GUI snippet
 

I've been working on improving the interface for God Wars II for nearly a year now, making it easier to navigate through a mixture of graphics, sound, and enhancements to the text. The following screenshots demonstrate my GUI using MUSHclient and Mudlet:
For the past few weeks I've been working on a snippet that adds the same feature support to other muds, and it's now pretty much complete. The snippet is relatively self-contained, and is designed to be easy to install and easy to use - I've added it to a few codebases already, and it generally takes me around 5-10 minutes (at least once I've worked out where the hooks need to go).

The underlying concept isn't new - muds like BatMUD, Maiden Desmodus, Primordiax, Archons of Avenshar, etc, have been offering graphical interfaces for a while. But those are handled through private clients and closed protocols. What makes this different is that it operates on existing open source clients, using an open protocol (MSDP) that allows owners and players alike to quickly and easily design custom GUIs for their favourite muds. You can see some of the interfaces my players have created for MUSHclient and TinTin++ , and .

A handful of other muds have also made progress in this direction - for example the Aardwolf MUSHclient plugin and the IRE Mudlet interface both work in a similar way. But implementing full server-side support is a non-trivial job, and many mud owners still view graphical interfaces as some sort of mysterious black magic that requires a huge investment of time and skill. While it's certainly possible to invest a lot of time into GUI work, even a simple interface can be a huge improvement, and it's something that can be achieved extremely quickly.

Here are a couple of simple proof-of-concept "themed" demo GUIs I created for other muds - they took me about 1-2 hours each:
Here's a slightly more fleshed-out GUI I created and then adapted - it took around 2-3 hours of tweaking to create the first one, the other two took only a few minutes each once I'd found suitable images:
In layman's terms, the snippet provides the following features:
In more technical terms, it adds support for TTYPE, NAWS, MSDP, ATCP, MSSP, MSP and MXP, as well as UTF-8 (using CHARSET) and XTerm 256 colors. The plugin is a Lua script bundled with some public domain images to get you started.

The Realm of War has already installed the snippet, while several other muds are currently in the process of adapting it to their needs, including Realms of Despair, SlothMUD and 4Dimensions.

If you're interested in using it as well, or just want to read more, you can . Even if you hate graphics, you may still find some of the other features useful.

Re: GUI snippet
 

KaVir, I could so kiss you right now. This is something I've been wanting to see available for the non-commercial muds for at least 10 years. I am definitely putting this as a major point on my to-do list.

Re: GUI snippet
 

KaViR, this snippet is amazing. I got it working on our development port within about 15 minutes and haven't been able to stop myself from messing around with it since. I've been following your thread over on MudBytes and had been hoping that you would eventually release something like this. If you are interested I can keep you up to date on how we end up using this on Ansalon.

Re: GUI snippet
 

Glad to hear people are finding it useful. I'd definitely be interested to see what you do with it - perhaps you could even post some screenshots once you've got a GUI?

Re: GUI snippet
 

Wow. This is really awesome stuff.

Just from the screenshots and the description it sounds great.

Re: GUI snippet
 

Just wondering is it still possible to extract data from the incoming stream ie my game has a hp ticker would it be possible to make that into a hp graphic bar.

Re: GUI snippet
 

Yes, you could also extract the data from the in-band stream using a regular expression. For example you could use the hp from your prompt to draw the energy bar, but that means that (1) you'd need to have a specific prompt pattern which included your hp, and (2) the energy bar would only update when you received a new prompt.

However the snippet uses MSDP to transmit the data out-of-band. That means you don't need to capture anything from the in-band stream - you can literally sit there with a static text window and watch your energy bars slowly refill, or watch the landscape scrolling past as you walk across the map, etc.

Re: GUI snippet
 

That's awesome the way I have seen muds do graphics is using specific lines on text which the client reads and then never outputs that line to the output window which is what I've been attempting to do but have failed so far I'll definitely check out this and see if it will fit in with my plans I'll post up some screen shots if I get it implemented.

Re: GUI snippet
 

Well you can gag the text, but you'll still get blank lines in most clients. In my mud you regenerate every second, so handling that in-band would be really spammy - it'd be like hitting enter once per second.

The only way you can really avoid that without going out-of-band is to send the data with something that should be displayed, like your prompt (this is also how MXP handles it). But then you've got the problem that the energy bars won't refresh unless the text window updates, and that feels pretty clunky - particularly when you're regenerating every second, and are waiting for your energy bars to refill before you carry on exploring an area.

