EtaMOO-0.2.0.0: README.md

Important!
==========

**This is experimental and (currently) incomplete software. It is not yet
fully usable, although with further development it is hoped that it soon will
be.**

_At present, the code will load a database and listen for network
connections. You can connect using any `telnet` client and interact with the
MOO environment, however no changes to the database will be saved, and a few
other features have also yet to be implemented._

About
=====

EtaMOO is a new implementation of the LambdaMOO server written in Haskell.

[LambdaMOO][] is a network-accessible, multi-user, programmable, interactive
system well-suited to the construction of text-based adventure games,
conferencing systems, and other collaborative software.

  [LambdaMOO]: http://www.ipomoea.org/moo/

EtaMOO differs from LambdaMOO in a few significant ways:

  * EtaMOO is multi-threaded. MOO tasks run concurrently, producing network
    output and changes to the database in isolated transactions that are
    committed only when not in conflict with any other transaction. (In cases
    of conflict, transactions are automatically retried.) Separate threads are
    also used for network connection management, so for example name lookups
    do not block the entire server.

  * EtaMOO supports 64-bit MOO integers via compile-time build option.

  * EtaMOO is Unicode-aware, and will eventually include support for Unicode
    MOO strings via compile-time build option.

  * EtaMOO supports IPv6.

The implementation of EtaMOO closely follows the specifications of the
[LambdaMOO Programmer's Manual][Programmer's Manual], and should therefore be
compatible with most LambdaMOO databases as of about version 1.8.3 of the
LambdaMOO server code.

  [Programmer's Manual]: http://www.ipomoea.org/moo/#progman

Installing
----------

EtaMOO is built with [Cabal][], the Haskell package manager. In the simplest
case, simply running:

    cabal install EtaMOO

should automatically download, build, and install the `etamoo` executable
after doing the same for all of its Haskell dependencies.

  [Cabal]: http://www.haskell.org/cabal/

Cabal itself is part of the [Haskell Platform][] which is available for many
distributions and platforms.

  [Haskell Platform]: http://www.haskell.org/platform/

EtaMOO has non-Haskell dependencies on two external libraries: _libpcre_ (with
UTF-8 support enabled) for regular expression matching, and, possibly,
_libcrypt_ (often part of the standard libraries) for the MOO `crypt()`
built-in function. You may need to ensure you have these available before
installing EtaMOO.

Hacking
-------

[Documentation][] is available for the various types, data structures, and
functions used internally by EtaMOO.

  [Documentation]: http://verement.github.io/etamoo/doc/