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                      JOURNAL FOR SUNDAY 29TH MAY, 2016
______________________________________________________________________________

SUBJECT: A quick Q&A on FAQs
   DATE: Sun 29 May 18:33:53 BST 2016

From time to time I get questions about WolfMUD, it's on going progress and
the direction it is taking. Usually the questions are via email and I respond
directly to the writer - I always like talking about WolfMUD, MUDs and
programming in general. I know it can be daunting emailing someone you don't
know with a question you may not be able to articulate precisely or you think
the question is very basic or even a bit silly. You may be worried that
English is not your first language[1]. Don't worry! I always respond to emails
as best as I can, be it a basic question, something advanced or even
hypothetical. I've emailed with young school children, researchers and
everything in between. I like talking to my users and I'm not going to berate
you or laugh at you or make you feel dumb. One thing I always say to people
is there is only one stupid question - the one you never ask! :)

If the question is interesting and I think other people would be interested I
may mention it in the journal. I will never mention the sender's name without
asking permission first. If a lot of people are asking the same thing then
there may be an issue I need to look into.

Anyone can email me at: diddymus@wolfmud.org

With that I will try and answer some questions I keep getting asked:


Q: Why don't you allow comments directly on your website?

A: A lot of people don't like to 'put themselves out there'. I also like to
   actually talk to my users and have interesting conversations. Doing things
   like that in public can put people off, especially if they are not sure of
   themselves. WolfMUD did have a discussion group for many years but people
   still preferred to email me privately. Plus moderating comments would be
   stealing coding time from WolfMUD.


Q: Why are you not writing tests and using the testing framework?

A: At the moment WolfMUD has been changing a lot and great swathes of code
   keep getting rewritten. I admit that if I was refactoring code tests would
   be invaluable. When rewriting swathes of code I find they get in the way.


Q: Will you be writing tests and using the testing framework?

A: Yes I will be. My plan is to put out the next prototype first. Then I will
   be spending time writing tests, benchmarks and documentation. Once that is
   done it will be released as the first point release.


Q: Will you be writing proper examples instead of putting example snippets in
   comments?

A: I will try. WolfMUD requires quite a bit of setup and putting together
   small runnable snippets for examples is not easy.


Q: Will you be releasing the 'bot' code for testing with thousands of clients?

A: The robot code is an embarrassing, messy, quickly hacked together mess. It
   needs to be rewritten. Hopefully this will be done for and released with
   the first point release of WolfMUD.


Q: Why is WolfMUD development so slow?

A: It's mainly just me working on it in my spare time as a hobby. With a
   full-time job, family, a home and bills to pay they have to take priority.
   I do try to set time aside after work on a Wednesday aka WolfMUD Wednesday!
   Any additional time I get to work on WolfMUD is a bonus.


Q: How can I help with WolfMUD?

A: There are many ways to help. You can point out my mistakes, contribute
   ideas or send Git pull requests or email patches. For code contributions
   you will always get credit for your help. For submitted code all I ask is
   that it is licensed under the BSD 2 clause license[2].


Q: I don't use Git and have never contributed changes before! Can you help?

A: Where I can I will always try and help anyone who emails me. Be it help
   with Git, submitting patches or coding advice.


Q: I can't program! Can I still help?

A: Yes you can! WolfMUD is more than just programming. There is the website
   which is just plain text files - you don't even need to know HTML or CSS if
   you want to contribute a guest journal entry or write an article :) You
   could contribute zone files for other people to use - again just plain
   text.

   As someone who cannot program there is another *very* important task you
   can do to help. Go to the downloads page:

     ../../../downloads/index.html

   Grab a copy of WolfMUD and try to install and run it yourself. It should be
   easy enough that anyone can do it. If you can't or if something is not very
   clear I need to know, so please email me your experiences. Not only will I
   help you but I can see where the issues are and update the documentation to
   help others.

   For some people interest in working on WolfMUD is enough incentive to learn
   programming - or to learn Go. Grab the code and Go documentation and start
   hacking! If some part of my code seems complex I'm happy to explain things.


Q: I'm someone with too much money! Can I pay you to work on WolfMUD?

A: Oh I wish someone actually asked me this question! ;) But I made it up :(
   I don't think it will ever happen. If it did WolfMUD would still have to be
   licensed under the BSD 2 clause license. I would also worry about the money
   being used to 'force' features into WolfMUD or control it's development. A
   better - though still very unlikely scenario - would be for someone to
   employ me as a developer and let me have a 20% or one day a week personal
   project to work on.


For now that's it for the Q&A. If you have anything you would like to then
drop me an email! diddymus@wolfmud.org

--
Diddymus

  [1] I may be able to program in over 30 languages but I only speak English.
      However, Google translate is amazing at bridging language barriers :)
      https://translate.google.com/

  [2] For BSD 2 clause license see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSD_licenses


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