This is an issue I struggled with for a while before settling on MSDP - if you're interested. The snippet (which took lothoemas 15 minutes to add to Ansalon) allows other muds to use the same features I've spent the last year working on.

Re: GUI snippet
 

Great post, KaVir, and thanks for sharing. Enhancing the player experience is my #1 priority and I'll be looking to use your snippet as a building block--one thing my server is missing is support for advanced desktop clients.

Just wanted to add a few more resources to the mix. If you're someone who is comfortable with HTML + JavaScript + PHP and who wants to extend the reach of your MUD to Facebook, or the web in general, with a custom web client for your game, take a look at these links:






(no login required, use IE9 or non-IE browser)

The app has the embedded automapper + a minimap, and the page code contains reusable functions for handling controls, etc. Feel free to rip the JS / HTML code from the Facebook app page as needed. Just plug your own art.

My FB app targets the non-mudder who wants to discover a new and more challenging game. While it doesn't have too many power user features, it supports such "pretty" stuff as player avatars with changing states, transparent overlay map, etc.

In my case, the server drives the app and minimap without using standard protocols, but you can easily change that. If you decide to give it a shot and need code snippets showing how the server feeds the app in my implementation, let me know.

Re: GUI snippet
 

I actually had a thought last night - how well will this scale to screens of various size and resolution? There's a big difference between my 22" widescreen on my desktop and the 10.1" netbook (which I don't typically MUD on because of screen size - in a busy room, just 'look' can fill my full screen). Will text size and the background graphics scale well, or will it create even more of a problem on the tiny screens?

Re: GUI snippet
 

That's entirely up to the client and/or plugin. A small degree of scaling is quite easy to handle - for example my MUSHclient GUI shrinks and stretches the text window and energy bars to fit the screen. But resizing bitmaps (particularly small icons) can degrade their quality.

Re: GUI snippet
 

I've linked your snippet from the and specification pages.

The snippet doesn't have a name (that I can find) so I named it Kavir's MUD Protocol Handler, is that alright?

Re: GUI snippet
 

Excellent, thanks. You may want to link to the copy in the instead though, it's a more "neutral" download location.

Sure. I didn't really name it.

Re: GUI snippet
 

I'll link MudBytes instead. Another issue I noticed the other night is that Realm of War's current MSSP initialization is rather poor.

- Realm of War is at the bottom.

I'm not sure if some kind of sanity checking would be helpful / too much work. Adding some comments with suggested values might help. I've emailed the guy; I guess MSSP is going to be a mess until a mud listing (that people actually want to be on) forces people to fill it out properly.

Re: GUI snippet
 

Well I do actually have the following comment directly above the table:
However I didn't want to clutter the table itself with too many comments. I considered including some default values, but figured some muds might leave them as-is rather than updating them, which would result in incorrect information - better to have less data than wrong data.

You could perhaps provide a script linked from the MSSP page that generates a report of any issues. It wouldn't deal with deliberately false information, like The Isles reporting a random number for "PLAYERS" every time you send it an mssp-request, but it would at least ensure that the fields used the correct format.

It'd also be nice if your crawler indicated MSDP support, particularly now that more muds are starting to add it.

Re: GUI snippet
 

Hadn't thought about creating a debugging script for server developers, that's a good idea.

I'll have a look at the variables you're using and synchronize the spec where needed.

Also, are there any links for your Mushclient / Mudlet plugins? As far as I can tell you've only linked screenshots, but no links to the actual plugins.

Re: GUI snippet
 

I've included the full set from the specification (including the extended variables), although all but the essentials are commented out by default.

I did provide a link to the MUSHclient plugin for the - you can . The others are tailored to a specific mud, and I've given copies directly to the owners of those muds. Nothing generic for Mudlet yet, but I can throw something together I guess...it's really the snippet that I'm promoting here though, the plugins are just a demo of what you can use it for.

Re: GUI snippet
 

I was wondering the other day, does your snippet's MSSP support work for a MUD crawler that doesn't respond to TTYPE?

Re: GUI snippet
 

If the crawler responds with either WILL or WONT, then the snippet will attempt to negotiate MSSP. If the crawler ignores the IAC DO TTYPE, then its telnet implementation is broken, and the snippet won't attempt to negotiate further.

Your includes the Realm of War, which uses my snippet, so clearly your crawler has no problem with it.

Re: GUI snippet
 

Hey thanks for pointing me towards using mushclient, I was able to build a pretty simple window in not that long of time and used a trigger code to snag outstream data that only that client sees. It was also possible to remove the text without leaving a white space which was nice cause the hp ticker got very annoying after a while. I'd love to one day implement that snippet you wrote but for now this is working very nicely. Thanks a lot for all the help you threw out there.

