.z3 or .z4 possible with Inform?
Mike Reddy
Hi, I'm using YAZI 1.1 as a Z-machine interpreter, which does not support
.z5-8 data files. Is it possible to take the existing sources and compile
them in .z3 or .z4 so that I can play them on my Newton?
--
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macu...@gloria.cord.edu
In article <mreddy-2001...@mreddy.comp.glam.ac.uk>,
mre...@glam.ac.uk (Mike Reddy) wrote:
>
> Hi, I'm using YAZI 1.1 as a Z-machine interpreter, which does not support
> .z5-8 data files. Is it possible to take the existing sources and compile
> them in .z3 or .z4 so that I can play them on my Newton?
existing games having source available, I wouldn't place any bets. In
any case, you'll probably have to tweak the source; .z3 doesn't
support a number of features. IIRC, this includes those box quotes
which are almost mandatory now.
..
Let me crack open the manual... Yep, read all about it in Chapter VI
section 31, and realize that you can't do any of the tricks in section
32 with .z3. Happy hacking!
..
Also: I feel your pain. My computer of choice is an Apple II, and
making .z3 work on it is about all I see myself being able to do in
the near future (of course this is how God wanted us to play text
adventures). My dream is to fit my game-in-progress, the worlds best
(and only) Latin Inform game into a .z3 and run it on an Apple II.
(Yes, my dream is to create the software product with the smallest
possible audience: and here I think I have a good shot =)
-Mike
-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet
Matthew T. Russotto
In article <885399753....@dejanews.com>,
<macu...@gloria.cord.edu> wrote:
}Also: I feel your pain. My computer of choice is an Apple II, and
}making .z3 work on it is about all I see myself being able to do in
}the near future (of course this is how God wanted us to play text
}adventures). My dream is to fit my game-in-progress, the worlds best
}(and only) Latin Inform game into a .z3 and run it on an Apple II.
}(Yes, my dream is to create the software product with the smallest
}possible audience: and here I think I have a good shot =)
}-Mike
The Apple II could run .z5 games. And .z6 as well -- in fact, every
Z-Code game Infocom made was released for the Apple II.
--
Matthew T. Russotto russ...@pond.com
"Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice, and moderation in pursuit
of justice is no virtue."
Graham Nelson
In article <885399753....@dejanews.com>,
<URL:mailto:macu...@gloria.cord.edu> wrote:
> ..
> Also: I feel your pain. My computer of choice is an Apple II, and
> making .z3 work on it is about all I see myself being able to do in
> the near future (of course this is how God wanted us to play text
> adventures). My dream is to fit my game-in-progress, the worlds best
> (and only) Latin Inform game into a .z3 and run it on an Apple II.
> (Yes, my dream is to create the software product with the smallest
> possible audience: and here I think I have a good shot =)
If you're prepared to expand your audience just a tiny bit,
a .z5 game in Latin ought to be just about possible (and rather
fun) -- you could write an Inform language definition file for
Latin and use the standard library.
Inform 6 basically no longer supports .z3, because more advanced
features (in particular, more parameters in function calls, the
ability to detect the number of said, etc.) are essential to the
run-time implementation of message passing. When I did make the
reluctant decision to give up on .z3, nobody was really using it
any more, but it was still a sad day. The end of the Version 3
format's working life.
--
Graham Nelson | gra...@gnelson.demon.co.uk | Oxford, United Kingdom
Matthew T. Russotto
In article <6a64m4$hc5$1...@ulowell.uml.edu>,
Jason C Penney <jpe...@cs.uml.edu> wrote:
}Matthew T. Russotto (russ...@wanda.vf.pond.com) wrote:
}: The Apple II could run .z5 games. And .z6 as well -- in fact, every
}: Z-Code game Infocom made was released for the Apple II.
}
}advent.z6 to run on an Apple II with Infocom's interpreter? I'd love
}to see what it does.
I just tried it, and it seems to put the cursor way over on the right
side under the score line. I'm not sure my makeshift program is
working right, though. (but it works okay with "etude")
Mark Walker
Mike Reddy wrote in message ...
>Hi, I'm using YAZI 1.1 as a Z-machine interpreter, which does not support
>.z5-8 data files.
There's probably a z-machine for the newton that can handle the .z5 stuff.
Isn't there? If not, maybe you should just port one. The sources for
various interpreters are all readily available.
Jason C Penney
Matthew T. Russotto (russ...@wanda.vf.pond.com) wrote:
: The Apple II could run .z5 games. And .z6 as well -- in fact, every
: Z-Code game Infocom made was released for the Apple II.
Is there anyone out there who is wise/brave/bored enough to try to get
advent.z6 to run on an Apple II with Infocom's interpreter? I'd love
to see what it does.
Later,
Jay
----
Jason C Penney (jpe...@cs.uml.edu) Xarton Dragon -=<UDIC>=-
<http://www.cs.uml.edu/~jpenney/>
"The trouble with computers of course, is that they're very
sophisticated idiots." -- The Doctor
Jason C Penney
: }: The Apple II could run .z5 games. And .z6 as well -- in fact, every
: }: Z-Code game Infocom made was released for the Apple II.
: }
: }Is there anyone out there who is wise/brave/bored enough to try to get
: }advent.z6 to run on an Apple II with Infocom's interpreter? I'd love
: }to see what it does.
: I just tried it, and it seems to put the cursor way over on the right
: side under the score line. I'm not sure my makeshift program is
: working right, though. (but it works okay with "etude")
hmm... did you try to play it at all after this happend? Since I
posted this a new version has but put up on GMD (it's probably still
in incoming). If you could try to grab Release 4 and try again I'd
appriciate it.
