BBS Toolkit/BBS Toolkit.iso/doors_2/pcove503.zip/READ.ME

Text File | 1993-03-08 | 15KB | 262 lines

Version 1.01. Correction was made so that if you bury treasure your
moves are adjusted. If you have 4 moves, because you have treasure
onboard, it is adjusted back to 12. If you have 2 turns when you bury
treasure, and have already taken two, your moves are adjusted to 10.
Logic is Number of moves for today-those already  taken. In other words
remove the 4 move limit and restore the player to what she or he would
if they never had any treasure onboard.

A non-fatal error was corrected in the treasure to points routine. In
the first version, 1.00, when you converted treasure the player was
sent to the penalty routine twice. Once with the conversion and once
upon return. This has been corrected and the player now only goes once
on each move. In testing I never had two penalties in a row, the odds
must be high in it happening, but it could have happened.

Version 1.02. This is really not a new version but rather to correct the
PCHELP file that was in WordPerfect 5.0 format by mistake. Sorry about
this error, I just copied the wrong copy into the directory when I
archived the file.

Version 103. I corrected a deleted player error. If a player was past 30
days the next player to log on that was in the database after the
deleted player became a new player without knowing it and all data was
erased but the players alias (real or otherwise) and points. What the
player really lost was any treasure they were carrying and I believe
they were also dropped from any team they might have been on but the team
would still think they were on it. This was a very confusing error and I
only caught it because it happened to me. No one else had reported it.

Version 1.04. I corrected an oversight in the jettison routine. If your
moves were zero you could not jettison treasure for a ship's percentage
increase. This checker is now inside the jettison routine. I also
corrected the internal Player Standings. Earlier versions would display
deleted players as ...........0, this has been corrected. There have
also been a few minor adjustments to the program. I added files to allow
the Sysop to run the program in local mode under GAP for testing and
evaluating the program. Also the warnings about the program not running
in local mode on a computer with a modem in it under PCBoard 14+. This
problem is with GAPQBDR and not with my code.

Version 1.05. I compiled and linked the program using GAPQBDR files date
8-28-89 that cured the problem with running locally on PCBoard 14+ when
there was a modem. I did not know of this newer version of GAPQBDR until
his time and right away I updated the program.

Version 1.06. I believe there was a year rollover problem with the
deletion of inactive players. I reprogrammed the date function so that
the deletion and inactivity checks show proper number of days. I also
made checks for extremes so that if you use a year newer or older date
on your system date than is correct, the program will ignore user last
on dates and proceed without deleting them or giving some strange
results or other errors. If you have problems in this area let me know
right away and with as much detail as is possible so I can duplicate the
results and isolate the problem. I added color to FIXPC.EXE for those
who have color cards. It still runs in mono for those who do not have a
color card.

Version 1.07. Compiled the program using newer GAPQBDR files (90?).
PCOVE.EXE came out about 20,000 bytes smaller. I also made some changes
to the error routine that now is supposed to erase PCOVE.LOK and if
present, PCOVE.NET on error caused exits. I also fixed a error in
FIXPC.EXE. If you corrected/adjusted a players point standings the
editor only updated PCOVE.PCD and not TEAM.PCD or WHO.PCD. Point
changes are now adjusted in all database files. I removed a blank line
from the bottom of the bulletin. There were other minor adjustments to
the program.

Version 1.08. It finally dawned on me that there was something seriously
wrong with the number of moves. I used 3 moves, buried treasure, and
when I return to pirating I still had 11 moves when I should have had 9
or less. Sure enough, I made a tragic error in the values that I used to
determine the number of moves remaining when you bury treasure and when
treasure is converted to points. The routine worked just fine until I
gave the players their proper moves after burying treasure. It was in
that version that I made the calculation error. Testing shows that it is
now correct. I am sure no one complained about TOO MANY MOVES. Right?

