Originally by Ron
Tapia <tapia@nmia.com>
Maintained by Matthew
Campbell <mattcampbell@pobox.com>
RMOO is a MOO client for Emacs. In addition to the basic features present in any MOO client, RMOO includes more advanced features, mainly the ability to edit MOO notes, mail, and code in separate Emacs buffers and to easily send these buffers back to the MOO. RMOO also includes support for the Emacspeak audio desktop, so that people who are blind and use Emacspeak can more easily use MOOs and other similar servers.
You can always find the latest version of RMOO, along with pre-built Red Hat packages, at the RMOO home page.
This is a maintenance release. In this release, I removed the activity alert that Emacspeak users used to get while they were typing in an RMOO buffer, because it caused problems with Emacs 20.5 and later. I also updated everything to reflect my new email address and Web site address. Finally, I quit using Latte and now write the HTML code myself.
This is a major release, and a lot has changed. I reworked the installation procedure to make it more like the standard procedure for Emacs packages and open-source software in general. I also improved support for Emacspeak and fixed other miscellaneous problems. In particular, I added special sounds that RMOO uses when running in conjunction with Emacspeak. I got them from a collection of cow sounds that I found on the Web. I hope they will make your MOOing experience more fun.
In local editing, I added two new commands: C-c C-c now uploads the current buffer to the MOO and destroys the window, and C-c C-] destroys the window without uploading the buffer.
There is a new variable, rmoo-send-always-goto-end,
which, if set to t, will make RMOO always go to the
end of the buffer after sending a line, no matter where in the
buffer the user was.
In this release, I have one specific goal: to make the RMOO extension for Emacspeak consistently notify the user of activity in a MOO buffer which is not his current buffer, and to make it consistently read that activity to the user when he switches to the MOO buffer. I believe I have achieved this goal.
To use RMOO, you should have GNU Emacs version 20 or later. I have not tested RMOO with XEmacs recently, though it may work. To take advantage of some features of the MOO Client Protocol (MCP), you will need Emacs/W3 as well.
To install RMOO from the source package, follow these steps:
Unpack the rmoo-1.1.tar.gz file.
Change to the new RMOO source directory (rmoo-1.1) and type the following commands as any user:
./configure
make
Now, as root, type this while in the RMOO source directory: make install
(require 'rmoo-autoload)
You can also get a Red Hat package that is ready to install and use from the RMOO home page.
For users of RMOO versions before 1.0, you need to do a little preparation before installing the new version. When you installed an older version of RMOO, you had to add a block of code from a file called fragment-of-.emacs to your .emacs file. You must now remove this code, because it has moved into the main RMOO code. This block started with the following:
;; ;; Change this if you want to keep the rmoo source somewhere else. ;;
and ended with the following:
(rmoo-load-libs)
Once you have removed this block, you can continue with the normal RMOO installation procedure. At this point, you will not have the shortcut key (C-c m) that you used to use to start RMOO. TO get this back, refer to the Tips and Tricks section.
Once you have installed RMOO using the instructions provided above, you can connect to a MOO any time by pressing M-x rmoo. When you are prompted for a MOO world, you can either enter one, optionally using Emacs's completion facility to help you, or you can press Enter without entering anything. If you do the latter, you will be prompted for the site and port, in addition to login name and password.
To add a new MOO world, type M-x rmoo-worlds-add-new-moo, and follow the prompts. Then save the world list by typing M-x rmoo-worlds-save.
One of the great benefits of RMOO is the ability to edit MOO mail, code, or other text in a standard Emacs buffer, with all of the editing commands available. This is a great improvement over the primitive line editor provided by most MOOs. To turn on local editing on a standard LambdaCore-based MOO, type:
@edit-options +local
A new Emacs buffer will now be opened when you want to edit something on the MOO. RMOO provides instructions for sending the text to the MOO or closing the window without sending.
If you have trouble with RMOO leaving the point at the end of the line you just sent, you may find it helpful to add the following to your .emacs file:
(setq rmoo-send-always-goto-end t)
This will cause RMOO to always go to the end of the buffer after sending a line. You can also configure RMOO so that it will not send your input to the server unless you are on the last line of the buffer. This is helpful for Emacspeak users who review the MOO buffer with the cursor movement keys, and then start typing without going to the end of the buffer. To turn on this feature, add this to your .emacs file:
(setq rmoo-send-require-last-line t)
You may find it helpful to have a shortcut key that you can use to start RMOO. To add this feature, add the following to your .emacs file:
(global-set-key "\C-cm" 'rmoo)
You can now start RMOO with C-c m.
Enjoy,
Matt Campbell