of macro and the current macroable keys are very unwieldly (try pressing F7 followed by SHIFT-F2 and then CTRL-F5 in 3 seconds) and pressing F1 (I sometimes press F1 when I want to press F2 or F3) opens up the help window and change the focus from mushclient to the help file, which usually means a quick death for my character.

Posted by

Meerclar USA (554 posts)

Date

Reply #7 on Sat 30 Nov 2002 03:29 AM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

Macro's are fairly easy to emulate with creative aliases and linked triggers. The truly skilled among us have even been known to write plugins for such commonly used things as speedwalking paths. Client macros in all honesty generally have to be restricted to function keys to avoid conflicting with any potential mudbased features though.

Meerclar - Lord of Cats
Coder, Builder, and Tormenter of Mortals
Stormbringer: Rebirth
storm-bringer.org:4500
www.storm-bringer.org

Posted by

Nick Gammon Australia (18,770 posts)

bio Forum Administrator

Date

Reply #8 on Sun 01 Dec 2002 09:06 PM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

"More programmable keys" is currently under development.

- Nick Gammon

www.gammon.com.au, www.mushclient.com

Posted by

Irzadi (7 posts)

Date

Reply #9 on Mon 16 Dec 2002 09:54 PM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

-How about a function to turn off all triggers ?
I know about the enable grop triggers function but if you have lots of grouped triggers or lot of triggers without groups then it's a bit unwieldly to turn em off one by one.

- how about enabling talking during speedwalking, for example commands will not be queued after the speedwalks unless it's a command that involve movement (n, s, ne, etc). Because if you receive a tell or someone talk to you in channels during speedwalk, they might think that you are impolite if you wait for 2 minutes before answering their tells.

Posted by

Poromenos Greece (1,037 posts)

Date

Reply #10 on Tue 17 Dec 2002 12:27 AM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

First of all, the mail system thing is ridiculously easy to do, just edit your mail in notepad and use paste to world to send anything you like together with commands or whatever. Secondly, irzadi is right, you can't currently turn off group triggers except through script... it would be nice if there was a "Toggle trigger group" menu item or something. Also, about the 2nd feature, i think it is easy to do that. when the user sends something that isn't one of the standard directions, send immediately instead of queueing... Great idea.

Vidi, Vici, Veni.
http://porocrom.poromenos.org/ Read it!

Posted by

Roxanne (1 post)

Date

Reply #11 on Tue 31 Dec 2002 04:54 PM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

Hello all;

As to the addition of an @mail/+mail/whatevermail handler, that -would- be nice, though I confess that I myself use a side-by-side session of UltraEdit32 for such things, since it blows far past the Notepad size limits, and has quick and easy features for tab, end of line, etc. substitutions. It also does character counts, which is very handy for someone like me who writes -way- too long all the time. Just FYI.

The one feature I didn't see mentioned that I myself would honestly like to see would be some enhancements to the 'activity bar'. I'd like to be able to increase the number of available buttons, even if it meant I had to sacrifice ctrl-# functionality. I'd also love to be able to put 'separators'/spaces in between buttons on the bar to separate out those which are going to different worlds - I have a few worlds where I have two, three, even four or five different alts logging in at the same time and I'd like to be able to group them together.

The ability to specify a preamble of some sort and then configure to break that out into sub-windows (loggable, please, just in case?) for channels, puppets, etc. would also be wonderful if possible.

As a feature to help a friend, I'd also love to find a way to get MushClient to accept input from Dragon Naturally Speaking, but I'm guessing that might be a configuration failure on my part rather than anything else right now.

Roxanne

Posted by

Demonsurfer USA (256 posts)

Date

Reply #12 on Tue 31 Dec 2002 05:11 PM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

"As I said, you only have two options, notepad windows, which are almost totally useless or a browser windows, which is like borrowing the Exxon Valdize (complete with drunk pilot) to delivery a single loaf of bread."

hahaha :) that's funny :)

Posted by

Linda Sweden (164 posts)

Date

Reply #13 on Wed 29 Oct 2003 10:21 AM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

Since it is almost Christmas again, I figured I'd resurrect this thread and ask again whether any of the enhancements mentioned in the first post ('properly' spawned windows such as SimpleMU has, a dedicated mail editor, minimize to tray and a thesaurus) might be added in the future?

I know alternatives were offered for some of the suggestions (such as spawing windows into notepad, or just saving mail in the notepad), but I think all of those solutions are less than ideal work-arounds and that they rely too heavily on people being able to script their own solutions. And even with the scripting you can't do quite what I was looking for.

Posted by

Flannel USA (1,230 posts)

Date

Reply #14 on Wed 29 Oct 2003 10:33 AM (UTC) [ quote ]

Message

the point of giving scripting flexibility, and coding plugins is to allow individuals to add to their own client, rather than be forced to carry around bulk that the majority of the other people might not ever feel the need for.

~Flannel

Messiah of Rose
Eternity's Trials.

Clones are people two.

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