Not to be confused with the LambdaMOO programmer's manual.
Thanks to Ted Wallace (Falryx) for the MUSE manual, from which I stole a few things here.
Items in bold type are things you are meant to type in.
Information contained within brackets [] is optional.
Information conained within arrows <> is required.
At times something may appear like:
Most of this manual applies to any MOO, however it's written for the
Harper's Tale audience, and the getting started stuff especially is
HT-specific.
Section One contains general getting-started information
Contents of Section One
This manual attempts to lead you through getting started on the MOO,
moving around and doing things in the MOO environment, and getting
you started with programming in the MOO language. It is targeted at
the MUSH user who is unfamiliar with MOO.
Characters are the virtual reality extension of you, the player. It is
the characters of the MOO who are able to manipulate the environment and
interact with one another. MOO supports a multi-player/character setting
where many computer users can connect simultaneously to the server and partake
of the virtual reality together
Rooms are 'places' within the virtual reality, relating to actual
physical locations. Rooms are very similar to the ones within your home, with
four walls and a ceiling, but can also be used to represent the 'outdoors'. In
this sense 'rooms' are a very broad category of objects meaning any place on
the MOO which relates to an actual 'physical' location where your character
can go.
Exits are objects which link rooms to one another. In your home, your
exits are doors, stairways, or perhaps even windows. Similarly, in a virtual
reality you can have exits which link one room to another, and this exits can
represent everything from a large hole, to a door, to a catapult which
launches you through the sky to land at your new location.
Lastly there are 'normal' objects. These are things that range from
empty soda cans, to cars, to a set of keys, or anything you can think of.
Objects can generally be manipulated to make them unique, or do things, or
just look nice. [There will be more on objects, rooms, and exits later.]
That's the basic idea of how the MOO environment is structured. Let's
log on and see what we can see.
The first time you connect to the MOO you'll be in the arrival room or
birthplace. Here's what it will look like:
To communicate privately with someone not in the same room, you will
want to use page.
There's another form of who you can use called '@who'; this will
show you where everyone is. On HT, there are abbreviations in front
of the who-locations for most players:
For more info on channels, read 'help channels'. This channel
system is identical to that on MicroMUSE.
You can also look at yourself to see what you look like now. 'look me'
One thing you might also want to do is set your age. There is an age
machine in the birthplace that will help you calculate what hatchsecs
you can set to make yourself a certain age.
Now you're probably ready to step out into the world; if you know what you
want, you can choose your hold or craft right away.
Let's say you've decided to move to Southern-Boll Hold, Tropical Paradise
on Pern. :)
As you wander around the MOO, you can see which way to go by reading
the "obvious exits" line. In order to go through an exit, you can
either type the name of the exit (if it is one word), or usually
you can type the first letter of each word in the exit name. So
if you see an exit called "Great Door", you can probably type 'gd'
to go through it.
To quit the moo, you must type '@quit'.
On MUSH, this command would be called @search me. On MOO, you can do
'@audit me'. There is no charge on MOO for any such commands.
A related command is @quota.
Ok, well now you have your own room, but it's rather bare. You decide to
make it more interesting. First off you can @desc the room itself.
Just do '@desc here as "description"' to set the room desc.
Now for another look around.
So, for example:
Ok, now we have a new room. It's important to remember to use many aliases
for the exits, because native MOO doesn't understand 2-word exit names,
so you must give a one-word alias, and preferably several aliases. Also
it's good building practice to use 'out' as an alias for any exit that leads
the player back outside from an inner room. You may also want to use
a cardinal-point alias (north/south/east/west etc) for exits, so that
people can use the '+compass' verb to get a feel for where they are.
@dig can be used in other ways as well. You can @dig a floating room
for just yourself:
Let's say you want to dig an exit to this room now, so other folks can
join you in your own hell.
Timed recycling is not native to MOO; normal MOO recycling is done
immediately, and there's no room for errors. You might wish to
remember this if you're playing on another MOO.
To launch the mail editor, you just type '@send
The @notedit (note editor) is almost exactly the same. You can do
'@notedit me.description' to edit your desc, and use 'say' to add
more lines, and 's/
Puppets have more limited abilities than players. Puppets cannot
@dig rooms or send mail, or page players. They can move around,
'look', pick up objects, and will replay back to you everything they
see as long as a) they are not in the same room with you, and b)
someone else doesn't pick them up. It's generally a good idea to
@lock your puppet to you so that others can't pick them up.
