There is a new improved version of the broker, running parallell with the old
one. The command for the new version is 'devbroker'.
It is not really a recoded or fixed version, it is completely rewritten from
scratch.
The reason I did this was to move it to SQL.
Why?
- Memory. Keeping it all in a huge mapping consumes memory. While Durand
claims memory is cheap, I prefer not to keep all this data stored in a huge
mapping that is loaded all the time. Also I do not know the real limitations
on mapping sizes.
- Web interface. To make a good web interface the data must be accessible from
outside the mud. Dralith will be working on this.
- Functionality. Some searches and other functions were simply not feasible in
the mapping version.
- CPU. Same as functionality, it was potentially too CPU intensive to do
searches in the mapping. By 'outsourcing' the searches to a separate vhost,
and more importantly, to an SQL server that is actually built to do just that,
we can now fulltextsearch some of the fields.
- More data. Now it stores data like creators, slots, itemtype (great helm,
full plate.. ) and is searchable on all fields.
I will probably not transfer all the current broker items into the new one.
Try out the new version, find the bugs and tell me (with bug command!) if you
see anything out of place.
Note that creators,slots,armour/weapontype,condition are grabbed directly from
the object. If you add items manually "devbroker add" it just asks desc and
price as usual. If you give it an object however, with "devbroker add belt"
it'll grab the object from your inventory as the old one did, and add the
additional fields to the broker.
Note also that the 'move' option has been removed. I figured it didn't make
any sense anymore. Every time you add an item it will get the lowest number
available for you. So if you delete something from the middle it'll be
available for another item.