General
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Remove "carried" and revise handling of implicit actions
"My suggestion would be to abolish 'carried' in action specifications (as in Eating is an action applying to one carried thing) and replace the carrying requirements rule with a new rulebook that's responsible for all implicit actions (including the existing implicit takes). This would make it easy to unlist an implicit action rule an author doesn't like or doesn't need and replace it with one s/he prefers. For example, instead of way the implicit take for eating currently works, an author would be able to write:
implicit action for eating a portable edible thing:
carry out the implicitly taking…0 votes -
(Parsing) Strip full stops from topics before parsing them as topic understood
If someone is using the topic matching system and they type ASK EMMA ABOUT FISH., that doesn't match "fish" because of the period/full stop, but we obviously don't want to strip out punctuation until after we've done the first bit of parsing and separated commands and so on. It would be possible to fix this with Punctuation Removal, but it's such a common issue that it would be preferable for the standard library to handle it.
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Let "showme" display temporary variables
Currently, code like:
repeat with item running through things:
showme "Checking [item]: valid."...will fail, claiming that the text substitution is a "temporary thing, long gone by the time it would need to be printed." But this is not in fact true in this case, and would be a useful thing to be able to check.
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(Programming) Ability to refer to objects in terms of their heading
Manipulation of objects based on the heading in which they
occurred, as inAll rooms in Section - first floor (living area) are in the Ark Quarters.
or
If the player is in a room in Section - first floor (living area) then...
0 votesThis might be possible to do, but in initial discussions there is no consensus
that this would be a good idea. Barring more persuasive argument, we are
inclined to leave the current behavior alone. -
(World model) Make talking actions apply to visible things
Currently, answering it that, telling it about, and asking it
about require that the person being talked to be touchable. It is proposed
that this be changed to "visible" instead. There are some implications for
the conceptual picture of what is going on - speaking in this way becomes,
perhaps, a less intimate act - but it seems more rather than less
realistic.0 votes -
Restarting clears prior actions for future recompile/replay requests
Requests to recompile and replay will not perform any actions taken in the last play-through prior to a "> restart" command being issued.
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0 votes
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(Programming/Tables) Adding default values in table columns
The ability to declare a column of a table to have a default
(non-null) value unless the author overrides this; as inTable of Drugs
drug cost
a drug a price (usually $1.99)0 votes -
(Syntax) Syntax to determine how many turns remain before a scheduled event
For instance:
Before turning the hourglass:
if the time until the sand runs out is less than 3 turns:
instead say “There’s only a little sand left on top; you might as well let it run its course.”This would require some additional syntax to determine whether this event is in fact scheduled at all; otherwise, checking for the time remaining until it runs out would have to return a runtime error.
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(Parsing/actions) More information available during parser errors
There are several kinds of parser error that are hard to edit through the rules for printing a parser error because they rely on information buried inside the I6 code. In particular, it is difficult to reproduce or modify "The foo is empty." replies in response to GET ALL FROM FOO. It would be nice if information about what action we think we were attempting were more exposed, at least so far as to allow the I7 author to override the various cases recognized by the I6 code.
When this is done, the example "Kiwi" should be revised to use…
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(World model) Optimize static relations
It may be possible to optimize searches
and loops using relations that are declared to remain static from compile time
onward.0 votesThis we believe would be useful; we’ve seen cases where it would substantially
improve performance. -
Allow constants I7 constants to be linked to I6 constants
Currently you can define constants only for kinds of value in Inform 7. You can define variables and objects with the "translates into I6" syntax, but you can't use that to define them with a I6 constants. Well variables can, but they're not treated as constants in I7, and you can't use them in tables for example. You can't define an object constant by the translates syntax because you'll get an I6 error about using the name twice. It would be useful to be able to bring an I6 constant into I7, especially if it's not limited to kinds of…
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(Actions/Syntax) Handling for reciprocal actions like TIE
A quick way to write rules about actions in which the noun and second noun are equivalent, as in
Instead of tying the blue rope to the red rope or vice versa: ...
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Provide mechanism to query model/parser for list of valid commands
Jon Ingold's work with Glk and type-ahead command hints is wonderful, but it's also a very complex piece of code.
I believe that this is a significant path to follow outside of the user interface and strictly within the game engine.
My suggestion to enable the author the ability to list "potential" commands, sort them on some probability of success, and let the author review them programmatically.
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0 votes
This is a bit of a performance challenge, and could produce very, very
verbose output, but we will look into it. -
(IDE) Reduce type size in IDE for tables
Use a smaller type size (more similar to the comment size) for tables. (Alternatively, make the table font/size configurable so that users can customize them as the Mac IDE allows with other kinds of text.) Smaller table text would allow more text on the "page" before it wraps and the table becomes impossible to read. This would continue the move toward greater readability that was advanced by the (very nice) auto-tabbing feature in the last build. This also has the advantage from an "ideological" standpoint, since it mirrors the traditional practice in books of setting tables in a different font…
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(IDEs) Pass the k flag to the Inform 6 compiler under Windows
...so that gameinfo.dbg is available for debugging.
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(Debugging) Strict rule-naming setting
The ability to use a strict setting so that the compiler will catch
unnamed rules (as for extensions which ought to name all of their rules
for the convenience of subsequent authors).0 votesWe accept this suggestion, though we think it should be something that can
be set per extension (like “authorial modesty”). -
A rulebook sorting law that orders by kind of object.
A new law that sorts rules based on the kind of objects specified after 'when' could be applied when the rules are otherwise equally specific.
Color is a kind of thing.
Blue is a color.
Red is a color.
The current color is a thing that varies;Frobbing is an action applying to nothing. Understand "frob" as frobbing.
Place is a room.
The current color is Blue.Instead of frobbing when the current color is something:
say "Thing!".
Instead of frobbing when the current color is a color:
say "Color!".
Instead of frobbing when the current color is blue:
say…0 votes -
(Debugging) Exportable walkthroughs/test me scripts
I
don't use much the skein or transcript concept, but I find the "test me"
command very useful. I'd like to be able to keep it after the release of the
game, or convert the command into a "walkthrough" option, which could either
display the whole solution, only a part of it, or replay the game
automatically (useful for testing a game with different interpreters). At the
moment I must export all the "test me" commands, clean up the code, and use it
with the replay command.0 votesWe’ll see whether this is possible.
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