Thanks,
Patrick Kellum
In article <ant211859868M+4%@gnelson.demon.co.uk>, Graham Nelson was talking about:
>Inform 6 basically no longer supports .z3, because more advanced
Really? I used the old libraries (6/2?) and compiled a v3 game not to
long ago.
Patrick
[ "i", "1" and "T" keys are messed up, please ignore any errors. ]
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My Arcade Page -- http://ygw.bohemianweb.com/arcade/
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Matthew T. Russotto
In article <6a6ll3$lnc$1...@ulowell.uml.edu>,
Jason C Penney <jpe...@cs.uml.edu> wrote:
}: I just tried it, and it seems to put the cursor way over on the right
}: side under the score line. I'm not sure my makeshift program is
}: working right, though. (but it works okay with "etude")
}
}hmm... did you try to play it at all after this happend?
Just a little -- aside from that oddity, it seemed to work. I'll try
version 4.
macu...@gloria.cord.edu
In article <6a5sgk$f...@wanda.vf.pond.com>,
russ...@wanda.vf.pond.com (Matthew T. Russotto) wrote:
>
> In article <885399753....@dejanews.com>,
> <macu...@gloria.cord.edu> wrote:
>
> }making .z3 work on it is about all I see myself being able to do in
> }the near future (of course this is how God wanted us to play text
> }adventures). My dream is to fit my game-in-progress, the worlds best
> }(and only) Latin Inform game into a .z3 and run it on an Apple II.
> }(Yes, my dream is to create the software product with the smallest
> }possible audience: and here I think I have a good shot =)
>
> The Apple II could run .z5 games. And .z6 as well -- in fact, every
> Z-Code game Infocom made was released for the Apple II.
Heh. I know, I've got quite a few of them =) However, I do just have an
Apple //e (with an Apple 3.5 drive incidentally, but no Superdrive Card),
so it is a specific problem. If I had a IIgs I could use an available
interpreter, but as it is, a few problems _would_ stand in my way (see
below):
1) Fitting the game file on one 140k disk (Not a problem for most games,
I'll grant).
2) The interpreters and gamefiles for these games are not clearly
seperable as in other platforms (or perhaps I'm just dim on this point,
see below =)
2) The only package I have seen for the //e, InfocomPro, requires you to
get a Version 3 Infocom interpreter (although I've heard it works on
several plus games, I have not heard anything about it working with
Inform .z5s)
Would that these be present concerns for me! InfocomPro, I have since
learned, requires some disk editing and filetype changing, (as well as
the requisite knowledge, which I do not as yet possess =) and the only
real utilities I have are the Apple System Utilities and Copy II plus.
If you or anyone else would care to help me out or suggest another
interpreter via e-mail, please do! I realize that the general preference
is for the whole newsgroup to learn from questions and answers, but this
seems so incredibly specific and useless to most people that I think I'm
safe in asking =)
-Mike (who would love to be proven wrong)
macu...@gloria.cord.edu
In article <ant211859868M+4%@gnelson.demon.co.uk>,
Graham Nelson <gra...@gnelson.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> Inform 6 basically no longer supports .z3, because more advanced
> features (in particular, more parameters in function calls, the
> ability to detect the number of said, etc.) are essential to the
> run-time implementation of message passing. When I did make the
> reluctant decision to give up on .z3, nobody was really using it
> any more, but it was still a sad day. The end of the Version 3
> format's working life.
*SOB* It's all so sudden... I'll need a minute to compose myself...
I guess that'll teach me to read the errata.
> In article <885399753....@dejanews.com>,
> <URL:mailto:macu...@gloria.cord.edu> wrote:
> > ..
> > My dream is to fit my game-in-progress, the worlds best
> > (and only) Latin Inform game into a .z3 and run it on an Apple II.
> > (Yes, my dream is to create the software product with the smallest
> > possible audience: and here I think I have a good shot =)
>
> If you're prepared to expand your audience just a tiny bit,
> a .z5 game in Latin ought to be just about possible (and rather
> fun) -- you could write an Inform language definition file for
> Latin and use the standard library.
That's the plan! There, I've said it. I've got quite the project going
now, but I actually did plan in advance to create a definition file for
Latin so I could write future games in Latin (Okay, so I'm a freak).
One question: I haven't fully read the translator's guide, but you did
mention casually examples from Hebrew. I'd like to do a game in Hebrew
someday (in the same way that I'd like a pony), but how could you make
the input text go from right to left in an Inform game? Would it
necessarily have to be done in a v6?
-Mike
Jason C Penney
: Jason C Penney <jpe...@cs.uml.edu> wrote:
: }: I just tried it, and it seems to put the cursor way over on the right
: }: side under the score line. I'm not sure my makeshift program is
: }: working right, though. (but it works okay with "etude")
: }
: }hmm... did you try to play it at all after this happend?
: Just a little -- aside from that oddity, it seemed to work. I'll try
: version 4.
Great. It's nice to know that it works well enough that if someone
wanted to they could play it (not that anyone would). Let me know
what happens when you try Release 4.
Thanks!
Jeremy A.Smith (not affiliated with Rancid the Elf)
Mike Reddy <mre...@glam.ac.uk> wrote in article
<mreddy-2001...@mreddy.comp.glam.ac.uk>...
> Hi, I'm using YAZI 1.1 as a Z-machine interpreter, which does not support
> them in .z3 or .z4 so that I can play them on my Newton?
Don't even know what YAZI is... sounds like some kind of Palestinian
Organisation.
You can compile games into z3 files using Inform, with the switch 'v3' or
something. Type Inform -? or similiar for a list of switches. If there are
enough resources available under V3, yes, you can run your own games.
