Many IF creators using Inform or Tads generally disregard other systems, especially systems with a development toolkit, because some of them are not "all plateform / OS" compatible. If it's true many computer users are using MSWindows, on the other hand many IF players / developpers are on Unix / Linux.
With some emulators, it's possible to make run some MSWindows applications. The problem is for Quest it didn't worked.

The question is do some people wish to see Quest runs on Linux ? I doubt someone would develop a Quest player on Linux, or in Java, but maybe Alex would be able to "tweak" a bit Quest so it could play with Wine, either for a special, light, version (with only the game engine, if possible), or for the common edition.
Generally with this emulator Quest starts to load, but soon we get the same error like when Quest on MSWindows runs out of memory, or there is a mistake in the ASL file.

In addition to this crash I got many error messages, many seems non relevant, but those are maybe more usefull :

[[email protected] Quest]# wine Quest.exe
/.../
fixme:ole:VarParseNumFromStr numparse: cDig=30, InFlags=954
fixme:ole:VarNumFromParseNum (..,dwVtBits=20,....), partial stub!
err:shell:SHGetSpecialFolderPathA Failed to create directory 'C:\My Documents'.
/.../
fixme:ole:VarNumFromParseNum (..,dwVtBits=20,....), partial stub!
fixme:ole:OLEPictureImpl_FindConnectionPoint tried to find connection point on {33ad4f92-6699-11cf-b70c-00aa0060d393}?
fixme:ole:OLEPictureImpl_FindConnectionPoint tried to find connection point on {33ad4f92-6699-11cf-b70c-00aa0060d393}?
fixme:ole:CoRegisterMessageFilter stub

It seems for example that Quest starts by looking in this 'My Documents' folder that doesn't exist on Linux. Do you think there is a way to make Quest runs on Linux anyway, without much recoding ?

Hi Farvardin. I wish there was a third option of "of moderate importance." I'm for any kind of expansion of Quest features, unless it draws Alex away from investing time in making the core Quest program better.

What would REALLY interest me is an interface that would allow someone to play Quest solitaire online. Does Questnet allow for solitaire play? I suppose that would not make much sense if you had to have Quest installed.

Many potential users may be at computers that do not allow for the installation of programs.

Even this is not as imporant as strengthening the core program.

Chuck

It would require me to basically write Quest again to get it to work natively on Linux. Linux is frankly a bit too much for me to figure out in the first place, if I want to ever get anything else done! I do have Mandrake installed as it happens, but I don't know much about Linux and nor do I really need to, save for fiddling around with CGI scripts on the axeuk.com server.

I tried Quest out under Wine and successfully got as far as the splash screen. Then I got a run-time error 50003 which in the past is something that has happened on Windows if the file ASYCFILT.DLL was missing. But I installed Quest on Wine using the usual setup file, which includes this DLL, so I'm at a loss as to how to fix this - and it's not something I can really put much into, as tweaking Quest under Wine would mean repeatedly rebooting into Windows, then Linux, then Windows, then Linux...

As a suggestion for Favardin, try creating a "My Documents" folder. I was able to get as far as the splash screen when I'd set up Wine to have the usual Windows folders, and perhaps you'll have more luck.

To Chuck, you could indeed play a solo game when connected to a QuestNet Server, though you'd be taking up the whole server (or port - you could have multiple people playing solo games by running several copies of qnetserv.exe on different ports). At some stage I will add the ability to connect to QuestNet Server through Telnet, so you could play QuestNet games without having Quest installed at all. It wouldn't be too hard for somebody to write their own QuestNet client though - and if anybody has the motivation to do this, let me know and I'll send you details of the protocol used for talking to QuestNet Server.

Write their own Questnet Client? i wish i knew VB

as for quest being compatible with other operating systems other than Microsoft Windows... nahhh, its a Mircrosoft Windows program, Build on a Microsoft Windows OS (i think). so lets leave it at that

At some stage I will add the ability to connect to QuestNet Server through Telnet, so you could play QuestNet games without having Quest installed at all

Sounds good, so it means it'll be possible to run Quest games on other operative systems, in a way !

