92 lines
4.6 KiB
Plaintext
92 lines
4.6 KiB
Plaintext
chapter 1 "Introduction to the Coding Environment"
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LPC Basics
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Written by Descartes of Borg
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first edition: 23 april 1993
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second edition: 25 may 1993
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CHAPTER 1: Introduction to the Coding Environment
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1.1 UNIX file structure
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LPMuds use basic UNIX commands and its file structure. If you know
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UNIX commands already, then note (with a few exceptions) options are
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not available to the commands. Like DOS, UNIX is heirarchical. The
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root directory of which all directories are sub-directories is called
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root(/). And from those sub-directories you may have further
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sub-directories. A directory may be referred to in two different ways:
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1) by its full name, or absolute name, or 2) by its relative name.
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Absolute name refers to the directory's full path starting from / winding
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down the directory tree until you name the directory in question. For
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example:
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/players/descartes/obj/monster
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refers to the directory monster which is a sub-directory of obj which
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is a sub-directory of descartes which is a sub-directory of players
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which is a sudirectory of /.
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The relative name refers to the name relative to another directory.
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The above example is called monster relative to /players/descartes/obj,
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but it is also called obj/monster relative to /players/descartes,
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descartes/obj/monster relative to /players, and finally
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players/descartes/obj/monster relative to /. You can tell the
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difference between absolute names and relative names because absolute
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names always start with /. In order to know exactly which directory
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is being named by a relative name, you naturally must know what
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directory it is relative to.
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A directory contains sub-directories and files. LPMuds only use text files
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inside the mudlib. Like directories, files have both absolute and
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relative names. The most basic relative name is often referred to as the file
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name, with the rest of the absolute name being referred to as the path. So,
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for the file: /players/descartes/castle.c, castle.c is the file name, and
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/players/descartes is the path.
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On some muds, a file with a file name beginning with a . (like .plan) is
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not visible when you list files with the regular file listing command.
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1.2 UNIX Commands
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Along with the UNIX file structure, LPMuds use many UNIX commands. Typical
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UNIX commands on most muds are:
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pwd, cd, ls, rm, mv, cp, mkdir, rmdir, more, head, cat, ed
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If you have never before seen UNIX commands, you probably are thinking this
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is all nonsense. Well, it is, but you got to use them. Before getting
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into what they mean though, first a discussion of current directory.
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If you know DOS, then you know what a current working directory is.
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At any given point, you are considered to be "in" some directory. This
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means that any relative file or directory names you give in UNIX commands
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are relative to that directory. For example, if my current directory is
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/players/descartes and I type "ed castle.c" (ed is the command to edit),
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then it assumes I mean the file /players/descartes/castle.c
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pwd: shows you your current working directory
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cd: changes your current working directory. You may give either relative
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or absolute path names. With no arguments, it changes to your home
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directory.
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ls: lists all files in the directory named. If no directory is named,
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it lists the files of the current working directory
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rm: deletes the file named
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mv: renames the file named
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cp: copies the file named
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mkdir: makes a new directory
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rmdir: deletes a directory. All files must have been first removed.
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more: pages the file named so that the file appears on your screen one
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page at a time.
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cat: shows the whole file to you at once
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head: shows you the first several lines of a file
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tail: shows you the last several lines of a file
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ed: allows you to edit a file using the mud editor
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1.3 Chapter Summary
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UNIX uses a heirarchical file structure with the root of the tree being
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named /. Other directories branch off from that root directory and
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in turn have their own sub-directories. All directories may contain
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directories and files. Directories and files are referred to either
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by their absolute name, which always begins with /, or by their relative
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name which gives the file's name relative to a particular directory.
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In order to get around in the UNIX files structure, you have the
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typical UNIX commands for listing files, your current directory, etc.
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On your mud, all of the above commands should have detailed help commands
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to help you explore exactly what they do. In addition, there should
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be a very detailed file on your mud's editor. If you are unfamiliar
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with ed, you should go over this convoluted file.
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