Better to get hold of Frotz for the Newton. Oh, I dunno. There should be a
better interpreter available.
As for .z4, that's a bit obsolete, perhaps.
--
Jeremy A.Smith
To reply by Email, change the 'z' in lwtcdz to i
"I will not stop... I will not stop... I will not stop..."
Robert De Niro to Al Pacino in Heat.
*What the hell?
*Read the hell?
http://www2.prestel.co.uk/lwtcdi/all/
*Z-code decompiler
http://www2.prestel.co.uk/lwtcdi/uninform/instruct.htm
Stuart Adair
Jeremy A.Smith (not affiliated with Rancid the Elf) wrote in message
<01bd26cb$ff594920$LocalHost@default>...
>Mike Reddy <mre...@glam.ac.uk> wrote in article
><mreddy-2001...@mreddy.comp.glam.ac.uk>...
>> Hi, I'm using YAZI 1.1 as a Z-machine interpreter, which does not support
>> .z5-8 data files. Is it possible to take the existing sources and compile
>> them in .z3 or .z4 so that I can play them on my Newton?
>
>Don't even know what YAZI is... sounds like some kind of Palestinian
>Organisation.
It's a dice game, isn't it?
Stuart
--
_____________________
\_ .:stuart adair:. /___ :dubstar::moby::scrawn&lard::eddieizzard:| "i'm
/ / stu...@bigfoot.com \_________ :bigbeat:::interactivefiction:| covered
/ / stuart...@stud.umist.ac.uk _) :terrypratchett::::drum&bass:| in
\ \/\ c.floor homepage back up! (_ /\ :zxspectrum::::fatboyslim:| beees!"
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Brock Kevin Nambo
macu...@gloria.cord.edu wrote in message
<885493204...@dejanews.com>...
>2) The only package I have seen for the //e, InfocomPro, requires you to
>get a Version 3 Infocom interpreter (although I've heard it works on
>several plus games, I have not heard anything about it working with
>Inform .z5s)
>
>Would that these be present concerns for me! InfocomPro, I have since
>learned, requires some disk editing and filetype changing, (as well as
>the requisite knowledge, which I do not as yet possess =) and the only
>real utilities I have are the Apple System Utilities and Copy II plus.
>If you or anyone else would care to help me out or suggest another
>interpreter via e-mail, please do! I realize that the general preference
>is for the whole newsgroup to learn from questions and answers, but this
>seems so incredibly specific and useless to most people that I think I'm
>safe in asking =)
Ugh. When I found this group I was still trying to find an interpreter for
Apple, BUT even if I could find one, Apple Access II (my modem program) does
evil things with downloads; furthermore, I couldn't do anything with the
wierd format gmd's stuphed files are in. (Or was I trying to do things with
a IIgs file? It's been a while)...
Hmm..
I'm using an Apple ][c, one 5 1/4 disk (the built-in one); is there any way
anybody knows of to either a) get files from the 'Net ok using Apple Access
II or b).. wait, I can't do that, this stupid newfangled computer has no 5
1/4 drive. Grr...
So now I've painted myself into a corner and if anyone can help me too (AOL
style: =^v^v^=ME TOO=^v^v^=) I'm open ;)
>>BKNambo
--
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"Lemming is the eternal force of life." --from the online weeding of Dee-Bee
and Br_Lee_Luuuuuurve
Graham Nelson
In article <885494530....@dejanews.com>,
<URL:mailto:macu...@gloria.cord.edu> wrote:
> > If you're prepared to expand your audience just a tiny bit,
> > a .z5 game in Latin ought to be just about possible (and rather
> > fun) -- you could write an Inform language definition file for
> > Latin and use the standard library.
>
> That's the plan! There, I've said it. I've got quite the project going
> now, but I actually did plan in advance to create a definition file for
> Latin so I could write future games in Latin (Okay, so I'm a freak).
> ECCE
In triclinium est puella. Puella est Cornelia.
Cornelia est magna puella.
(that's about as far as I can remember the plot of my school Latin
textbook, which is not as racy as these opening words might promise,
though there is a scandalous incident involving a nude Senator in
about book 5).
Why not, though? It would be an interesting exercise, and some Latin
teachers might even like it as a teaching aid.
> One question: I haven't fully read the translator's guide, but you did
> mention casually examples from Hebrew. I'd like to do a game in Hebrew
> someday (in the same way that I'd like a pony), but how could you make
> the input text go from right to left in an Inform game? Would it
> necessarily have to be done in a v6?
This seems an odd way to like a pony. The literal answer is no: with
enough messing about, you could do this using version 5 screen
capabilities, I think. It wouldn't be easy!
However, at least Inform supports the ISO Hebrew character set
(if you use the -C8 switch), which is a start.
Den of Iniquity
On Fri, 23 Jan 1998, Graham Nelson wrote:
> > ECCE
> In triclinium est puella. Puella est Cornelia.
> Cornelia est magna puella.
>Why not, though? It would be an interesting exercise, and some Latin
>teachers might even like it as a teaching aid.
There can't be many computer news-groups where you'd find as many people
with a smattering of Latin than this one. Yes, I believe Latin teachers
would appreciate such a resource - you might even be able to sell
Latin.h adventures for educational purposes (or indeed many other
languages). I remember once being taken up to the computer room at school
in a Latin lesson to try some Latin 'games' but these consisted more of
matching adjectives to nouns one way or another and 'Latin space
invaders'. A Latin adventure would be more interesting. Maybe an
interactive Virgil's Aeneid, with lots of the original poetry (surely not
still in copyright?) - much more scope than The Tempest... :)
(Though I'd question the use of ECCE for look - you'd want consistent use
of imperatives of verbs whereas ecce is more 'behold' - still, I
suppose you would want as many synonyms as possible.)