SYNTAX: help < command | topic >
The '|' symbol means 'or'. In other words - you should type 'help
MOO stands for MUD, Object-Oriented. If you're not familiar with the
term MUD, it stands for Multi-User Dungeon. MOOs are used for a variety
of purposes; the networking and gopher support of MOO make it useful for
a conferencing tool. However, its primary use is as a multi-user text-
based gaming environment.
Basic MOO
MOO is a virtual world that consists of several types of objects.
Generally these include other players (like you) who login to the MOO;
Rooms, which are the place were most people exist and move through during
their time on the MOO; Exits are merely doors from one room to another, and
finally Things that can be picked up and carried. Each object has a unique
number in the database, often referred to as the dbref# or database reference
number. This number is how the MOO stores data on the object internally.
For any object in the MOO, you can always refer to it by its dbref# no matter
where it is located, and get any information on it that you are entitled to.
Birthplace (#11)
You awaken in a featureless white room, the entry room to the world of Pern.
This room is the last vestige of OOCness before you step through and choose
your destiny. You will probably want to read 'help getting started' before
you enter the world of Pern. If you are uncertain how to begin, type 'help
topics', or just 'help' if you are unfamiliar with MOO.
Before you enter the world of Pern, you must set your gender - see 'help
@gender' - and your description. (help @describe). Then you will choose a
birthplace - either a hold or a craft, though if you choose a craft you will
still need to talk to the craftmaster.
Choose whichever exit you like, or you can 'Skip' if you want to look
around before choosing a home.
You see Lag Meter, Bulletin Board, Agifier, Strasbourg Clock, Suggestion Box,
and Twitterbug here.
Obvious exits:
MOO School
First off you will want to communicate with other players, since
they might talk to you immediately after you log in.
Communication
Some basics on communication: if you don't already know how, use
'say
page
Type 'who' to see who's logged in. To set your @doing message that's
displayed in the 'who', you can do:
@doing me is "Trying to figure out what to do!"
Then next time you do a 'who' you'll see your @doing displayed.
HarpH = Harper Hall
HealH = Healer Hall
IstaW = Ista Weyr
IstaH = Ista Hold
DolpH = DolphinCraft Hall
Channels
Harper's Tale has a channel communication system, which is used
for OOC communication. You may notice it immediately as looking
something like this:
[public] Delron: He's a very nice person, Petrie !
[public] Kitro raises an eyebrow.
[public] Kitro: What is wrong with being a German?
[public] Petrie isn't convinced "Naahhh... I don't believ before I see :)"
To communicate on the public channel, you can type 'pub
Getting Started
Now, there are a few commands you may have learned to do at this point
from your MUSH days, something like '@sex me=
@gender male
@desc me as "A scruffy fellow, looking a little dazed."
You can also set a special wearing message that's separate from
your description:
@wearing me is "He's wearing an old tunic and patched trousers."
Now you might want to look around at the world. The 'look' verb is
mostly the same as on MUSH; if you type
look clock
You'll see the clock's description (and in this case, a nifty display
of various times around the world, since the clock has been programmed
to do this.)
look age
Really Useful Age Machine (#919)
A strange machine, with a number of knobs and dials, and a clear glass plate
which seems to have writing on it. It is used to help people work out their
age.
To find out how to use the machine, do `about machine'
The glass display reads:
Age: 2 months and 9 days
hatchsecs: 751005600
Obviously someone has just set the age of a baby here. :) You can type
`about machine' to find out how to change the age on the machine, and once
you have reached the age you want to be, simply type '@hatchsecs
holds
You can choose any of the following holds:
All you have to type is 'boll' and you're set. You'll be whisked away to
Southern Boll, and Lord Zie will probably be sending you mail in a day
or so about your room at the hold.
Reading Mail
Now, let's say it's a few days later and you log on again. If you have
mail, the MOO will tell you so:
Last connected Thu Nov 4 08:14:58 1993 EST from sugar.NeoSoft.com
There's a new edition of the newspaper. Type 'news' to see it.
You have new mail (1 message). Type 'help mail' for info on reading it.
Daran wakes up.
Ok, so how do you see your mail? Well, first off you can type '@mail'
to get a list of your current mail messages. Only the last 15 messages
are displayed, so you will want to be sure to delete your mail after
you've read it so that you don't accumulate tons of mail in your mailbox.
@mail
4 messages:
1: Sep 9 02:07 Kira (#2) @programmer Daran (#1319)
2: Sep 9 19:57 Zie (#203) Re: New Resident
3: Oct 4 23:07 Syrelia (#793) Craft Things
>>>4: Oct 26 13:40 Search-request (#145) Search Interview
5:+ Nov 4 08:20 Kira (#2) blee
----+
Any NEW mail is indicated by the + sign after the number of the message.
