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Some notices for you who would like to hack the source in order to
improve powwow, fix bugs or just have fun:
* Try not to run large chunks of existing code through your C
beautifier if the indentation style doesn't please you. This will
only greatly confuse the original author (if he can't recognize and
maintain his own code, who can?). If you write any new functions,
ok, use your own style as long as it's clear and consistent.
* For portability, powwow is written using a few #defines that can
generate either K&R and ANSI function prototypes depending on the compiler,
so that it (should) compile fine in both cases.
If people convince me that non-ANSI compilers are rare enough these days,
we could switch to ANSI-only prototypes. Even then, please, do NOT
use any gcc-specific features (I've seen the char constant '\e' in some
places) even if gcc is very common. Our goal should be to let the
maximum number of people use powwow. (Most non-ANSI compilers grok
void and unsigned, so these are safe to use.)
* For the same reason, do NOT use C++ style comments //
* To sum it up, assume that the user has:
- a non-ANSI C compiler (use the __P, __P0, __P1, ... defines!)
- an exotic non-VT100 terminal (use TERMCAP!), possibly on a slow line
- a slow workstation, or a larger computer shared by 100 users and
aggressive sysadmins who think that mudding doesn't justify 10% or
even 5% CPU load.
* Document your changes! A brief report of changes in the Changelog file is
absolutely necessary. So is updating the doc files (powwow.doc, powwow_help
and README) Also, sending an e-mail to the code author/mantainer documenting
your changes will be appreciated.
Report from cancan's "Hacking":
*******************************************************************************
Remember, that although I (Yorick) am the original author, I don't dictate
the code; it is explicitly in the public domain. I am merely trying to keep
some kind of order; if versions are permitted to diverge, they are very
painful to merge later. Also, different version branches are very confusing,
and makes it hard to define the "latest and best" version. Please try to
synchronize your hacks into one - the latest - version!
*******************************************************************************
Well, Yorick refused to merge Powwow and Cancan, so now they both exist
indipendently... Now I (Cosmos) say exactly the same thing Yorick said
('do not let version diverge'), but I fear this will happen again :(
Only difference is that powwow is now GPL-ed and not Public Domain.
I hope this will help a little.
* Rather than you just distributing your hacked version, I _really_ prefer you
to send back to me your changes, so that I can put them into the following
release. You lose nothing doing so, since even in case I refuse to include
your changes you can still distribute your version if you absolutely want :)
Even if you decide to distribute such a modified version, please
make it clear that it is not the original version, use a version number
which can't be confused with an original version, and put your name
in Changelog and in POWWOW_VERSION.
* I've tried to make the code obey the following rules for modularity:
- All exported things from one .c file is declared in its .h file.
- Conversely, symbols are imported by #including .h files,
not by local extern declarations.
- Everything that can be static should be (this is not quite true yet)
Please obey these rules (or improve them).
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