Side-programs for Graal
 

For servers that switch to the NPC Server thing, I have heard that most of their NPCs will not work any more. I think that Graal needs some side-programs (like the level generator) that will run through a folder of levels, searching for NPCs, and add // #CLIENTSIDE or whatever command makes it act like a normal server, so that the NPCs will work until everyone can properly update the server. Suggestions or ideas?

wouldn't work

all scripters have different styles, and a program couldn't determine (in some cases) what the NPC is supposed to do

:)
 

couldn't they do it so, it would correct the ones it knew how too, and the ones it didn't go into a list, and the owner/operater cound fix manually? That would help Mr.Tyhm a whole lot, that is if Kai shows Mr.Tyhm how to make p2p scripts

Assimilators will have great difficulty with such things. I'd be surprised if anybody ever made one. If you could do it by just specifying everything as clientside, then what's the point of havng serverside script functionality?

This isn't supposed to determine what the NPC is supposed to do and replace code accordingly. This is just for servers switching to P2P, so that their NPCs will work like they did before. At least things will still work, unlike a heck of a lot of NPCs when the server makes the switch.

But putting //#CLIENTSIDE in front of them will not make them work.

I'm not sure what DOES make them work, but whatever it is, can it be added at the beginning of a NPC and it will work? How exactly DO you make a NPC act like they used to on regular non-P2P servers?

You can't. There is no magic little piece of text you can add to make them work. They must be converted in a fairly complicated manner.

If you want a tool, make it yourself. The NW level format is in human language and can be parsed easily. You could do the //#CLIENTSIDE thing with a (relatively) simple perl script.

Yet it wouldn't work, as I have explained.

Plus you could do it damn near any language.

But a Perl script would be the best solution, probably, because of its powerful pattern matching tools.

And I think the idea was that it would just put the //#CLIENTSIDE at the very beginning of each script; then they would function just the way the did before the switch to P2P. The server admin could then take his time in updating each script himself.

*shrugs*

I'm very careful in using words like "best" when I haven't seen all the languages out there.

But that wouldn't work! I've already explained it in this thread!

Okay, let's look at this. You write a script designed to be entirely clientside, because you don't have an NPC server. All of a sudden you get one, because of the new prices and account system and whatnot. Now all your clientside scripts are executed serverside, and that causes problems. So you put a line in each script which makes the entire script clientside, and therefore they all act exactly as they did before.

Where is the problem here? I certainly don't see one. Yes, you'd have to go back and fix all the scripts, but in the meantime it's better to have scripts which don't use the NPC server than scripts which simply don't work.

I've explained this a million times. Bottom line: Scripts that worked on non-P2P servers usually won't work with the NPC Server just because you added //#CLIENTSIDE. There's more to it.

Such as?
Examples?

Bottom line. Line at the bottom. Just trust me on it, okay?

NPC weapon scripts cannot begin with //#CLIENTSIDE...the server thinks you are trying to hack by adding illegal weapons :(

You cannot warp players clientside on p2p...you can use clientside npcs for warping, but it must be done through triggeraction...same thing with money, all done serverside to prevent the use of memory editors to change vulnerable variables and strings

You can convert all the .graals to .nw's, then do a search through them all for toweapons, then just have a good scripter switch em to P2P serverside. Easy enuf =)

NO, it's far more complicated.

Kai: No one knows anything. Let them spit out their ignorance becasue obviosly truthfull information is unimportant.

Let me just say this, if you don't know how to script serverside, then don't make suggestions on how to make an assimilator to do the work for you. Only humans can make logical decisions such as the ones you have to make when converting non-p2p to p2p. I have yet to see an assimilator with artificial intelegence, hell i have yet to see TRUE artificial intelegence!!

That's because the core tenet of Artificial Intelligence is that everything can be expressed or at least aproximated algorythmically. It runs counter to the human ego - imagine a scientist telling you he could predict your every action with a complex mathematical formula! - and so once we see how an AI works, we insist it's cheating and that it is not, in fact, AI. The only way to make an AI is to throw everything in a Box of Mystery, add some component that nobody understands. Key example, Short Circuit. Johnny Five was only an AI because he was struck by lightning. Up to that point, he was running a complicated formula. After that point, nobody understood the formula anymore.
Another example, Elisa. You know, that "AI" psychologist. It seems to be an AI until you realize it's just a sentance diagrammer with a few keyword recognition routines. Then it's just another stupid program that cheats to make you think it's smart.

Point being, as long as there are rules for converting Classic script to NPCServ, there is an algorythm for it and, consequently, a way to make an assimilator do it for you.

you guys should listen to Kai, *hmm, wonders why he is the NPC moderator of this forum* Kai you should just say it wont work and leave, it'll never get added because stefan knows this:)

The program would have to know whats serverside, whats clientside, and move the lines around and then put clientside in the right place.
There are people that have trouble doing that don't push computers power...

Next you'll know someone will want a program that can write scripts from scratch on just about anything :rolleyes:

I don't deny that it could be done. I just doubt that it could be done in any small amount of time, or with any measure of ease.