Version 2.00. This version now corrects the strange Error #5 error. I
have no idea what this happened on some systems and not others. It NEVER
happened locally where I alpha and beta tested the door and where it
continues to run error free. I did not reproduce the error at home until
I lost the data on my hard drive and restored the drive from memory (I
had used my backups for disk mailings). It was as I struggled to get all
my doors running that the Error #5 came up. I isolated it to a single
line of code. This same code had run fine before and was running at a
local BBS. I presume that some system error triggered something in that
code. I saw nothing WRONG with the code but I did rewrite it using a
different syntax. It works fine now.

There are changes in this version. In previous versions when a team
player converted points they had to share the points with other team
members. This did not let them compete on a individual level. I have
now changed this and ALL PLAYERS get 100 percent of their points. This
has no effect on the team totals. Team players no longer get a 10
percent bonus. When you come across other pirates in a sector they now
have a 50x50 chance of performing three actions: They can do nothing,
they can shoot at you and miss or they can shoot at you and hit you.
This happens for as many pirates as there are in the sector. In earlier
versions you always attacked them, now they can attack you. This does
seem to be a lot fairer than before. The bulletin now shows the
percentage of your ship.

Version 3.00. I removed the ship's percentage from the bulletin. I liked
it but there were those who moaned and groaned that other players would
know their percentage, seek them out and sink them. I found this logic
to be poor. It is very difficult to search 143 sectors for another
player in only 12 moves but I made the change back to the old bulletin
(registered versions only).

I also made an island ejecter. Players may now only remain on the island
for any two days at a time. After that they are randomly place somewhere
on rows 10, 11, or 12.

FIXPC.EXE has been updated to 2.00 to incorporate the changes the
changes in 2.01 of Pirate's Cove. I also fixed a problem in the routine
that added treasure to a player.

FIX.EXE must be run if you have current data and installing PCOVE.EXE,
version 3.00. The data structure has changed. YOU MUST RUN THIS PROGRAM
if you have existing data. The program converts current data structure
to the new structure. RUN THE PROGRAM ONLY ONCE OR YOU WILL CORRUPT YOUR
EXISTING DATA. It erases itself after converting the data.

Verson 3.01. I corrected and error in the bury routine. If your chosen
site showed signs of digging, and you answered No to continue, the
program would not let you pick another site. I discovered that if you
jettisoned treasure you could reenter the door and jettison the max.
Doing this there was no limit to how much you could jettison. I have now
put a counter into the main database so you can only jettison up 9000 in
treasure, per day.

FIX2.EXE must be run if you have current data and installing PCOVE.EXE
version 3.01. The data structure has changed again. YOU MUST RUN THIS
PROGRAM if you have existing data. RUN THE PROGRAM ONLY ONCE OR YOU
MIGHT CORRUPT YOUR EXISTING DATA. It erases itself after converting the
data.

If you are converting to a version below 3.00 to 3.01, and you have
existing data, you must run both FIX.EXE and FIX2.EXE. If you are
converting from 3.00 to 3.1 you need only to run FIX2.EXE.

Safest way to upgrade if you have current data is to erase the current
data and install the new PCOVE.EXE and not worry about the "fix"
programs.

Version 3.02 When I changed the scoring for team players I deleted too
much of the scoring routine. If you have current data use FIXPC and edit
the data for each player on a team. All you have to do is type back in
the current points. Version 3.02 will then run correctly from this point
on. The error is only in the treasure to points routine. If a player has
sunk another pirate their points and team points are correct. The error
was only in the totals for team scores.

I have made a change in the bury routine. In the past if your treasure
was stolen and you buried new treasure on top of the old there was no
way to tell that the earlier treasure had been stolen. Now you get a
warning just like you do when you go to dig it up. The program then
resets the buried value to $0 and the mature date to nothing as you are
returned to the burial location prompt. You are encouraged to pick a new
location but you are still able to use the current one if you want to.
The message does not come up the second time you try to bury at the
current location.

