User:Atari2600tim/merged

New article[edit]

Article name and names of editors[edit]

The name of this new article is of significance. Many different software are all called "Online Creation" by their authors. It also matters how we refer to each of them within the article. Calling one OLC and another not OLC is misleading because it refers to both. For the ones that are currently mentioned (ignoring the earlier ones for the moment), I think it would make sense to include codebase name or else the authors' name if it's an independant thing. "NiMUD OLC" and "SMAUG OLC" sound fair. If I wrote an OLC which was a plugin, without being part of a larger package, then it would be "Tim's OLC"; and if it were part of SquirrelMUD, then "SquirrelMUD OLC". The name of the article should be something other than "OLC" or "online creation" as well, to encourage neutrality.

Original Online Creation article[edit]

Online Creation (OLC) is a type of software add-on for Dikumud variant online text adventure games. It was released publicly as NiMUD or "The Isles MUD" by authors Herbert "Locke" Gilliland and Christopher "Surreal" Woodward in 1993.

OLC was inspired by the online building system of Hidden Worlds, which Locke was a player on. The system used by Hidden Worlds was not publicly available open source, and thus its usage was limited to that single MUD. On Hidden Worlds, Locke never reached the level of immortality required to build, though Surreal did. He and Surreal decided to write an online creation system, and start a MUD derived from Diku. He asked Surreal, his neighbor, to begin writing it, and they completed it over the telephone / internet during the September of 1993, and was publically released in various stages of development from 1994 to 2005, almost religiously by its surviving author.

It changed the way Dikumud worlds were created, providing an outlet for those who wished to edit the game. Jason Dinkel originally ported it to other software as the "ILAB/OLC" package. The software's popularity continues to grow, and it has been ported to a variety of MUD softwares and is currently included in at least 35 derived works. However, most have not followed the NiMUD license, and e-mailed the author for permission before distributing derivatives. OLC became known as "Ivan's OLC", "EnvyOLC", "ROMolc" and "ILAB/OLC". It was influential in the design of other online building systems for Diku-derived muds and multiplayer games. Because it is multi-modal, live and persistent, the idea is translated graphically, to three dimensional world editors such as Sauerbraten.

Origin of the Feature[edit]

According to Google's USENET archives, online building and online creation-like features have been present in MUDs since the beginning. Possibly the earliest feature to be recorded was in a predecessor to TinyMUD called Monster created by Rich Skerta at Northwestern University. The feature present in this software is referred to as Customization of rooms and objects, and boasts some similarities to the type of interface present in online building. TinyMUD, LPMUD and MUSH, MUCK and MUX software are all similar in that they provide extensibility and customization live without rebooting the game server.

External link[edit]

Original online building article[edit]

A term referencing the popular DikuMUD editing add-on. Online "building" was the original moniker for software that was later released publically as online creation. Unlike OLC, "builder" commands were not multi-modal, and were similar to commands in the original software that allowed immortals to 'modify' copies of the world database templates for quest purposes. Pioneered by Kalgen of Zebesta Merc/DikuMUD (Alex Mohr of the University of Washington in Seattle, WA) on Hidden Worlds DIKU. Online building was an alternative to popular offline editors, though many "area designers" or "area builders" wrote the files by hand.