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| alias |
(1) In a MUD, a user-defined command that executes another
command. For example, if a player assigns the command
"murder Louie" to the alias "1", entering
"1" causes the murder command to occur. (2) In MUD Mage, a variable that is replaced with its value. It is defined much like the alias in the first definition, but it can be included within any lengthy command, hotkey, alias, or trigger. |
| ANSI | A terminal type for producing special effects with text, such as color and cursor movement. Most MUDs that support color use ANSI graphics. |
| ASCII | Plain text. ASCII text has no special formatting, no special fonts, no colors, no sizes, or any other special feature. Windows notepad and DOS edit view and edit ASCII files. Files with the "INI" extension contain ASCII text, for example. |
| character |
(1) A fictional persona or part to role-play. (2) A text symbol. Letters, numbers, and punctuation are considered characters. |
| checkbox | A square that may either contain an "X" or nothing within it. |
| class | Profession. For example, a character may be a thief, a warrior, or a mage. |
| client | A program that must connect to a server as a guest process to operate the server's services. |
| hack-and-slash | Refers to swinging axes and swords. Games of this variety exist solely to satisfy the competitive bloodthirst of the players. |
| hotkeys | Defined keys that produce an event when pressed. For example, pressing "ALT" and "F4" at the same time causes the current window to attempt to close. |
| lag | Delay in operation. Lag is usually the slowness of an Internet connection, although it is a programmed feature in MUDs so mobility is a bit more natural to the players; taking the time to glaze a dagger with poison will cause lag. It can be caused by many things outside of MUDs, especially too much data flow, slow computer processors, bad connections. |
| log file | A recording of a MUD session. |
| mobiles (MOBs) | NPCs in a MUD for interaction and interest. Usually, it is more interesting for most players to interact brutally with MOBs and gain experience from killing them. |
| MUD | A Multi-User Dimension/Dungeon. MUDs are multi-player text adventure games on the Internet available through a telnet connection. |
| MUDaholic | Someone who plays a MUD so much that it takes precedence in that person's life over other things considered socially important, such as lovers, GPAs, occupations, eating, and sleeping. |
| MUDder | One who plays MUDs. |
| newbies, noobies, and nubies | Players that are new to playing MUDs. Newbies should read as many help files as they can find about playing a MUD before attempting to interact in the MUD environment. |
| Non-Player Characters (NPCs) | Entities in a role-playing game who are uncontrolled by players. The game runs them. See MOBILES. |
| Player Killing (PK) | Killing other players' characters in a MUD. In the better MUDs, who you can PK is limited by levels and experience percentages. |
| registration | The process of becoming the legal owner of a shareware package. Shareware is not free. Shareware usually has an evaluation limit of 30 days. After that, one must register or delete it. |
| role-play | Assuming a role or part in a story. The player pretends to be the character in the game. For example, a player commands his hill giant character to say "Me squash you head!" to another character who has, according to the story, enraged his character. |
| server | A program that hosts for clients and provides them particular services, such as a MUD. |
| session | A period of time spent playing a particular MUD. |
| shareware | Software written and distributed for people to evaluate until they decide to register or delete it. |
| spamming | Sending the same data or command repeatedly. |
| technical support (tech support) | A service provided free of charge to registered users by the author (or his technical support team); users may gain answers to questions related to the software and help in configuring the software for use on their systems. |
| telnet | A special Internet service that facilitates a direct connection between one machine, the client, to another machine, the server. A MUD client is telnet software with special features for MUDs. |
| toggle | To force into an opposite state. For example, a light switch is a toggle for a light: when the light is on, it may be turned off, and when the light is off, it may be turned on. |
| trigger | An event that occurs in response to specified text coming from the host system. For example, if the trigger keyword "hi" was defined with the command "smile", the "smile" text would be sent to the host any time the MUD client detected the word "hi" coming from the host. |
| word wrapping | If the last word, or collection of characters not separated by spaces, on a line cannot fit on the same line as the text before it, it moves to the beginning of the next text line. |