Version 4.00 This version is not downward compatible with earlier
versions. If you have an earlier version running you must delete *.PCD
in order to install this version. The play grid has been increased to
16x16 and the island grid to 12x12. Turns are now 18 without treasure
and 5 if you have treasure. A gambling casino has been added to the
island to increase a players activities. The British Fleet has been
added to the play grid and they are randomly placed on the grid each
time a player uses the program.

I felt that with the earlier 3.0+ versions and their fixes that it would
be too confusing to make a fix that would convert current data to the
new formats. That is would be easier to have the BBS roll over (delete)
the current data. This also will let current players get used to the new
format, size and etc. There is just so many things different about this
version I am not sure I have noted them all.

I made a new routine that keeps track of the moves a player has used.
The program is now more accurate in restoring the moves when treasure is
buried or converted to points. If you exit the program with treasure
onboard your maximum moves are set to whatever moves you have remaining.
If you return the same day you moves remain at what they were on your
exit and cannot be increased unless you have not jettisoned treasure and
you have treasure to jettison. I also corrected some display errors that
were overlooked before. I corrected an oversight in the jettison routine.
If you had jettisoned all your treasure your moves were not returned to
non-treasure status.

To the best of my knowledge ALL earlier errors have been corrected in
this version.

FIXPC.EXE version 2.03. The editor has been updated to reflect the
changes in Pirate's Cove and I corrected an error that did not properly
check for the input letters out-of-range when editing a file. I made an
error handler that asks the user to report any errors to the author and
exits the program.

PCOVE 4.02. I have removed the local BEEP from the program so that the
sysops no longer hear the tone when a caller is on remote.

FIXPC.EXE version 2.04. I corrected an ERROR 55 that I missed on an
update. I am sorry if this caused any trouble, I just goofed on that
one.

PCOVE.EXE version 4.03. Just some minor adjustments and closing credits.

FIXPC.EXE version 2.05. Corrected a minor program error if you were not
in the correct directory. Also updated the credits and put my correct
address in the exit routine.

************************************************************************

PCOVE.EXE (5.0). PCEDIT.EXE (3.00). Whole new version that runs under
Door Patch 3.8 and QuickBASIC's BRUN30.EXE (patched version). Editor
is now PCEDIT.EXE, maintenance is now an external program called
PCMAINT.EXE (2.00) and must be run daily to update players, galleons,
etc. Format for .CFG files is different than the .CNF files used with
previous versions. This version requires a serial number to be
registered, no hard coding needed as in earlier versions. Serial number
will be good for future upgrades/updates.

Read the two docs for all the changes. An overall better program with
better BBS and modem support. There are a lot of changes and
enhancements in version 5.0. There is also a file format change in this
version so it is not comptible with earlier versions. If are running an
earlier version please delete the entire directory and start over. This
is the only way to upgrade to version 5.00. Part of this reasoning is
that there have been major changes on several earlier versions and an
update program would have to space too many changes and would not be
able to tell which version it was updating.

I have corrected some errors that have gone unoticed by everyone
including myself. When a user had treasure on board it was possible to
use up their five turns, exit and reenter the door and get five more
turns on the same day. This has been corrected. A user when exiting with
moves remaining did not always have the correct number of moves when
they rentered the door. This has been corrected. There were some other
minor errors that I caught during the rewrite/conversion, which turned
out to be a major undertaking.

Version 5.01. Made some minor corrections and updates to PCOVE.EXE.
Corrected error in PCEDIT.EXE (3.01) which if you un-sunk someone
their new location was not being added to the WHO.PCD file.

Version 5.02. Made some minor changes in PCOVE.EXE. Added to the help
files that you are able to press "B" (bet) to get pirate activity at
Rosa's even if you do not have any money to actually make a bet. This
ability has been there since 5.00 was released but forgot to add it to
the help files. No errors have been reported.

Version 5.03. When I converted this program from the GAPQBDR back to
Door Patch 3.8 I just used the old keyboard timeout routine. In working
with the door I discovered that it was not working correctly. It was
possible to fall asleep and just let the door run. I have corrected the
timeout problem. No errors have been reported.

                     James Huckabey
                      (03-08-1993)