So here, message 5 is new. To read it, you can do '@read new'. To
read another message in the list, just '@read
@read 2
Message 2 of 5:
Date: Thu Sep 9 19:57:07 1993 EDT
From: Zie (#203)
To: Daran (#1319)
Subject: Re: New Resident
Daran,
Your room is ready for you to move into. You can move into it at any time. It
is located on the 3rd floor west hallway of the hold.
-Lord Zie.
--------------------------
Ah, a new room at last. Well, first off, let's go find your room! The
long and drawn-out way to do it is to walk through the hold, but if you've
already toured the hold to your heart's content, you might just want to
cheat and @move there. How do you find out your room#? Or for that
matter, how do you find out what all you own?
@audit me
Objects owned by Daran (from #0 to #2185):
#1319 Daran [Candidate's Barracks]
#1335 Daran's Apartment
#1336 Daran's Apartment *West Hallway->Daran's Apartment
#1337 Hallway Daran's Apartment->*West Hallway
#1388 Weaver Knot [Daran]
#2075 same old clothes [Daran]
#2147 Daran's Cot [Candidate's Barracks]
Total: 7 objects.
This display shows the object#'s, their names, and on the right side are
the location of the objects, or for exits there's a display of where the
exit goes from->to. ROOMS will have a blank space in the right hand
column; this is because rooms exist nowhere and don't have a location,
generally.
@quota
You can create 5 new objects without recycling any that you already own.
Anyway, we've decided that we're going to move to our new room, and from
the @audit we can see that the room# is #1335. You can use @Move to
move yourself to any room that you own.
@move me to #1335
Daran's Apartment
You see nothing special.
Obvious exits:
Hallway
Moved.
@Move is similar to MUSH's @tel or @teleport. On HT MOO, it will only
be useful to you when moving to your own rooms. Most HT rooms are set
!free_entry (this is like being !JUMP_OK) and cannot be @move'd to except
by the owner of the room.
Setting your home
Now, the first thing you want to do in your new room is make it your
home. Type `@sethome' to do this.
@sethome
Daran's Apartment is your new home.
Now, wherever you are in the MOO, if you type 'home', you'll return here.
@desc here as "The place is a real mess."
Description set.
There! Most splendid; the Lord Holder would be proud. Ah... but there's
more things that must be set, for it to be a proper room. The exits
have both descs and messages as well.
look Hallway
You see nothing special.
That will never do; you can desc exits the same way you desc everything else.
@desc Hallway as "A beat-up wooden door that's been slammed one too many
times."
Description set.
Setting exit messages
Now, you'll want to set messages on the exits, just as a matter of style
and good building practice. To see what messages are on the exit, you
type `@messages
@messages Hallway
The MOO will display the following:
@nogo out isn't set.
@onogo out isn't set.
@arrive out isn't set.
@oarrive out isn't set.
@oleave out isn't set.
@leave out isn't set.
@weather_prefix out is "Outside,"
These are all messages that are displayed when a player uses the exit,
save for the weather_prefix message, which will display the weather
on the other side of the exit when you look at it. Let's look at the
equivalent MUSH->MOO names for these exit messages:
In MUSH In MOO Message seen by who?
------- ------ ------------------------------
@fail @nogo the player if they can't go through
@ofail @onogo others in the room if player can't go through
@succ @leave the player before they go through
@osucc @oleave others in the start room
@drop @arrive the player after they go through
@odrop @oarrive others in the destination room
Now you'll want to set some messages. Message-setting is the same
MOO-wide, regardless of whether its for an exit or a room or a player
or anything. `@
@nogo Hallway is "You can't seem to get out the door!"
@onogo Hallway is "can't seem to get out the door!"
@arrive out is "You slam the door behind you."
@oarrive out is "runs out of Daran's room and slams the door behind %p."
@oleave out is "runs out of the room."
@leave out is "You run out of the room."
Now you're set - at least for this door. You'll also want to set the
messages for the door leading INTO your room as well, and for any
new exits you create.
l
Daran's Apartment
The place is a real mess.
Obvious exits:
Hallway
Digging new rooms
Well, let's say you'd like to dig another room off of this one, maybe
a bedroom. The @dig syntax for MOO is a little different than for
MUSH:
@dig exit,alias,alias|return-exit,alias,alias to "New Room Name"
The above example creates a new room and the exits to and from
it. There are a few important things you must remember when using
@dig: You CANNOT put spaces in the exit-specs, and any exit-names
with more than one word names must be enclosed in "quotes".
