• Fixed a problem with items in an opaque container being possible to manipulate using ALL.
  • Fixed a problem with inherited reference attributes affecting proposed door class implementation. Now works as specified.
  • Fixed position calculation with -ide (for use with AlanIDE) to be platform independent.
  • Unified the automatic display of objects and actors so that they now both are listed in indefinite form. Actors are still listed separately since they might carry things and have script descriptions.
  • Moved the special actor handling of automatic display to the library.
  • Changed the message identifiers SEE_OBJ_xxxx to SEE_xxxx.
  • Removed the message identifier SEE_ACTOR.
  • Adjusted default listing of containers without a description so that it always occurs unless the container is opaque.
  • Added analysis of parameter references embedded in strings.
  • Allowed expression in Step After (previously only allowed integer).
  • Fixed a problem where you could not refer to the script of an actor, if the actor was a loop variable.
  • Fixed inheritance of Initialize clause.
  • Printing of pronouns.
  • SET statement can now set a literal set value: Set x Of l To {}.
  • SET statement can now set a set to the value of another set; Set set1 Of i1 To set2 Of i1.
  • IN can now test set membership in set literal: If int Of i In {1,3,5,7} Then...
  • Saving did not handle sets and strings correctly, could cause crashes, fixed.
  • Initialization of a set attribute to an empty set is allowed and possible in two ways:
    1. The attribute is inherited so the member type and class is known.
    2. A single class identifier is given instead of members.
  • Integer loops: For Each i Between 1 And limit Of bridge Do ...
  • Loops over Sets and Containers: For Each i In friends Of hero Do ...
  • Aggregation over Sets and Containers: Count In friends Of hero
  • Reference attributes can be initialized with a class instead of an instance if declared in a class. In this case all instances must give the attribute a value.
  • Fixed WinArun startup so that it now prompts for a game name if the program is activated instead of activating a game.
  • Fixed the renaming feature of the interpreter which was broken (if renamed the interpreter will look for game files with the corresponding name).
  • Finally fixed the about box in WinArun to work in Win2000 and WinXP.
  • Debugger now knows on which lines it is possible to set breakpoints.
  • Added NEGATIVE ARTICLE/FORM for "Can't see any xyzzy here.", including a corresponding Say form and embedded printing symbol.
  • Fixed a bug where a single trailing $ caused spurious output, now correctly outputs a single $.
  • Removed M_???_ARTICLE and M_PRONOUN messages since they are equivalent to the corresponding clause in the class 'entity' which now sets them as default. You can override them by adding the clauses with an Add statement instead of using MESSAGE.
  • Fixed numerous bugs in the UNDO handling:
    • Now saves only states when player changes anything.
    • Now handles strings and sets correctly.
    • Now responds with "'<command>' undone." which is a new customizable message.
  • Added more separators (characters that automatically inhibit space and force capitalization).

  • The DIRECTLY qualifier can now be used for all Where-type expressions
  • A container using the default description will list its content
  • The List statement can now operate on expressions, notably involving reference attributes
  • Implemented text style hints which of course only works in some interpreters, notably non-trivial GLK-variants
  • Exits can be inherited and added
  • Initialize clause added to classes and instances, this makes it easier to control initializations locally
  • Events can be referenced from attributes in the same way as instances
  • NEW Play statement to play sounds, interpreter dependent support of course
  • All media resources are now automatically packaged into a single resource file (blorb-format) by the compiler
  • Improved word handling to enable more correct parsings when words are of multiple classes, e.g. verb&direction, adjective&verb and preposition&verb
  • Nearby expression can test locations
  • NEW Near expression which tests the adjacency between two instances
  • Simplified the language grammar notation in the manaual
  • Clean up of AT and IN. They are both now transitive/recursive. Optional qualifier, "Directly", can be used in expressions to get direct location or containment.
  • Clean-up of pre-defined classes. Everything must inherit from some class. "entity" can not have location (invisible and everywhere), "thing" can but is not described automatically (invisible but localized). "actor" and "object" are described automatically (visible). Sub-classes to "entity" behave like "entity". This harmonizes with the fact that "literal" is a subclass of "entity".
  • Names are now inherited by adding names down the hierarchy. This means that if a name is available for a more general class it will also be available for the more special classes and instances. Good candidates for use of this feature is fruit/apple/macintosh and human/person/man.
  • Initial locations are inherited.
  • Restrictions on auto-generated syntaxes now matches the class the verb was declared in.
  • New statement "Random In" extracts a random element in a set or container.
  • Pronoun declarations. Instead of the previously built in "IT"-handling and synonyms, it is now possible to declare pronouns for a class or instance. These words can be used in player input to refer to the instance if the instance was previously mentioned explicitly in the previous player command. (This also solves the problem with referring to a single instance using "them". "them" can still be used to refer to the same multiple set of instances as used in the previous command.)
  • Improved use of correct case for words.
  • Printing actor names are now done in the same way as for other instances wrt. to definite/indefinite forms.
  • Parameters are available in the Message sections for many messages. This allows e.g. fixing the message wrt. to noun case (as in German, "any" = kein/keine/keiner depending on noun case).
  • Changed default messages to use parameter handling in as many cases as possible, e.g. default location "content" listing, and container listings. It is now possible to re-format these into tabulation instead of the standard in-line form, for example.
  • Added message for "unknown word".
  • Deprecated "$include" in favour of a new, equilvalent, "import" statement. (***spoiler***) This makes future IDE-building easier.
  • Verified that an inherited set or reference attribute retains the original type even if the infered type of a redefinition is not the same. A sub-class of the original is required.
  • Fixed debug/trace output to show up also in winarun.
  • Fixed command line arguments to winarun, you can now run the debugger, trace etc. also in GLK-variants of the interpreter.
  • Fixed a bug which mixed up several syntax-declarations so that interpreter would respond with "You must supply a noun." for some legal inputs.
  • Fixed a bug with spacing in command line version.
  • Fixed a bug with opaque attribute not being inherited for inherited containers.
  • Fixed a problem with some attributes not being saved and restored correctly.

What They Say

"I think its most attractive quality is simplicity, a quality that no other adventure creation language possesses."

Walt Sandsquish