Re: GUI snippet
 

Using MUSHClient's omit_from_output feature, I assume? That , and (because the text is actually drawn then removed) won't work for screen readers, and may cause flickering if you send a lot of data. If you want to omit multiple lines you'll need to look at something like Nick Gammon's plugin (although that'll strip all blank lines, making the display look a bit squashed). Other clients will require their own solutions.

Your plugin will also need some way to tell the mud what data it wishes to receive. You could try looking over some of the older threads on the MUSHclient forums for inspiration (particularly the Aardwolf ones from 2006-2008), as your approach is similar to the way the "old school" plugins worked, before the recent push towards out-of-band protocols.

The snippet lets you avoid all of these issues of course, using a generic solution that works on a range of clients, but that's not all it does - it also supports extended colour, client detection, clickable links, inline graphics, unicode characters, sound, etc. And it's public domain, so there are no licence restrictions.

Bryantos also uploaded earlier today, if anyone's interested.

Re: GUI snippet
 

For anyone wishing to use the snippet in a TBAmud derivative, I've now updated the version in the MudBytes code repository to include full TBA installation instructions - you can . I recommend using those instructions rather than the diff file in the TBA section, as the diff appears to have some issues.

I'm now aware of four operational muds using the snippet (not including my own), and at least two other muds using it on their test ports. If you support MSDP (either through the snippet or through your own solution), please contact Scandum so that he can add you to the .

Re: GUI snippet
 

If anyone has used the Merc installation instructions, please be aware that I missed something - thanks go to Bryantos for pointing it out.

In read_from_description(), you need to replace this:
With this:
Without that change, spammed commands will be silently dropped, which can be rather annoying (particularly for movement).

Re: GUI snippet
 

Finally got this in and going, thanks to KaViR and Bryantos. We also just released the first version of our GUI, not far from KaViR's Generic Plugin but I have certainly learned a lot so far and plan on learning more as I hope to get a bitmap version of my ascii mapper going as well as a tracking of our three moons in the top/right corner.

Here is a link to our GUI's wiki page:


And a screenshot:

Re: GUI snippet
 

I've to resolve a couple of issues that were recently brought to my attention. If you're already using the snippet, I recommend using diff first, so that you don't wipe over your MSSP variables.

The first issue is broken packets. If the client splits the data across multiple packets, the snippet can now handle it correctly. Thanks go to Tyche for pointing this out.

The second issue is a bit more tricky. provides a mechanism for cycling through multiple terminal types, and the mud uses this standard to detect support for XTerm 256 colors. However when used with Windows telnet, the client is left in a terminal emulation mode that appears unable to communicate with the mud - and it refuses to return to the top of the list. Or to put it in simple terms: Windows telnet freezes when it connects to the mud.

My solution is a bit nasty, but it's simple and effective. If the first TTYPE is "ANSI", the mud won't request any further terminal types. This has no impact on dedicated mud clients such as WinTin++ and BlowTorch, as they identify themselves by name on the first TTYPE request.

There is an alternative approach , which I may add in the future, but it comes with a different drawback; the mud would need to pause for a few seconds before displaying the login screen. However this approach would also allow you to avoid the automatic disabling of echo for Windows telnet users.

Re: GUI snippet
 

I've updated the snippet again, primarily because the MSDP specification has undergone several changes since the snippet was released, but also to resolve a few issues I've encountered while helping other people install it.You can download the latest version from MudBytes .

An updated version of the generic MUSHclient plugin can be downloaded from .

The following muds are now using the snippet to offer their players cutting-edge protocol support:If you've added the snippet but aren't on the above list, please let me know!

There are also a few other muds that have implemented their own MSDP solutions, including The 7th Plane (7thplane.net 8888), which has also incorporated a few of the other features from the snippet, ConQUEST (conquest.sdmud.com 5000), Elvenblade (elvenblade.ca 23), and Lowlands (lolamud.net 6969).

Meanwhile, I've seen a few more muds adding support for GMCP, which offers similar functionality to MSDP. Both protocols make it considerably easier to design graphical interfaces, so it's pretty exciting to see more and more muds .

EDIT: If you're using version 3, there's a bug in AllocString() - you need to replace malloc(Size) with malloc(Size+1), to take into account the NUL string terminator. The Mudbytes link now points to version 4, which includes the fix.

