was: Scramble boards now h2o

[mgh <hartwell@gate.net>]

> ... Possibly even worse than
> the initial programming, is satisfying all the humans who use the
> server, afterward. You know how people are- the more you give them,
> the more they want. There would be an endless series of requests:
> "I want to change my colors!" "I want a smaller/larger image!" "I want
> a drink of water!" :-)
>
> David

david: I searched the help files, but couldn't find the syntax for the water
command.  I would like a drink of water, but the server keeps throwing back
errors.  Also, is there a chance that someone could implement a coffee
command?


Back on topic for a half second:  I think FIBS might be a good example of
how to solve this problem.  The first international backgammon server has
several (3 or 4) board styles.  If you want to connect and play using a
telnet client, you use one boardstyle, where the board is drawn out with
lines and x's and o's.  If you want to use any of the graphical clients, you
may ... and the clients work from a boardstyle that is not very human
readable, but it is easier for a program to parse.  Then you point and click
... drag and drop your pips ... and when you make your move, the client
sends the command to the server.

so in theory, anyone could write a small little program to parse out the
board and then display it graphically in any of a million different
combinations of board colors, sizes.  You could play with ivory pips, onyx
pips, pips that look like packmen, pips that are made of dry ice and sit
there subliming as you think about your move.  Whatever someone wanted to
code.

the only change on the server side would be to have an option to display the
board in a simple computer readable format.

just a thought .... i'm going to go get a drink of water


....mark hartwell