@dig "Messy Bedroom",mb,bedroom,bed,br|out,ou,o to "Daran's Bedroom"
is the proper way to do it. Exit-specs are separated by commas,
but don't put spaces in them. If you type in something like
@dig "Messy Bedroom", mb|out, ou, o to New room
It will NOT work because there are spaces between the exit names/alaises.
@dig "My own Private Hell"
My own private hell (#2192) created.
This creates a new room that's "floating" or isn't connected to anywhere.
The only way you can get there is to type '@move me to #2192'.
@dig "secret door",sd,door,doo,secret to #2192
Exit from Daran's Apartment (#1335) to My own private hell (#2192) via {"secret door", "sd", "door", "doo", "secret"} created with id #2193.
Now you have a new exit leading to your own hell.
Recycling
Well that was all fine and well, but now you want to destroy your
own hell room and the exit leading to it. The MOO equivalent of
@destroy is @recycle.
@recycle #2192
Scheduling My own private hell (#2192) for recycling in 5 minutes.
@recycle #2193
Scheduling secret door (#2193) for recycling in 5 minutes.
If you @recycle something accidentally, you should do '@cancel-recycle
The MOO Editors
Now you may be at the point where you wish to send mail to someone, or
make a more elaborate description for yourself. MOO has several builtin
editors that are used for this.
Sending Mail
Let's try sending mail first. Now we're so happy that Lord Zie has
given us a room, we'll spam him back with a note of thanks.
@send zie
Subject:
[Type a line of input or `@abort' to abort the command.]
Thanks for the room.
Mail Room
Do a 'look' to get the list of commands, or 'help' for assistance.
Composing a letter to Zie (#203) entitled "Thanks for the room."
Now you're in a special room that's an editor. Anything you 'say'
in this room gets added to the text of your letter. So:
say Hey lord Zie, thanks for the cool room!
Line 1 added.
Now to see what you've typed, you can do 'list'.
list
__1_ Hey lord Zie, thanks for the cool room!
^^^^
If this is all you want to write, just type 'send' and the mail is
sent. There are numerous other editor commands you can use; anything
you 'emote' is appended to the end of the current line. (You can see the
current line by the location of the ^^^^ arrows.) Anything else you
say will be addd after the insertion point or current line.
say How can I get a job here?
Line 2 added.
say When's the next gather? Can I make a booth for it?
Line 3 added.
list
1: Hey lord Zie, thanks for the cool room!
2: How can I get a job here?
__3_ When's the next gather? Can I make a booth for it?
^^^^
Let's say you want to change 'cool' on line 1 to something more
impressive. To do this, you want to move your insertion point to the
line _after_ the one you want to edit. Use 'ins
ins 2
__1_ Hey lord Zie, thanks for the cool room!
^^2^ How can I get a job here?
Now you have to use the substitution command to change 'cool' to
something else. The syntax is 's/
s/cool/most excellent/
__1_ Hey lord Zie, thanks for the most excellent room!
Now you've made all your changes and are happy with the note, so
you just type 'send' to mail it.
send
Mail actually sent to Zie (#203)
You're then returned to the room you started from.
Puppets
MOO does not provide any standard form of puppet code, so the following
is HT-specific. It is in some ways applicable to DF MOO as well although
the method for setting things puppet is different.
@create "Daran's Dog",dog
You now have Daran's Dog (aka dog) with object number #2192 and parent
Generic Thing II (#115).
@set dog.puppet to 1
Property #2192.puppet set to 1.
drop dog
You drop Daran's Dog.
@addfl dog=#2192
Code 'dog' installed for Daran's Dog (#2192).
cddog :woofs.
Daran's Dog woofs.
cddog out
Daran's Dog> West Hallway
Daran's Dog> This is the west wing of the third floor. The third floor
houses the apartments of all the general residents of Southern Boll Hold.
The hallway continues east.
Daran's Dog> Obvious exits:
Daran's Dog> East Apartments
Daran's Dog runs out of the room.
Daran's Dog> You slam the door behind you.
Etc. The key components of making a puppet are @set thing.puppet to 1,
and @addfl =thing#. See 'help puppets' and 'help CU' for info
on the control units.
Locking is a little different on MOO:
@Lock
So to lock your puppet so nobody can pick him up:
@lock #2192 with me
Or similarly to lock doors so only you can go through:
@lock out with me
There is considerable help under 'help locking' and 'help keys'.
End of Section 1.