I'd be happy to help proofread a Latin.h if anyone's creating one (though
I wouldn't fancy writing one myself).
--
Lustrum
(Rewrite in-game messages in Latin in classical hexameter? Argh!)
Mary K. Kuhner
In article <Pine.SGI.3.95L.98012...@ebor.york.ac.uk>,
Den of Iniquity <dms...@york.ac.uk> wrote:
>(Though I'd question the use of ECCE for look - you'd want consistent use
>of imperatives of verbs whereas ecce is more 'behold' - still, I
>suppose you would want as many synonyms as possible.)
Hm. It strikes me that a game written for language
teaching might want to be a little more stringent about
grammar than one written purely for entertainment.
This might be a place where overriding Inform's
"accept as much as possible" standard would really be
helpful. Otherwise, the first time your students
actually try to use the language (okay, not an issue
with Latin, but in general) they may end up unwrapping
doors....
Mary Kuhner mkku...@genetics.washington.edu
John Francis
In article <ant230053b49M+4%@gnelson.demon.co.uk>,
Graham Nelson <gra...@gnelson.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>In article <885494530....@dejanews.com>,
><URL:mailto:macu...@gloria.cord.edu> wrote:
>> > If you're prepared to expand your audience just a tiny bit,
>> > a .z5 game in Latin ought to be just about possible (and rather
>> > fun) -- you could write an Inform language definition file for
>> > Latin and use the standard library.
>>
>> That's the plan! There, I've said it. I've got quite the project going
>> now, but I actually did plan in advance to create a definition file for
>> Latin so I could write future games in Latin (Okay, so I'm a freak).
>
> In triclinium est puella. Puella est Cornelia.
> Cornelia est magna puella.
>
>textbook, which is not as racy as these opening words might promise,
>though there is a scandalous incident involving a nude Senator in
>about book 5).
>
>teachers might even like it as a teaching aid.
I thought Latin tended to stick the verb at the end, so we'd get
"Cornelia magna puella est." (cf Gallia in tres partes divisa est)
Disclaimer: It's been 35 years since I did any Latin. I do,
however, own a copy of "Winnie Ille Pu". And I used to have
a copy of "Alicia in Terra Mirabilis", but it seems to have
vanished :-(
--
John Francis jfra...@sgi.com Silicon Graphics, Inc.
(650)933-8295 2011 N. Shoreline Blvd. MS 43U-991
(650)933-4692 (Fax) Mountain View, CA 94043-1389
Unsolicited electronic mail will be subject to a $100 handling fee.
John Elliott
John Francis (jfra...@dungeon.engr.sgi.com) wrote:
: I thought Latin tended to stick the verb at the end, so we'd get
: "Cornelia magna puella est." (cf Gallia in tres partes divisa est)
One of the Latin textbooks I used started off with the words in English
ordering rather than Latin. I suppose it would help those with zero
knowledge of the language.
- what's the Latin for 'xyzzy'?
- what sort of provocation would the parser have to have before saying
"oderis dum metuas"?
------------- http://www.seasip.demon.co.uk/index.html --------------------
John Elliott |BLOODNOK: "But why have you got such a long face?"
|SEAGOON: "Heavy dentures, Sir!" - The Goon Show
:-------------------------------------------------------------------------)
Matthew Garrett
> > ECCE
> In triclinium est puella. Puella est Cornelia.
> Cornelia est magna puella.
>
> (that's about as far as I can remember the plot of my school Latin
> textbook, which is not as racy as these opening words might promise,
> though there is a scandalous incident involving a nude Senator in
> about book 5).
with teacher hitting Cornelius with a stick and calling him an ass?
I started off with that one, but when I moved to Northern Ireland we
started using a different textbook (Not to mention pronouncing "v" as
"v", rather than "w". Confused me utterly.) which I remember had
something about a chariot knocking people into a ditch. Then I swapped
to German instead.
--
Matthew Garrett | ca...@enterprise.net
Rhodri James
In article <ant230053b49M+4%@gnelson.demon.co.uk>,
Graham Nelson <gra...@gnelson.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> In triclinium est puella. Puella est Cornelia.
> Cornelia est magna puella.
> (that's about as far as I can remember the plot of my school Latin
> textbook, which is not as racy as these opening words might promise,
> though there is a scandalous incident involving a nude Senator in
> about book 5).
Ah, happy days. Was that "Ecce Romani"? I'd always remembered the
opening as "In pictura est puella." Oh well. I don't remember the nude
senator at all, though, unless I've got him confused with Titus :-)
Actually, the first thing that I did when the Translator's Manual came out
was to try to do a Latin port. I didn't get very far, mostly because it's
a decade since I used Latin with any seriousness and I don't have any
useful references at home. Such is life.
--
Rhodri James *-* Wildebeeste herder to the masses
If you don't know who I work for, you can't misattribute my words to them
... Worse things happen in C
Branko Collin
On 23 Jan 1998 18:15:40 GMT, jfra...@dungeon.engr.sgi.com (John
Francis) wrote:
>In article <ant230053b49M+4%@gnelson.demon.co.uk>,
>Graham Nelson <gra...@gnelson.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>> Cornelia est magna puella.
>I thought Latin tended to stick the verb at the end, so we'd get
>"Cornelia magna puella est." (cf Gallia in tres partes divisa est)
It may be convention, but it is not necessary.
--
branko collin
col...@xs4all.nl
Magnus Olsson
In article <6aamoc$5m...@fido.asd.sgi.com>,
John Francis <jfra...@dungeon.engr.sgi.com> wrote:
>In article <ant230053b49M+4%@gnelson.demon.co.uk>,
>Graham Nelson <gra...@gnelson.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>> In triclinium est puella. Puella est Cornelia.
