Using JamochaMUD

In addition to some of the standard GUI features, JamochaMUD also offers a few features and short-cuts that are operated by text commands.

Resizing the Input / Output windows

The relative space of the Input and Output windows can be adjusted if you are using JamochaMUD's Swing interface (available only with Java 1.2 and higher). A “grippy” will appear dividing the input and output windows. By clicking the mouse and dragging the “grippy” the two areas can be resized.

Saving output from a MU* session

By choosing the option “write log to file” found under the File menu you will be presented with a save file dialogue box. You can specify the name of the file you wish to save and any extension needed (having .txt on the end of your file name may be beneficial on Windows-based systems). Currently, JamochaMUD will only save the output as a plain text file, but future versions may support HTML output to preserve colours and formatting.

Disconnecting

There are three ways that you can initiate disconnecting from a MU* when using JamochaMUD. By closing JamochaMUD (either by clicking the close icon on the window frame or choose Quit from the File menu) the connection to your MU* is automatically terminated. If you have more than one MU* connect open, you may choose Close this view from the Connections menu. A connection may also be terminated by choose Disconnect from MU* from the Connections menu.

Pausing output

The output window of JamochaMUD may be paused at any time by single-clicking the mouse pointer on the output window. The title of the JamochaMUD frame will change to read “Output Paused (press any key to resume)”, such as in the image below. JamochaMUD will continue to accept output from the MU* server, but will not show it until you released the pause.

Releasing paused output

To release paused output in JamochaMUD, simply type any key (no, not the “Any key”) and the pause will be released. The pause may also be released by clicking the mouse in the input window or, if TinyFugue key emulation is enabled, by using the CTRL+Q key combination.

Once the output pause has been released, the title on the JamochaMUD frame will return to it's previous reading.

Scrolling output from the MU*

In addition to using the scrollbars found on the MU* output window of JamochaMUD, you may also jump forward and backwards a page at a time by using the key combinations of Shift+Page Up (to scroll up) and Shift+Page Down (to scroll down).

Command History

JamochaMUD can keep track of the commands that a user types, in the event that they need to be recalled. The command history may be accessed by right-clicking on the input window in JamochaMUD or by using the key combination of CTRL + N (if TinyFugue emulation is enabled). The last typed (previous) command may also be recalled using the CTRL + P combination (if TinyFugue emulation is enabled). The number of entries contained in by your command history may be changed by navigating to Options -> Configure JamochaMUD -> Command History.

Configuring JamochaMUD

Backing up your preferences Starting with the 2006-02-05 release of JamochaMUD settings and preferences can easily be backed up and restored in a platform independent way. This allows a user to back-up a configuration, for example, on Linux and restore it in Windows. This back-up procedure will back-up all JamochaMUD settings and settings for Plug-ins that are coding to the standards outline in JamochaMUD.

Saving settings

To back-up your settings choose File -> Export JamochaMUD settings. You will be asked for a name for the back-up file (the extension of .jsa is automatically added for a JamochaMUD Settings Archive) and a location to save it. Once the setting archive has been created, you may continue using JamochaMUD normally.

Restoring settings

To restore settings from a JamochaMUD Settings Archive navigate to File -> Import JamochaMUD settings. You will then see a file dialogue that will ask you to locate your .jsa file. When you find this file the settings will be restored. JamochaMUD will then shut itself down. When the user restarts JamochaMUD the restored settings will be used.

Customized output colours

JamochaMUD allows you to customize the output colours presented by different MU*s. When accessing this dialogue from Options -> Configure JamochaMUD -> Output Colours you will be presented with a grid of 16 colours. The left column represents the “low colour” range and the right column represents the “high colour” range. Double-clicking on any of the cells in the table will allow you to modify the colour. The custom colours only over-ride ANSI colours that are set by MU*s, and will not affect your regular foreground and background colours. Standard telnet colours may be restored at any time by clicking the “Reset Colours” button.

