NAME

powwow - telnet protocol client for MUD playing

SYNOPSIS

powwow [ host port ] | [ definition-file ]

DESCRIPTION

powwow is a client program that implements the telnet protocol, adding some bells and whistles to the standard telnet(1) communication utility, mainly intended for playing multi-user games such as MUDs (Multi User Dungeons).

powwow is either invoked with host and port, and then does not save any definitions, or with a definition-file, which is supposed to contain various definitions as well as the name of the host and the port number. If the definition-file does not exist, the user is prompted for the host name and port number which are saved in the new file. The definition file can be edited with any text editor, and is updated whenever a definition (action, alias, etc.) is changed. If the environment variable POWWOWDIR is defined, powwow will look there first for definition files (and create new ones there).

Lines that begin with `#' are assumed to be special commands to be processed locally. Help is available with the #help command. There is also a more detailed manual somewhere. Notably, semicolons separate commands on a single line. To send a literal semicolon, prefix it with a backslash.

powwow also supports the MUME editing protocol for editing texts locally. The name of the editor is taken from the environment variable POWWOWEDITOR or EDITOR. emacs(1) is used by default. For text viewing, POWWOWPAGER is searched, then PAGER and more(1) is used by default.

If the first character of the editor is `&' (which is then skipped), the editor is assumed to run in another window and powwow will run concurrently with the editor without waiting for it to finish.

When launched, the editor program will have its TITLE environment variable set to the document title sent from the MUD.

AUTHOR

Massimiliano Ghilardi <max@Linuz.sns.it> and Gustav Hållberg are the people that added many new features to an existing client, Cancan and transformed it into powwow. Mattias Engdegård (f91-men@nada.kth.se) was the original author of Cancan but many other people have contributed at least as much, including Finn Arne Gangstad (finnag@pvv.unit.no), David Gay (dgay@di.epfl.ch), Gary Dezern (gdezern@satelnet.org) and Lai-Chang Woo (vivriel@scs.com.sg).

powwow moved to hoopajoo.net in 2005, and is now maintained by Steve Slaven <bpk@hoopajoo.net>, please send bug reports and patches to that address.

The powwow WWW page is: http://hoopajoo.net/projects/powwow.html

powwow was originally inspired by Peter Unold's Tintin client, but now only bears a very remote resemblance to the original. It aims to be a simple but very interactive client, and contains features that are interesting for ``immortal'' players, in particular on MUME, though any mud player should benefit from powwow as well.

FILES

powwow: The binary.
$(POWWOWDIR)/*: Definition files for aliases, etc.

ENVIRONMENT

TERM: Your terminal type.
POWWOWDIR: Where powwow will store and search for its files by default.
POWWOWEDITOR or EDITOR: Name of editor to use.
POWWOWPAGER or PAGER: Name of pager to use.

DIAGNOSTICS

Most diagnostics are self-explanatory. Some are even more self-explanatory than others, namely those who crash the program. There is a diagnostic report called `core' which is not currently in human-readable form. The messages from powwow are generally prefixed with a `#' to separate them from output from the remote host.

BUGS

Are you kidding?