>I thought Latin tended to stick the verb at the end, so we'd get
>"Cornelia magna puella est." (cf Gallia in tres partes divisa est)
But Latin has a very much freer word order than English, so both
examples are correct, as would "Puella magna est Cornelia".
To get back to IF: how would the Inform parser handle this? Of
course, the imperative syntax would simplify things: you could
require that the verb always be first. But in some inflected languages,
direct and indirect objects are distinguished not by position, but by case.
If translated literally into English, we might have the two equivalent
"Give the bone (accusative) the dog (dative)"
and
"Give the dog (dative) the bone (accusative)"
Would this have to be coded as two distinct grammar rules?
--
Magnus Olsson (m...@df.lth.se, zeb...@pobox.com)
------ http://www.pobox.com/~zebulon ------
Not officially connected to LU or LTH.
Andrew Plotkin
Magnus Olsson (m...@bartlet.df.lth.se) wrote:
> To get back to IF: how would the Inform parser handle this? Of
> course, the imperative syntax would simplify things: you could
> require that the verb always be first. But in some inflected languages,
> direct and indirect objects are distinguished not by position, but by case.
> If translated literally into English, we might have the two equivalent
> "Give the bone (accusative) the dog (dative)"
> and
> "Give the dog (dative) the bone (accusative)"
> Would this have to be coded as two distinct grammar rules?
You'd probably want to write a LanguageToInformese() function which chewed
through the string, analyzed all the inflections, and put the words in a
standard order. Or maybe inserted words like ',acc' and ',dat' to serve as
fake prepositions.
--Z
--
"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the
borogoves..."
macu...@gloria.cord.edu
> I wouldn't fancy writing one myself).
>
> --
> Lustrum
Thanks! Consider yourself committed =)
>
> (Rewrite in-game messages in Latin in classical hexameter? Argh!)
Before an interactive Aeneid must come Ruins: the Latin edition.
Although I must admit that requiring player input in dactyls sounds
attractive =) A six- foot parser would certainly stand on the opposite
side of the spectrum of a two- word parser for technical achievement, and
yet still be as annoying =)
Den of Iniquity
On Sat, 24 Jan 1998, Andrew Plotkin wrote:
>Magnus Olsson (m...@bartlet.df.lth.se) wrote about Latin:
>> If translated literally into English, we might have the two equivalent
>
>> "Give the bone (accusative) the dog (dative)"
>> and
>> "Give the dog (dative) the bone (accusative)"
>
>> Would this have to be coded as two distinct grammar rules?
>
>You'd probably want to write a LanguageToInformese() function which chewed
>through the string, analyzed all the inflections, and put the words in a
>standard order. Or maybe inserted words like ',acc' and ',dat' to serve as
>fake prepositions.
There's a few nasty problems with Latin - like English there are phrases
which have to be judged from context - some combinations of nouns and
adjectives can lead to ambiguous sentences with more than one meaning. (I
can't think of an example off the top of my head and my vocab is so rusty
it squeaks, but bear with me...)
In English word order helps enormously - 'give the X a Y' can only
mean one thing - no need to judge the context of the situation. If one
didn't constrain Latin parsing to obey specific sentence order, you'd
leave the parser to try to judge context, and that would require, at
present, some special case coding for any ambiguous sentence the
beta-testers happen to try - thankfully there'd be few examples but
they'd be very difficult to anticipate.
--
Den
Marshall T. Vandegrift
jfra...@dungeon.engr.sgi.com (John Francis) wrote:
>I thought Latin tended to stick the verb at the end, so we'd get
>"Cornelia magna puella est." (cf Gallia in tres partes divisa est)
AFAIK, Latin clauses/sentences of the style:
Subject -> Linking Verb -> Predicate Nominative/Adjective
usually place the linking verb between the subject and predicate whatnot.
Otherwise, the verb usually goes at the end of the clause. (Unless the verb is
in the impertive mood, in which case it usually goes at the beginning.)
----------
Marshall T. Vandegrift (ma...@DONT.intrlink.SPAM.com.ME) (You know the drill.)
"Even in laughter, the heart is sorrowful." --Proverbs 14:13
Erik Max Francis
Den of Iniquity wrote:
> There's a few nasty problems with Latin - like English there are
> phrases
> which have to be judged from context - some combinations of nouns and
> adjectives can lead to ambiguous sentences with more than one meaning.
> (I
> can't think of an example off the top of my head and my vocab is so
> rusty
> it squeaks, but bear with me...)
Esperanto would be an interesting IF language of choice, because it's so
simple. Especially from a parsing point of view, it's very
straightforward. All nouns end in -o, all adjectives end in -a.
Accusatives end in -n. Verbs have different ending for the different
tenses, but what would be relevant in IF would be the imperative form,
which always ends in -u.
So "Give the dog a bone" would be "Donu oston al la hundo." Here,
_oston_ is the direct object, and _la hundo_ is the indirect object.
> In English word order helps enormously - 'give the X a Y' can only
> mean one thing - no need to judge the context of the situation.
Esperanto is interesting because the order of clauses doesn't matter.
"Donu oston al la hundo" has the same meaning as "Donu al la hundo
oston."
The only disadvantage to Esperanto is that there are some accents which
would require a Latin-3 encoding (circumflex accents over consonants,
and a "short" accent over the u). People have adopted a number of
ASCII-only conventions for representing these characters (the accented g
is often written gx, g', or g^; the accented u is written ux, u', uw,
etc.) which avoid ambiguities (and are even all compatible with each
other). Even for people who put the representation accents before the
letter (e.g., ^g), one can use a simple little heuristic to look over
the string and determine whether the accent characters must be prefix or
suffix by their vicinity to the accentable characters.
