[MUD-Dev] Re: PDMud thread summary

[Niklas Elmqvist]

On Thu, 22 Oct 1998, The Arrow wrote:

[Simplicity:]
> However, among all the buzz-words and efficiency talk, there is one word I
> miss:  simplicity.  Personally I think this project first of all should be
> simple, and efficiency and modularization should come after that.  At leas
> it should be so if we want this, I don't know waht to call it, "creation" ;)
> to spread outside the little circle this list really is.

Well, if we decide to stick to the three main levels of the PDMud project
as proposed earlier, then the complexity would be very different depending
on what level you are looking at. Level A or zero (the driver level, that
is) would be like the kernel of most OS:es -- you can certainly try to
tamper with it, but doing so requires a fair degree of insight in how the
system works and may very well result in that things break higher up :) 

Okay, the (proposed) design at the module level is a little different from
most MUDs in that we here have several different (potentially dozens or
more) individual modules talking to each other and collaborating towards
behaving like a MUD, but that does not necessarily mean it is more complex
than a "conventional" MUD server. Anyone with a little time on their hands
should be able to write new modules or modify exisiting ones. Since we
want to support *any* kind of MUD system (even where the term does not
really apply), you should be able to rip out all modules and build new
ones with as little effort as possible. 

Going still higher up in the hierarchy, people who want to use the MUD but
not get involved in the module development can dig into the lib and build
on the world, design quests, tweak the laws of physics, and so on. 

All parts of the project should be thoroughly documented to serve as an
educational tool for new MUD developers. We also need some kind of
tutorials on how to build new modules, how the event manager works, how
inter-module communication is performed, etc.

I don't know how much more simplicity we can add before limiting
ourselves. IMHO, the current model is quite simple and therefore a Good
Thing<tm>.  Since we want to cater to just about any taste, we need this
kind of flexibility.

> / Joachim

-- Niklas Elmqvist (d97elm at dtek.chalmers.se) ----------------------
  "The trouble with being a god is that you've got no one to 
   pray to."
		-- Terry Pratchett, Small Gods