Re: GUI snippet
 

I wasn't sure whether to start a new thread for this, but figured to post this here as the subject is identical.

I finished work on MTH 1.4, a public domain telnet / protocol handling snippet this week and it's now available for download .

MTH 1.3 (released April 6, 2009) added support for NAWS, TTYPE, NEW-ENVIRON, MCCP, and MSSP. The MCCP implementation might be of interest to some because it uses 32K of memory per player, instead of the 138K used by most MCCP implementations.

MTH 1.4 adds support for EOR, MSDP, MTTS, Arachnos, and xterm 256 colors.

follows specification and should work with KaVir's MUSHClient plugin. In addition the MTH snippet has a walkthrough for implementing the ROOM variable, which combined with this provides you with a status bar and fully automatic automapping. Not a whole lot of eye candy, but it's very effective, and will work with any other client that can parse MSDP and has an OOB mapper.

is a standard I created to negotiate terminal capabilities to the server. It's currently only supported by TinTin++, and in MTH it's used to detect 256 color support, and can be used to detect ANSI, VT100, UTF-8, and SCREEN READER support as well. MTTS is very easy to add both client and server side, unlike other alternatives.

is an MSDP based Intermud network. Arachnos is relatively easy to implement for any MSDP enabled MUD. Instead of the traditional Intermud systems where you connect your MUD to a central server, an Arachnos spider connects to your mud using the normal connection, then uses MSDP to receive and transmit chat messages. Intermud gaming spiders are a likely future addition as anyone can create and run a spider. More information is available in the spec.

MTH extends the classic 16 color ANSI color system to a 32 color system using xterm color codes. ANSI supports 6 primary, 6 secondary, and 4 gray-shade colors. MTH adds the 12 , and 4 gray-shade colors. A stand alone version of the color snippet and a screenshot is available . The code also supports color code compression.

Enjoy.

Re: GUI snippet
 

While helping Splork get the snippet working in , we came across an interesting problem - it seems that the MXP specification doesn't actually define whether the server should initiate negotiation with IAC WILL MXP or IAC DO MXP. While some clients therefore support both, others support only one or the other. I've therefore updated the snippet to support both (it attempts one if the other fails).

There was also a complaint from another user about the MSSP table being cumbersome to update for non-static fields such as players and uptime. I've therefore changed the table to use function pointers, which should make it much easier to update in future.

Scandum also asked me to change LIST to use an array, as per the latest specification, which I've done.

Other than that there were a couple of bugfixes, but nothing serious. Here's the list of changes:You can download version 5 .

Re: GUI snippet
 

Version 6 is , and contains the following minor changes:

Re: GUI snippet
 

Version 7 of the snippet is now available (from , and from MudBytes once they accept the latest update), and includes the following changes:If you're updating from an older version of the snippet, please don't forget to make a backup of your MSSP and MSDP variables before copying the latest version, and update the appropriate literals for your mud name, MCCP, etc (in fact I'd recommend doing a diff just to make sure you don't miss anything). You'll need to update to use the new ProtocolNoEcho() function (instructions are in the installation text files), but other than that you shouldn't need to make any additional changes to the rest of your mud.

Re: GUI snippet
 

Just a quick update, in case anyone is using version 7. One of the variables wasn't initialised, resulting in some confusion during negotiation - this has now been fixed, and uploaded for version 8. There are no other changes other than a couple of additions to the ROM installation instructions.

Re: GUI snippet
 

I hope this is the right spot for this...

Is there any way I can actually use this GUI snippet as a generic template for every MUD I play on without the MUD having to do anything? I love the centered text, the background and the like. The prompt I think I might be able to change myself, since it's only:
HP:10/10 SP:10/10 AP:10/10>

Thanks in advance!

Re: GUI snippet
 

The snippet is a module that needs to be integrated into the mud, and it offers a number of powerful features, with MSDP being the primary one.

The generic plugin is a simple example to showcase the advantages of MSDP, although you can also use it as a starting point for designing your own GUI. You can in theory use the plugin for muds that don't use the snippet, but if they don't support MSDP (or a similar protocol) you'll have to use regular expressions to capture the data. This will require additional work, limit your options, require you to have a specific prompt pattern for data you wish to capture, and the display will only update when new text is sent to the screen - in other words, it'll suffer from the very limitations the snippet was designed to overcome.

Re: GUI snippet
 

I see. No problem, I'll definitely show this link to the MUD I play and see if we can get something going.

Thanks a ton for the reply! You're doing the Lord's work here, good sir!