--
Erik Max Francis, &tSftDotIotE / mailto:m...@alcyone.com
Alcyone Systems / http://www.alcyone.com/max/
San Jose, California, United States / icbm://+37.20.07/-121.53.38
\
"Life may be / the product of imperfections."
/ (Marclo Gleiser)
Erik Max Francis
Jonathan Badger wrote:
> You're about the fourth person to suggest an Esperanto Inform parser,
> but so far nobody has done such a thing. I am tempted from time to
> time but always suffer a guilt trip from the idea of devoting so much
> effort to something not relevant to my doctoral thesis.
I can certainly understand this. I have a long, long list of things I
am really excited about working on (most having nothing to do with
interactive fiction), but I continually find it amazing how little time
I spend working on them.
> Of course the code for handling the accusative (the "n" ending in
> Esperanto) has to be written which may not be non-trivial...
I'm not sure what you're getting at here. What's hard about parsing out
the accusative? My guess is you're referring to the internals of the
way Inform handles things, rather than a global difficulty in parsing
Esperanto, which is clearly not there. I have been considering using
Esperanto for some natural language experiments _because_ it is so easy
to parse, and is so unambiguous.
The only issue that comes to mind is that sometimes the verbs in
Esperanto don't have obvious equivalents in English. Namely, some verbs
in Esperanto are transitive, where the English equivalent would be
intransitive, or vice versa. (Unfortunately, no interactive fiction
examples are coming to mind immediately.) This would certainly change
the parsing model slightly, but I assume that it must be at least a
_little_ generalized to handle other languages as it stands.
> >The only disadvantage to Esperanto is that there are some accents
> > which
> >would require a Latin-3 encoding [...]
>
> I'm not sure that the existing interpreters would have a problem with
> Latin-3 encoding. In any case, the problem would be similar to
> handling Latin-1 encoding (needed for Romance and Germanic languages)
> which presumably has to be solved if Inform is to be used with
> non-English languages.
Actually, what I was trying to get at (though I admit I didn't do a
terribly good job) is that with Esperanto, there are multiple ways to
represent the accented letters (there are only a handful), all of which
are equivalent. That is,
man*u [1]
mangxu
mang'u
mang`u
man'gu
man`gu
and other forms should all represent the same word, which is the
imperative form of "to eat," e.g. "Mangxu la pomon," ("Eat the apple").
These variations should be parsable in most cases (disambiguation in
case of the prefix and postfix case is pretty straightforward), but the
trick is they must all represent the same word. That is the obstacle I
was referring to.
.
1. The asterisk here means the Latin-3 encoding of the accented g,
which I can't represent in ASCII, so I'm not bothering to try.
Jonathan Badger
Erik Max Francis <m...@alcyone.com> writes:
>Esperanto would be an interesting IF language of choice, because it's so
>simple. Especially from a parsing point of view, it's very
>straightforward. All nouns end in -o, all adjectives end in -a.
>Accusatives end in -n. Verbs have different ending for the different
>tenses, but what would be relevant in IF would be the imperative form,
>which always ends in -u.
You're about the fourth person to suggest an Esperanto Inform parser,
but so far nobody has done such a thing. I am tempted from time to
time but always suffer a guilt trip from the idea of devoting so much
effort to something not relevant to my doctoral thesis. I envy Graham
for his ability to balance Inform, his poetry career, and his
research...
>Esperanto is interesting because the order of clauses doesn't matter.
>"Donu oston al la hundo" has the same meaning as "Donu al la hundo
>oston."
Of course the code for handling the accusative (the "n" ending in
Esperanto) has to be written which may not be non-trivial...
Jonathan Badger
Erik Max Francis <m...@alcyone.com> writes:
>Jonathan Badger wrote:
>> Of course the code for handling the accusative (the "n" ending in
>> Esperanto) has to be written which may not be non-trivial...
>I'm not sure what you're getting at here. What's hard about parsing out
>the accusative? My guess is you're referring to the internals of the
>way Inform handles things, rather than a global difficulty in parsing
>Esperanto, which is clearly not there. I have been considering using
>Esperanto for some natural language experiments _because_ it is so easy
>to parse, and is so unambiguous.
Well, consider your example "Donu la oston al la hundo". It could just
as well be "Donu al la hundo la oston", or even "La oston donu al la
hundo". The parser would have to handle this. I'm not sure the current
Inform parser could handle the different word orders. Secondly, while
parsing Esperanto may be less ambiguous than English, it isn't
completely unambiguous and like natural languages sometimes requires
human common sense to parse. If rigorous unambiguity of parsing is
demanded, Loglan fits the bill. (Of course this rigor is somewhat
offset by the fact not even the creator of Loglan managed to learn it
fluently).
>> >The only disadvantage to Esperanto is that there are some accents
>> > which
>> >would require a Latin-3 encoding [...]
>>
>> I'm not sure that the existing interpreters would have a problem with
>> Latin-3 encoding. In any case, the problem would be similar to
>> handling Latin-1 encoding (needed for Romance and Germanic languages)
>> which presumably has to be solved if Inform is to be used with
>> non-English languages.
>Actually, what I was trying to get at (though I admit I didn't do a
>terribly good job) is that with Esperanto, there are multiple ways to
>represent the accented letters (there are only a handful), all of which
>are equivalent.
But these other methods are only used because until recently most
computing tasks were limited to ASCII (which has only English
letters). This caused users of many other languages besides Esperanto
to find ways of representing their missing characters, umlauts, etc.
But if the software can suport fonts with the correct characters there
isn't any point to using the older methods.
