Zugg Software :: View topic

Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 10:36 pm

This will be a heavily moderated thread. What I'm looking for is a list of all of the "must-have" features of CMUD that you love. These are the features in CMUD that would keep you from ever going back to zMUD.

I plan to use the results of this forum post to put together a better list of features to help market CMUD. Because of this, I will delete anything posted to this topic that doesn't relate to the subject. Do not post questions about how to use a particular feature...create a separate forum post for that.

Feel free to either list a single specific feature, or to give a top-ten list, or whatever you want. But these should be features that are already in CMUD and *not* a wish-list of future features. I'm looking forward to seeing what people are liking the most.

Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 11:04 pm

Mapper. Mapper mapper mapper mapper mapper mapper mapper. In all the "which client should I pick" threads I've seen, mapper trumps all, and it really is that useful. A MUD client without a mapper is like a car without a GPS - you can get around, but you have to spend a lot of time planning your route and peering at tiny roads on maps to get somewhere, and god forbid you're trying to get somewhere you've never been before. Typing in "GL4 0PQ" is so much easier.

After that it gets more difficult - a lot of the stuff I like is hard to describe in a snappy, PR-friendly way. I guess integrated Lua support comes quite highly, but it's also stuff like packages as easily-pluggable black boxes, the ability to make trigger libraries with events that leave the actual scripting up to the end user, and more I can't think of right now.

The trigger tester's pretty nifty for debugging regexes too.

Apprentice Joined: 13 Aug 2007 Posts: 166

The script editor. Editing aliases/triggers/whatever... It's way more readable and programmer-friendly than the one in zMUD. I love it.

D

Wizard Joined: 03 Mar 2001 Posts: 1127 Location: London

Scintilla based editor
Lua when I get around to it
Mapper once it's improved

What would keep me going back to zMUD is that CMUD makes it *look* old, and I like shiny new looking things. So I guess there's an improved GUI, and it looks like a Vista program too now that the theming is gone

SubAdmin Joined: 18 Nov 2001 Posts: 5182

Script speed. So many scripts I dreamed of writing were impossibly slow in zMud; with CMud I can actually make them, and make them better and with more features then I originally envisioned.

Threading. While it is not always easy to do it right, and I am sure some of the thread stuff in my toolbox is really confusing. It gives the ability to do some amazing script designs.

Wizard Joined: 25 Mar 2003 Posts: 1113 Location: USA

Packages. Makes it easier to modularize code for sharing between characters or with friends.

Events. I've been asking and praying for a long time that there was a way to do event-based scripting in my MUD client, and I'm thrilled to finally be taking advantage of this feature to decouple my scripts and make better "plugin" modules.

Speed. I agree with Vijilante on this one. Local variables, faster data record and string list variables, multithreading, and more makes my scripts run so much faster.

Priorities. We now have full control over what fires in what order, and this is especially important now that I'm modularizing my scripts more and more.

Scintilla. I've been using SciTE for a couple years now to edit all sorts of scripts, including zMUD and CMUD scripts, and I think it really improves the user-friendliness of CMUD's Package Editor.

Posted: Thu Jan 10, 2008 6:06 am

New Features
Scintilla Editor
Package Library
Events
Compile scripts

Old Features
Mapper.. Like Fang said it's the reason I do CMUD
Scripting power

Magician Joined: 09 Oct 2003 Posts: 459 Location: USA

Scripting Improvements. I love the new case/switch statements. Local variables are wonderful as well. My code is cleaner, friendlier, and happier.

Package Library. So that my clean, friendly, happy code can be downloaded by all of those people who rely on me doing the coding of their scripts for them and I don't have to worry about setting something up myself for them to download and tell them when bugs have been fixed or improvements made or supporting them through the new script install process, or making sure their special character settings are correct... the list goes on and on and on and on... (yes, I realize that's the run-on sentence from h-e-double-hockey-sticks, but I love that feature).

The new Scintilla IDE.

Windows being objects within your session package instead of each of those being a different .mud file.

Did I mention that I like things that have to do with the writing of scripts?

GURU Joined: 27 Sep 2000 Posts: 90 Location: USA

New Features
Compiled Scripts (speed)
Package Library
Events

Old Features
Mapper (This is the trump)

Basically...what Tech said.

Enchanter Joined: 09 Sep 2007 Posts: 605

Q: What is your favorite feature in CMUD?
1) Scripting improvements (priorities, events, new commands, compiled scripts, local vars, fixed threading issues). Especially events - I'm glad they were introduced into CMUD.
2) Mapper.
3) Scintilla-based editor.
4) The concept of packages.

