This repository contains two related (but separate) IF demos. I will
describe them separately.

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Remote-IF: Demonstrates connecting a server-side IF interpreter (using
RemGlk) to a client-side IF display library (GlkOte).

Written by Andrew Plotkin. The remote-if.py script is in the public domain.

This script launches a Tornado web server which can manage an IF game
as a subprocess. The web client connects to the game via the GlkOte
library (included).

To try this...

- Compile Glulxe with RemGlk. Use the latest GitHub version of RemGlk:
   https://github.com/erkyrath/remglk
- Download the Glulx version of Colossal Cave: 
   http://ifarchive.org/if-archive/games/glulx/advent.ulx
- Type:
   python3 remote-if.py --debug --command='glulxe advent.ulx'
- In your browser, visit:
   http://localhost:4000/
- Press "log in", then "play the game".

The connection between GlkOte and the server is handled with AJAX requests.
If you add "--connect=ws", it will use Websocket requests instead. They
both work; I just wanted to provide sample code for both.

To try the Glulxe experimental debugger, compile Glulxe with the VM_DEBUGGER
option. Then invoke it like this:
   python3 remote-if.py --debug --gidebug --command='glulxe -D advent.ulx'

(The --gidebug option activates the HTML debugging console; the -D option
for Glulxe activates the back-end debugger feature.)

To try a game with graphics...

- Download Sensory Jam:
  http://eblong.com/zarf/glulx/sensory.blb
- Also download the Python BlorbTool script:
  http://eblong.com/zarf/blorb/blorbtool.py
- Create a resource subdirectory in the static directory:
  mkdir static/resource
- Run BlorbTool to unpack the image data into the resource dir:
  python blorbtool.py sensory.blb giload static/resource
  (this will create files static/resource/pict-0.jpeg, etc)
- Type:
  python3 remote-if.py --debug --command='glulxer -ru http://localhost:4000/static/resource/ sensory.blb'

The -ru argument tells the display library to fetch images using URLs of
the form http://localhost:4000/static/resource/pict-0.jpeg. See the
RemGlk docs: http://eblong.com/zarf/glk/remglk/docs.html

(You might think that you could use the -rd argument to serve the files
directly from the local file system. This does not work, because modern
browsers will not allow an http: web page to load file: image URLs.)

This is a demo, *not* a production-ready solution.

- This has no database component, nor any other sort of persistence.
  Instances of the IF game run as subprocesses of the server. If the
  server restarts, the games are all killed.

- Since the IF games run as subprocesses, they consume memory for as
  long as they run. There is currently no reaping of abandoned games,
  so the server will eventually consume all RAM and choke.

- File dialog operations can only prompt for a bare filename.

- If you reload your browser window, RemGlk does not respond sensibly.

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Transcript-IF: Demonstrates accepting transcript recording from a
client-side IF display library (GlkOte).

Written by Andrew Plotkin. The transcript-if.py script is in the public
domain.

This serves two purposes. First, it's a simple way to catch transcript
data from GlkOte/Quixe. Received data is printed to stdout. You could
alter this script to store it in a database or whatever else you wanted.

Second, the server allows other users to join and watch the game be
played in real time! Since the original game library is sending complete
I/O updates, the server can reflect them out to viewers.

To use this, install Tornado (version 3) and launch this script:
  python3 transcript-if.py

Then open http://localhost:4000/transcript-if.html. Game updates will be
received by the server and printed to stdout.

You can then visit http://localhost:4000/ in a web browser to see
a list of connected games. Select one, and you will see the current
game state; it will update as the original game receives input.

You could run Quixe this way if you replace transcript-if.html with
Quixe's play.html file. You'd have to add
  recording_url: 'http://localhost:4000/record',
to the game_options object in play.html. You'd also need to change all
of the links in play.html (JS, CSS) to refer to the static/ subdirectory.
(See transcript-if.html.)

This is a demo, *not* a production-ready solution.

- Game information is not stored in a database. It's kept in memory
  forever, which means that the server will eventually consume all RAM
  and choke.

- The server does not try to reformat the IF display state for the
  viewer's window size. Everything appears in a pane the size of the
  original game's window.

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These scripts require:

  Python 3 (tested with Python 3.9)
  Tornado web server (tested with Tornado 6.1)
    http://www.tornadoweb.org/
  (For remote-if.py) An application (such as Glulxe) compiled with
    RemGlk 0.3.0 or later
    http://eblong.com/zarf/glk/

This package contains the following additional libraries:

  jQuery JavaScript Library v1.12.4
    http://jquery.com/  (MIT license)
  GlkOte 2.3.2
    http://eblong.com/zarf/glk/glkote.html  (MIT license)