Erik Max Francis
Jonathan Badger wrote:
> Well, consider your example "Donu la oston al la hundo". It could just
> as well be "Donu al la hundo la oston", or even "La oston donu al la
> hundo". The parser would have to handle this. I'm not sure the current
> Inform parser could handle the different word orders.
Okay, then that's what I thought -- you were just suggesting that the
word order problem might not be easy to handle with Inform's parser
model, not that it is in general hard to parse.
Which is funny, because I would have tought that Inform would be able to
handle other word orders (not all languages have the same word order as
English). Or are you saying that it just can't handle _multiple_ word
orders?
> Secondly, while
> parsing Esperanto may be less ambiguous than English, it isn't
> completely unambiguous and like natural languages sometimes requires
> human common sense to parse.
This is absolutely true. These issues generally arise when the
statement implicitly contains assumptions about the listener and _their_
knowledge base, which is of course very hard to handle in interaction
fiction. There was a recent thread about this.
> If rigorous unambiguity of parsing is
> demanded, Loglan fits the bill. (Of course this rigor is somewhat
> offset by the fact not even the creator of Loglan managed to learn it
> fluently).
The difference between Esperanto and Loglan (and Lojban, and some of the
other planned languages) is that Esperanto is designed to be _used_ as a
common second (or third, etc.) language for everyone, whereas Loglan and
many of these other languages are merely designed as feasibility
experiments. As you say, even the creator of Loglan isn't a fluent
speaker.
> But these other methods are only used because until recently most
> computing tasks were limited to ASCII (which has only English
> letters). This caused users of many other languages besides Esperanto
> to find ways of representing their missing characters, umlauts, etc.
> But if the software can suport fonts with the correct characters there
> isn't any point to using the older methods.
The problem is that you need _both_ the fonts to print the Latin-3
characters _and_ a keyboard mapping that will allow you to easily
generate them (I'm not even sure if these exist for Esperanto, but they
must).
Normal discourse on Usenet or in email doesn't allow 8-bit clean
messages -- and not all Esperanto readers around the world have access
to Latin-3 fonts and encodings anyway -- so people are forced to use
ASCII-only representations of the accented characters, which I outlined
earlier. Since a text adventure is not too far removed from that
discourse, and quite frankly people who would be playing an Esperanto
work of interactive fiction would likely be somewhat used to typing with
the ASCII-augmented accents, I would think they should be supported.
Magnus Olsson
In article <34CE20F6...@alcyone.com>,
Erik Max Francis <m...@alcyone.com> wrote:
>Which is funny, because I would have tought that Inform would be able to
>handle other word orders (not all languages have the same word order as
>English). Or are you saying that it just can't handle _multiple_ word
>orders?
Each grammar rule in the Inform parser corresponds to a fixed
word order. For example, for the two equivalent English commands
"Give the bone to the dog" and "Give the dog the bone", you'll
need two grammar rules:
verb 'give'
* held 'to' animate -> Give
* animate held -> Give reverse
;
where the "reverse" keyword means that the indirect object comes
before the direct object (I'm not a 100% on the syntax here, but you
get the idea).
Adjectives and nouns (or, rather, the components of a noun phrase; the
standard parser doesn't distinguish between adjectives and nouns) can
be in any order, though, as long as they are adjacent. A further
complication would be parsing languages where adjectives and nouns can
be separated, as if it was possible to say
*Give small the bone to the dog
in English, with some way of seeing that "small" refers to the dog,
not to the bone (in a language similar to Latin, "small" and "dog" would
both be in the dative case, so you could use that information to group
them).
Jonathan Petersen
Erik Max Francis wrote:
>
> The difference between Esperanto and Loglan (and Lojban, and some of the
> other planned languages) is that Esperanto is designed to be _used_ as a
[bunch of snips]
OK, my interest is fully piqued. What are some good resources to learn
Esperanto?
Jon
Brock Kevin Nambo
Jonathan Petersen wrote in message <34CE50...@ucla.edu>...
I haven't touched the stuff in ages, so all I remember is that one of my
teachers has a lot on it, at his webpage on our school's server at
http://www.southern.edu/~caviness/
Hope you find what you're looking for!
Dan Schmidt
Jonathan Petersen <en...@ucla.edu> writes:
| OK, my interest is fully piqued. What are some good resources to learn
| Esperanto?
<http://www.webcom.com/~donh/esperanto.html> is your one-stop shop for
all things Esperanto.
--
Dan Schmidt -> df...@alum.mit.edu, df...@thecia.net
Honest Bob & the http://www2.thecia.net/users/dfan/
Factory-to-Dealer Incentives -> http://www2.thecia.net/users/dfan/hbob/
Gamelan Galak Tika -> http://web.mit.edu/galak-tika/www/
Erik Max Francis
Jonathan Petersen wrote:
> OK, my interest is fully piqued. What are some good resources to
> learn
> Esperanto?
The Esperanto Access website that Dan Schmidt posted is an excellent
reference. Since you're in the United States, you might want to also
try the Esperanto League for North America:
mac...@alaska.net
In article <34CE50...@ucla.edu>,
en...@ucla.edu wrote:
(snip)
> OK, my interest is fully piqued. What are some good resources to learn
> Esperanto?
Try any of the links (multilingual) from
<http://www.esperanto.net>,
among other places. I recommend the 10-lesson free e-mail
tuored
courses: the one for English-speakers is administered by
Marko Rauhamaa
(who also has one for Finnish-speakers off of his webpage)
reachable at
<ma...@iswest.net>, or the web course called "Esperanto
Viva" (Esperanto
Alive or Living Esperanto) by Ian Fantom. Or since
evidently you're at
UCLA, you might consider the summer courses offered at San
Francisco
State University (to an Alaskan that seem _close_ to LA!
