Subj : Re: Private data on function objects
To   : netscape.public.mozilla.jseng
From : James Turner <james.turner@crocodile-clips.com>
Date : Mon Jan 13 2003 10:46 am

In <3E1DF1EC.5090903@meer.net> Brendan Eich  wrote:

> 
> What language or system are you bridging JS to and from, anyhoo?

Hoo-boy. I'm attempting to use JavaScript as the implementation language 
for most of the rule logic in a game server for WorldForge (http://www.
worldforge.org/). WorldForge is a project to build and run open-source 
massively multiplayer online game systems (UltimaOnline, etc). This is 
all highly experimental, don't look for references on the website or 
anything. The first thing i have to do (and part of the reason I decided 
to use JS, even though one of the other 'rival' servers uses Python) is 
that the set of types defined by our network protocol and data encoding 
layers matches the JS primitives very closely.

So we have a layer which is sort of like XDR (though it can be encoded 
using any system you like, we use XML at the moment and have binary 
encodings too), and on top of that is a type / object system which 
defines the game objects ('entities') and the things you can do to them (
'operations'). This entire system is common to all of the clients, 
servers and tools in development, and is implemented (so far) in C++, 
Java and Python, with Perl interfaces.

The problem is, Atlas was designed by someone who'd used Python too much, 
and as a result it's C++ API is a bit of a dog, and excessively verbose 
to get anything done in. So my aim is to map the Atlas classes to JS 
classes, the Atlas entities to JS Objects, and so on, so that people 
writing game logic don't have to deal with Atlas at all, they just use 
JS objects / variables and everything works.

So far, this appears to be working, but it's extremely early days. 

Anyway, once I have a webpage and something more interesting, I'll post 
it here.

H&H
James

.