JamochaMUD Plug-ins

All information related to JamochaMUD plug-ins is located under the Plug-ins menu item on the main JamochaMUD window. Enabling and Disabling plug-ins (post 2004-07-27) In more recent versions of JamochaMUD, the handling of enabling and disabling plug-ins has now been moved from a separate dialogue box to be handled directly in the plug-ins menu itself. On Swing-based Java Virtual Machines a green or red globe will appear beside the plug-ins' name. Green indicates that the plug-in is enabled, while red indicates that the plug-in is not currently enabled. A sub-menu on each of the plug-ins' names will give you the menu options of viewing the plug-in's properties, enabling or disabling the plug-in and getting a description of the plug-in. Properties are user-definable options of the plug-in. If a given plug-in does not have any user options to it the Properties menu item will be disabled (greyed out). If the plug-in is already enabled, a “Disable” option will appear on the sub-menu. Should the plug-in be disabled, an “Enable” option will appear instead. The Description menu item will present you with a dialogue box giving a brief description of the functions the given plug-in performs.

Enabling and Disabling plug-ins (older versions of JamochaMUD)

In previous versions of JamochaMUD plug-ins had to be enable or disabled via the “Manage Plug-ins” dialogue box. Plug-ins can be individually enabled and disabled by going to the plug-in configuration dialogue, located under the Plug-ins -> Configure Plug-ins menu item. In this dialogue you will see two lists, one containing active plug-ins and one containing inactive plug-ins. To activate a plug-in, click on the name of the plug-in in the inactive list and then click then “Add” button. To deactivate a plug-in, click on the name of the plug-in in the active list and then click the “Remove” button.

Installing new plug-ins

To install a new plug-in, navigate to the Plug-ins -> Install plug-in menu item. You will be presented with a file dialogue where you can navigate to the location that you have downloaded the plug-in archive to. The plug-in archive should have the extension of .jpa (JamochaMUD Plug-in Archive).

Selected the archive and confirm your choice. JamochaMUD will proceed with installing the plug-in the proper location. You may need to restart JamochaMUD to take advantage of the new plug-in.

Configuring plug-ins

Plug-ins may be configured in two different ways. Either choose the plug-in's name from under the Plug-ins menu on the main window, or choose Plug-ins -> Configure Plug-ins menu item. Not all plug-ins have user changeable configurations. Plug-ins that ship with JamochaMUD JamochaMUD comes with a few plug-ins installed already (though they may be disabled when you first run JamochaMUD). The details of these plug-ins will be described below.

FurryMuck location plug-in

Most likely this plug-in will only be useful if used on the FurryMUCK server, though it may also work for other mucks that run Fuzzball servers. Being mostly benign, this plug-in simply watches output from the MU* for [fmlc] tags, which contain the names of different locations on the muck. When you enter a new location this plug-in will parse that tag and place the name of the room/location as the title of JamochaMUD's window. There are no settings or options for this plug-in.

MusicBox plug-in

This idea was blatantly stolen from the LiveJournal client DeepestSender ( http://deepestsender.mozdev.org/ ). This plug-in can be setup to look for a music information file that can be created by most “mp3” playing software. In the example shown at left, we have selected the “Playing file” which contains the song information written out by the mp3 player. In this case it is called “playing.txt” and located in the e:\bin\audio\Plogg directory. Simple enough, huh?

The “Display” line tells the plug-in how to paste the music information into your text input window. Any number surrounded by percentage signs (such as %4%) tell MusicBox to insert the information from that line into the position of the number and percentage signs. In this case, if our playing file contents looked like this: Now playing: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds No More Shall We Part God Is In The House 2001 and having “%4%” by %2% as our display will result in “God Is In The House” by Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds being pasted into the text input area of JamochaMUD.

Of course, we need a way to activate MusicBox, and that is where the Control Key comes in. You can tell MusicBox that you want a combination of CTRL, Shift, and Alt along with an alpha-numeric key to paste the music information into JamochaMUD. In this example, hitting CTRL+ALT+m will have the desired results!

Gags & Highlights plug-in

Seeing as this is one of the most useful plug-ins that ships with JamochaMUD, we thought it would be in our best interest to devote a page specifically to it! If you like colourful output and the like, this one is for you.