Q: What are the features in CMUD that would keep you from ever going back to zMUD?
1) CMUD was designed to work with XP and later OS. CMUD is native to XP and that says all. And as Guinn mentioned, CMUD has an improved GUI that match design guidelines for OS CMUD running in, so it does not irritate my eyes.
2) Script Editor - all settings are at one place. Easy to find, easy to organize, easy to work with. And there is only 1 Script editor window.
In 2001 I took a look at latest zMUD version and I was scared with zMUD ability to open multiple windows with settings and other things. It was an awful mess. After fighting for 2 days with its interface I've told my goodbye to zMUD.
3) All of improvements which was made to scripting, mapper, CMUD stability - see my first list.

Posted: Tue Jan 15, 2008 1:01 pm

The features that make me excited are:
1) Events
2) Threads
3) SQL (not here yet, but if it's done right, i'll be over the moon. This one feature would far outweigh all my dislikes in CMUD)

The features (or lack of) that are letting me down right now would have to be:
1) AutoExpand always set to true
2) AutoExpand always set to true
3) AutoExpand always set to true

I'm sure there's things i've missed, and i like the new scripting system a bunch, but the fact is, i've spent so much time learning to optimize my zmud scripts, that the speed boosts compared to my available coding time these days just doesn't outweigh the differences to what happens when i type sometihng in the command line. If there was one setting i wish you could implement after this is all done, it would be a set of options to revert the command line to act the same as the possible actions in zmud.

Also, the triggers seem a little less powerful. Been a while since i've tested cmud, and today i've been impressed again with it, but if i remember correctly, i can't make it expand wildcards within { and } anymore etc, which was extremely useful when making auto-prompt detecting triggers etc for those scripts you wish to distribute.

Apprentice Joined: 26 Apr 2007 Posts: 113

Editor, scripting improvements and now the stability of the client. I've hardly had any speed or other problems with Cmud that rend it completely worthless to my mind.

Posted: Tue Jan 15, 2008 6:23 pm

Wizard Joined: 22 Mar 2007 Posts: 2320

Modules and modularity
Events, which makes modularity better
True functions, again for modularity's sake
Hm. Interesting. I didn't realize I was such a big fan of modularity!

The following are not new, but a great feature over other clients
Multistate triggers
Mapper
Buttons, gauges, statusbar, and other window utilities

Sorcerer Joined: 10 Oct 2000 Posts: 706 Location: USA

1) Compiled Scripts
2) Package Library
3) Setting Editor - Everything in one spot

Old Features
1) Mapper - Like other said.. This puts it over the top.. I can't wait for the new mapper to be completed. Razz

Magician Joined: 17 Apr 2005 Posts: 496

ATCP, #sayadd, regex lookarounds.

Beginner Joined: 17 Sep 2002 Posts: 16

I could agree more with Guinn. For me what tempted me over to CMUD and what will keep me here would have to be the interface.

The fact that it's also being actively developed is nice.

Apprentice Joined: 14 Apr 2008 Posts: 105

MAPPER!

Beginner Joined: 17 Sep 2002 Posts: 16

Oh I forgot to mention the scroll back in CMUD... I hated in zMUD how it would drop down and get stuck sometimes, it just wasn't smooth. It is in CMUD, and it makes a big difference for me. I guess it's part of the interface, but at least it's a little more specific than my first post.

Beginner Joined: 05 Nov 2007 Posts: 14

I like nearly everything from something as simple as making color triggers, aliases, macros, counting how many kills of each type of foe per session, to more complicated setups like sorting through texts to get keywords used in mantras. The package idea is brilliant, as it lets us fellow mudders share our genious code.

I just wish I had some cmud guru's on the mud I frequent. :)

I also like the mapper, but for some reason it doesnt work well on my mud. But this is really the one and only downside I have seen.

Wanderer Joined: 31 Oct 2004 Posts: 94

The mapper is why I use CMUD/Zmud.

I'll also go ahead and say that the database leaves much to be desired.

Apprentice Joined: 18 Feb 2007 Posts: 190

threads and signals ^ infinity Exclamation

loop and conditionals speed is nice too
so are better regexes and telnet triggers

Apprentice Joined: 14 Sep 2007 Posts: 167 Location: aztx

(1) Clear, Organized and Efficient :D

(2) It is Fast

Those are my main reasons.

Magician Joined: 17 Apr 2005 Posts: 496

Real time debugger.

Posted: Thu Feb 05, 2009 1:05 pm

the Mapper, definitely the Mapper