<today someone wrote>
> It dosen't matter if the pfiles are ascii or binary, they are
> still both easily modifiable. Hell - i wrote a perl script two years ago
> to allow me to look at a binary pfile. It took about a half hour
> (debugging mainly) to write a program that looks at the binary file, and
> probably would take about 10 more minutes to allow one to alter it..
>
Here's a few points for ascii pfiles:
1) A damaged pfile can be more easily reconstructed if damaged somewhow.
2) A structure change merely requires a new routine to read the old pfiles
interpret them and save them in the new format, at time of login. This job is
considerably more difficult when using a fixed length binary formatted file.
3) Ascii pfiles/objfiles save disk space. I personally received a 95%
reduction
in pfile/rent file space usage when converting, due to the wasteful storage
of
the entire possible length of a field in the file, when it contained a small
amount
of data.
4) Ascii pfiles/rentfiles are more portable. If there is any file format that
can be
converted to another OS, it's the lowly text file.
After all, the world files are ascii, and so is darn near everything else. No
one
is suggesting changing those to binary (except those who wish to use a
database technology)
Using binary makes more sense than the player files, to speed up mud
bootups..
(and you can keep your ascii's as masters.. just create a routine to do the
conversion.
Ideal for a building port/production port concept.)
--Mallory
"Never worry about the bullet with your name on it. Instead, worry about
shrapnel addressed to 'occupant.'" --Murphy
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