;-) )
mac...@alaska.net
In article <34CE20F6...@alcyone.com>,
(trancxo)
> Normal discourse on Usenet or in email doesn't allow 8-bit clean
> messages -- and not all Esperanto readers around the world have access
> to Latin-3 fonts and encodings anyway -- so people are forced to use
> ASCII-only representations of the accented characters, which I outlined
> earlier. Since a text adventure is not too far removed from that
> discourse, and quite frankly people who would be playing an Esperanto
> work of interactive fiction would likely be somewhat used to typing with
> the ASCII-augmented accents, I would think they should be supported.
Supozeble vi pravas... tamen ia enketo estus konvene, cxu ne, antaux
ol
eki al la verkado de la de vi imagata "tekstaventuro"! Ekzemple vi
povus aperigi mallongan priskribon de la projekto, tia kia gxi
nuntempe
ekzistas en via menso, en la reta diskutejo <soc.culture.esperanto>, k
versxajne rikolti ian reagon de la gesamideanoj tutmondaj (aux
almenaux
"tutkiberuje") ...
Francis Irving
On Wed, 28 Jan 1998 01:01:25 -0600, mac...@alaska.net wrote:
>Supozeble vi pravas... tamen ia enketo estus konvene, cxu ne, antaux
>ol
>eki al la verkado de la de vi imagata "tekstaventuro"! Ekzemple vi
>povus aperigi mallongan priskribon de la projekto, tia kia gxi
>nuntempe
>ekzistas en via menso, en la reta diskutejo <soc.culture.esperanto>, k
>versxajne rikolti ian reagon de la gesamideanoj tutmondaj (aux
>almenaux
>"tutkiberuje") ...
Aww.... Shucks. The Alta Vista translation service doesn't support
Esperanto yet...
Francis.
Work: fra...@ncgraphics.co.uk Home: fra...@pobox.co.uk
Brock Kevin Nambo
Francis Irving wrote in message <34d416f2....@news.demon.co.uk>...
>On Wed, 28 Jan 1998 01:01:25 -0600, mac...@alaska.net wrote:
>
>>Supozeble vi pravas... tamen ia enketo estus konvene, cxu ne, antaux
>>ol
>>eki al la verkado de la de vi imagata "tekstaventuro"! Ekzemple vi
>>povus aperigi mallongan priskribon de la projekto, tia kia gxi
>>nuntempe
>>ekzistas en via menso, en la reta diskutejo <soc.culture.esperanto>, k
>>versxajne rikolti ian reagon de la gesamideanoj tutmondaj (aux
>>almenaux
>>"tutkiberuje") ...
>
>Aww.... Shucks. The Alta Vista translation service doesn't support
>Esperanto yet...
Uh, "I guess you're right... but, [something something something],..."
Nevermind; the BKNambo translation service doesn't seem to either.
>>BKNambo (and I started out so well too!)
Jonathan Badger
fra...@ncgraphics.co.uk (Francis Irving) writes:
>On Wed, 28 Jan 1998 01:01:25 -0600, mac...@alaska.net wrote:
>>Supozeble vi pravas... tamen ia enketo estus konvene, cxu ne, antaux
>>ol eki al la verkado de la de vi imagata "tekstaventuro"! Ekzemple vi
>>povus aperigi mallongan priskribon de la projekto, tia kia gxi nuntempe
>>ekzistas en via menso, en la reta diskutejo <soc.culture.esperanto>, k
>>versxajne rikolti ian reagon de la gesamideanoj tutmondaj (aux
>>almenaux "tutkiberuje")
>Aww.... Shucks. The Alta Vista translation service doesn't support
>Esperanto yet...
Well, what the poster said was:
"Presumably you are right, however, some investigation would be
appropriate before beginning the writing of your planned text
adventure. For example, you could post a short description of the
project, as you currentlu envision it, on the newsgroup
<soc.culture.esperanto> and probably obtain some reaction from
Esperantists worldwide (or at least 'netwide')."
Francis Irving
On 28 Jan 1998 15:24:20 GMT, bad...@aquarius.scs.uiuc.edu (Jonathan
Badger) wrote:
Nearly as quick, supports more languages, and didn't even crash... I
guess you're out of beta... :-)
Thanks for the translation,
Erik Max Francis
Jonathan Badger wrote:
> > ... la reta diskutejo <soc.culture.esperanto> ...
>
> ... on the newsgroup <soc.culture.esperanto> ...
Here's an example of the power of Esperanto. _La reta diskutejo_
literatelly means "the networked discussion place" (_diskuti_ is "to
discuss," so _diskuto_ is "discussion," and _diskutejo_ is "place of
discussion"). Frequently, I've seen _newsgroup_ translated more
literally as _novajxgrupo_ (_novajxo_ is "news," and _grupo_ is
"group"). But with Esperanto, so long as the meaning is clear, you can
use either form.
This, by the way, allows one to come up with some interesting profanity
in Esperanto . . . :-)
tv's Spatch
Jonathan Petersen made the baby Jesus cry by writing this:
> OK, my interest is fully piqued. What are some good resources to learn
> Esperanto?
Episodes of _Red Dwarf_ can help you, but only if you want to learn
phrases like "Pardon me, but there appears to be a frog in my bidet."
--
spa...@javanet.com.andbacon has his wacky fun .sig back up. Rar.
More fun than watching phone booths rust -- PUTPBAD!
http://www.spatch.net/booth shows you how it's done!
"IT'S TOO BAD SHE HAS TO MEOW. BUT THEN, WHO MEOWS?" - Pixel T. Cat