AVATAR AREA BUILDER

*OVERVIEW* 
The Avatar Area Builder is a program created to assist
with the creation of new areas for the AVATAR mud.  It is possible to
create an entirely functional area within the program without using a
text editor.  The program is however NOT intended to be a replacement
for the official Area Building guide which along with formatting
information gives general rules and advice on area building for
AVATAR.  This program along with DaWiz's ListArea and AvAreaVerify
programs will help ensure correct formatting is applied as specified
by the official Area Building guide.

In addition to each section of an area file having its own input
screen, the program also includes 'power toys' for making rapid
wholesale changes to areas as well as an inline area explorer that
gives a feel for what the current area will look like once loaded onto
the mud server.

*INSTALLATION* 
Create a new folder and copy 'Area Builder.exe' and
'qhtm.DLL' into it.  Double click 'Area Builder.exe' to launch the
application.

*USING THE PROGRAM*
Upon launching the program you will be presented
with a blank workspace and a menu bar leading to the following
choices:

*FILE*
Here you will be able to create a NEW area, OPEN and existing
area or 'SAVE AS'to save the area currently being worked on.  There is
no 'SAVE' option in order to encourage sequential backups.  There are
options to 'SAVE AS dos style' which is useful for editing files in
windows notepad as well as 'SAVE as unix style' which is the format
that final draft areas should be in as this is the format required by
the mud.

*WORKFLOW*
This section contain the 'meat' of the program.  Here you will find
all the relevant sections of an AVATAR area file.  These correspond
directly with the official builders guide.  Explanations for the
contents of each section are therefore exactly the same as those
contained within the builders guide and will therefore not be
discussed within this help file.  There are however several options
within each section that have be included for convenience so these
will be elaborated upon along with basic instructions on the program
itself.

ROOMS 
To create a room enter a room vnum in the box in the top left
corner.  Click on add or add/edit to create the room.  (The add/edit
option will add the specified room number as well as select it for
editing.) You are then free to populate the room with information -
descs/flags/sector etc.

Doors are created by using the radio buttons to select a direction and
by then clicking 'create/edit'.  This will bring up a sub dialog that
will let you specify door information as detailed in the builder's
guide.  You have the option to specify a room in the top combo box
that doesn't exist - doing so will automatically create a new room in
the main room work screen if a two way door is created.  The two way
door option will ensure a logical entrance/exit from both rooms (i.e.
a door leading north from room 1 to room 2 will then create a door
leading south from room 2 to room 1).

A quick way to create simple, doorless, logical exits can be done with
the 'quick exits' button on the main room dialog.  Simply select a
direction then type in the destination room in the box in the top left
corner.  Click 'quick exits' and a two-way logical doorless exit will
be made and a new room will be created if needs be.

The main room dialog also contains wrap and format options.  selecting
wrap on/off will toggle word wrap in the main edit box.  The format
buttons will automatically trim line length to the 72 characters as
specified in the builder's guide.  (1sp and 2sp refer to the number of
spaces following a period).

MOBILES 
Works in the same way as the ROOMS section and also contains
the formatting options.  The only additional option is the option to
copy a mob.  This is useful as for reasons discussed in the builder's
guide it is best to have mobs with unique vnums even if they are
identical in all other respects.

OBJECTS 
This screen works in a very similar manner to those before
it.  Worth noting are the various item types included in the list box
in the bottom left of the screen.  Each item type has its own
customised mini-dialog in which object values can be set.

RESETS 
The main resets page contains buttons that lead to seperate
pages for each type of reset supported by the MUD (with M,G and E
resets being done together - i.e.  loading mobs and equiping with
/giving them items).  The RESETS section is driven by information that
has already been provided in the ROOMS/MOBILES and OBJECTS Sections
(i.e.  this section should be completed after the three preceding it).

MISCELLANEOUS 
This section contains dialogs for the sections which
are usually fairly simple and short.  Here you will find dialogs for
completing the SHOPS, AREA, AREADATA, HELPS and SPECIALS.

*TOOLS* 
This contains the explorer and power toys options.

EXPLORER 
Once an area has rooms you can use this option to view the
area in a similar manner to how it will be displayed when online.  
Typing 'help' will display the commands available from within the
program.  (Basic movement is supported as well as the 'goto' command).
Be sure to use the 'edit' command in the explorer if you notice any
issues that need a fixing.

POWER TOYS 
These have been provided to quickly do tasks that could
otherwise take a long time.  SAVING is a very good idea before using
any of these.

- Room flag/sector amendments: Use this to quickly add/remove room
flags to a selection of rooms or to set the sector flag for multiple
rooms.

- Mob Flag amendments - Similar to above except for mob acts and
affects.

- Object flag amendments - Same as above

- Room description changes - Use this to set a selection of room
title/desc to the same text all at once

- Mob exclamation marks - This automatically adds an exclamation mark
to all mob keywords that don't already have one.  (Handy to avoid
problems with players having there names stolen by new mobs)

- Vnum shifter - This power toy is used to change the vnum allocation
of an area.  It does this by determining the lowest and highest vnums
used by either mobs or rooms and then running through every vnum
included in the area and increasing or decreasing it by a user entered
value.  An area with vnums between 9900 and 9950 could therefore be
incremented to say 11551 to 11600.  Vnums outside the range of the
area are not affected thereby preserving portals leading out of area
etc.  Note that vnums contained within descriptions or help text won't
be amended.

- Mass auto format - Format all mob or rooms full descriptions to 72
characters long.

- Auto comments - Generates generic comment information for resets
that can then be supplemented as needs be.

- File associations - Use this option to associate or disassociate
.are files to/from this program.

- Mob prog skeleton - This generates a very basic mob program skeleton
in the current working directory. The format used is based on the
current standard used in the main mud mobprogram file.

- Map - This option attempts to construct a map of the current area
in a 3d space. Use the following keys to navigate:
 - w,a,s,d    - basic movement forward, backward, left and right
 - q,e        - movement up and down
 - arrow keys - used for panning up/down and left/right.
 - r,t        - display/hide room vnums
 - y,u        - Display solid/wireframe rooms

 
 *note - this option is very imperfect and is experimental.


TEXT EDITOR
The program now includes a very simple inline text editor.
This editor allows you to directly import the area you
are currently working on into a notepad style workspace.
Changes can be made directly here then exported directly
back into the main area building program. Please note
that any export done will overwrite any amendments made
to the area subsequent to the last import.  Formatting
errors made will also get exported.  There is even
a potential for the export to cause the program to crash.
Save first! You have been warned!

*CREDITS* 
Many thanks to Kariya for encouraging me to complete this
program as well as to Ibn and Zahri for all their effort in testing
and the great suggestions they came up with.  Finally thanks to DaWiz
for the technical support regarding area formatting.

If you have any queries, comments, bugs etc please contact me at 
malaclypse@outland.org.