Inform 7

[maiki]

Continuing the discussion from Contribute code to a text adventure using Inform 7:

[] Data page

[maiki]

@trashHeap, @judytuna, what’s the low-down on inform7? Please give me an update on the project, and if it is worth downloading and using before the source opening.

@trashHeap

(In no particular order)

• Name
• Status (Dead/Healthy/Abandoned/Maitenaned/Security Patches Only)
• Release Schedule/Cycle
• License
• Is license OSI/FSF/DFSG approved ?
• Runtime (Java / Electron / NodeJS / Native (or libc) / etc.)
• Widgets ( Qt / Gtk / Coacoa / Windows Forms / Swing / etc. )
• Platforms
• Build System
• Website
• Repository
• Function ( Text Editor / Compiler / Calculator / Emulator / etc.)
• Online Required
  • Decentralized / Centralized
  • Peer to Peer
• Protocols supported
• Web Based
  • Supported Web Servers
• DRM & Type of DRM
• Last known price
• Publisher
• Studio / Lead Dev
• Package types available ( DEB / RPM / Flatpak / Snap / MSI / Installshield-EXE etc. )
• Initial year it became available.
• Recommended by other Talkgroup/Mage party member
• Governance Model

[trashHeap]

• Name: Inform 7
• Status: Inconsistent
• Release Schedule/Cycle: Inconsistent
• License: The core compiler is (currently) proprietary and is planned to shift to Artistic 2.0 with planned Bison like code generation clause. The various OS specific IDEs are GPLv3.
• Is license OSI/FSF/DFSG approved ? Not today.
• Runtime: Inform 7 executes as native code but outputs Glulxe or ZMachine VM.
• Widgets: Output is text based. IDE is Gtk3 / Cocoa / Windows Forms.
• Platforms: GNU/Linux (badly supported) , Windows , Mac OS X.
• Build System: Unknown
• Website: http://inform7.com
• Repository: Somewhere near: ganelson (Graham Nelson) · GitHub
• Function: Compiler / Programming Language / Natural Language Processor
• Online Required: No
• DRM & Type of DRM: None
• Last known price: Gratis
• Publisher: N/A
• Studio / Lead Dev: Graham Nelson
• Package types available: Flatpak is the only option for most GNU/Linuxes currently.
• Initial year it became available: 2006 for Inform 7 , 1993 for all prior versions of Inform. Inform 7 is a very different programming language though than from what came before.
• Governance Model: Dictator for life.

[trashHeap]

@maiki

and if it is worth downloading and using before the source opening.

This is a complicated issue.

My own personal beef is that I don’t want to commit a lot of personal investment in a programming language; if it could die with the author. And right now Inform 7 can. For example the GNU/Linux builds are allready rotting quite badly and can only get running under a modern distro with Flatpak.

It however remains the most technically and historically interesting way of making portable interactive fiction; and remains very central to the interactive fiction community. It’s natural language approach also may make it extremely accessible over some other options.

Until it’s FLOSS though building ontop of it feels like building ontop of sand to me.

[maiki]

First pass for warez page:

https://interi.org/warez/inform-7/

From text at interi/warez - inform-7.md at master - warez - allthe.codes.

Same deal as SGDK, I need to figure out how to format many of these fields. A little bit each day.

[judytuna]

this is amazing. thank you for writing up all that data, @trashHeap!!!