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Gen-mesgboard

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gen-mesgboard(#419FWLM2) is a program that implements simple in-game bulletin boards.

Setup

First you must pick an object to hold the datastore for the message. There are two approaches to this.

  • Use an object (THING). This is nice because you can easily move the board around. However, the board can only be read in the room the object exists in.
  • Use a room or parent room. This is nice because you don't have to have a separate object, and in the case of a parent room the bulletin board can be read anywhere under it. On the downside moving it becomes a major chore involving copying large property trees.

Once you have decided, you can create the board. This is really as simple as creating the exit that handles all it's actions. If your bulletin board's dbref was #123456, the command would be:

@action write;read;erase;editmesg;msg-edit;protect=#123456,#419

It is often wise to set an expire time on messages. This is set in days in a property on the bulletin board. To set a 14 day expire on messages on the above bulletin board, you would type:

@set #123456=_expire:14

Usage

Writing Messages

To write a message, you use the write command. Optionally you can follow it with a subject, otherwise you will be prompted for one. It then asks for keywords, and then drops you into the lsedit editor. Using .end will save the new message, and .abort will cancel it.

You can edit a message you previously posed with editmesg <message number>, again putting you back in the editor.

Deleting Messages

If you wrote the message, or are the owner of the board, you can type erase <message number> to delete a message. Be careful, you can't undo this! A common mistake when deleting multiple messages is to forget that the message numbers will change when you have deleted one. Check the index again! (Or delete later messages first.)

Reading Messages

To get an index of messages, you can simply type read. To read a specific message, you use read <message number>. A convent trick is to use read - which reads the next message after the last one you read. This is a quick way to go through a bulletin board. It also remembers where you were between sessions. You can type bbs #unread to get a listing of boards with unread messages on them.

Expiration Protection

It is common to have rules posted to a bulletin board, or other important instructions for a public area. You can protect messages from expiration with the protect <message number> command.

Protecting a message also changes the ) following a message number to a }, letting you know it's protected. This also tends to give the users the impression that the message is somehow important.

See Also

  • bbs - A global command for finding message boards with new messages.
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