While it would be nice to have cross-platform compatability, it's not really what I would consider a key feature to be implemented. PLUS, with the way the linux community is, if they want something, they will do it themselves. Of course it'd be quite difficult with no source to go from but I imagine in the future, when Quest has gotten more popular it might not be unreasonable for a *nix developer to get a copy of an out of date Quest source or Qnet source and work something out.

Of course that's just my opinion, it's all in Alex's control as it should be. Realistically though, it'd make more sense to make a linux Qnet server program than any of the other programs. BUT, if it would take learning the ins and outs of a *nix system, it's definitely not worth it at this point in time. Another idea would be for some industrious types to try and code it in a cross-platform language like Python or something.

The problem below seems more like it's a problem with Quest still trying to "think" in a windows environment... ie: C:\My Documents\ ... I think we all see the problem in that, if this is the only error so far, it may be just as simple as setting it to create a directory in a linux manner... ie: root/home/Quest/ ... or whatever. If anything it'd get you past the load screen.

edit *P.S. Something's up with the formatting on the preview and how it looks submitted, not a big deal, but my posts must all be beautiful.

Quest is working now under Linux, with the help of Wine. Of course I can't garantee it would work on a computer without a dual boot and Windows already installed. I'll try to give the necessary files to someone who has Linux only to see if it works.

Since the configuration prg for Wine can pick the necessary DLL from the MSWindows partition, the missing dll in the older test can now be found. Without Quest installation and with only the dll provided by Quest running in the same folder as Quest.exe, it works, but is there a way to know which other dll or files, not in the Quest installation files but in every MSwindows installation, are also needed by Quest ?

But for someone who already has MSwindows, at the moment, you need the lastest version of Wine, found in RPM at http://sourceforge.net/project/showfile ... up_id=6241

You'll need also winesetuptk-0.6.1-b.i586.rpm to make the necessary configurations.

And this way it should work.

Quest also requires the following DLLs and OCX files to be in the Windows System directory:

StdOle2.tlb
MSVBVM50.dll
OleAut32.dll
OlePro32.dll
AsycFilt.dll
ComCat.dll
RichEd32.dll
comct232.ocx
comctl32.ocx
comdlg32.ocx
mci32.ocx
richtx32.ocx
CSWSK32.OCX
UUCODE32.DLL
NPMOD32.DLL
VBUZIP10.DLL

I've managed to fix the problem for running Quest with Wine, it was in the configuration file only, so in the case you're using Linux and wish to use Quest at the same time, just send me a private message and I'll send you my working config file.

My .02 worth: I would really like to see Quest accept a telnet client. That would be real close to having a platform-independent client. From viewing other posts here, it seems that others would like that feature as well. So, Alex, thanks for thinking about us! - Alf

I suppose the idea of Quest working on Linux would be fine in theory but at the end of the day the majority of computer users have Windows and not Linux so it's of limited use. The Quest community is also pretty small and I doubt there are many of us here who use Linux and so wouldn't benefit from this sort of thing.

You can connect to a QuestNet Server via Telnet - the server just needs to be running the Telnet adaptor, which is included in the download.

Thanks, Alex. I'll give it a try. I had followed an earlier post about the telnet adaptor, but understood that it needed a little more "polish".

I appreciate all the effort that goes into Quest!

About the telnet client it's working only for a QuestNet game. I tried to convert my normal game into a QuestNet game, and the behaviors are not as expected from the single user client.

 but at the end of the day the majority of computer users have Windows and not Linux so it's of limited use

pff, hopefully not everyone is thinking like you.
I'd be very curious to know the percent of interactive fiction users who are using either Linux or Mac OS X. I'm sure it's much more than the average computer's users. And just by the review of the ifcomp it seems windows only based games are not very welcome (severy testers reported they couldn't test them because they don't use windows)

Sorry for posting on a week-old post, but my internet usage ran out on the 20th. I've only got one thing to say, and that's too Zelimos:

The attitude you are taking with saying what you said is the attitude taken by many people, and this is why MS Windows is so popular, and why most things are written for it and not for the Macintosh or Linux. If we all took this attitude, then Linux and Mac would be dead. Fortunately for the users of those os's, we don't all take this stance. I would certainly program for Linux or Mac over windows (I hate microsoft), but I don't know how. Fortunately, some kind-hearted people do.

I'm not trying to make you out as a bad person for saying that Zelimos (not that I haven't elsewhere), I'm just making that point.