Lensmoor Book Generator Documentation

EXAMPLES

Feel free to submit examples to be placed in this list!

A basic example by Jenifer Irwin

BASICS

To use the generator, fill out the configuration fields and then start putting text in the INPUT box. In the WYSYWIG box below, you'll start to see a preview of your book.

In the third box at the very bottom, you'll find all the commands required to create the book in-game. You can copy these and then paste them into the MUD to string up your entire book at once! Please read the Caveats section below before doing this, however.

CONFIGURATION

KEYWORD is 'book' by default. This is the keyword that will be used in the restring commands.
TITLE is 'Title' by default. This is the title of your book, and will be displayed on the table of contents.
AUTHOR is 'Author' by default. This is the author of your book, and will be displayed on the table of contents.
TAGLINE is blank by default. This is an optional little blurb that will be displayed below the title and author name on the table of contents.
DEFAULT COLOR is {x by default. This is the color code that will be used as the default color for all of the text in your book. The generator places this color code at the beginning of every line. While you can use whatever Lensmoor color code you like, keep in mind that it can be unpleasant to read large blocks of bright, garish text. {x, {g, and {c are commonly used, safe choices.
UI COLOR is the color used for the headers, footers and other decorations in the book.
MAX COLUMNS is 77 by default. Values higher than 77 will irritate the in-game editor (and probably most readers). It won't go lower than 5 or higher than 502.
MAX ROWS is 24 by default. It won't go lower than 5 or higher than 120.
The 77x24 defaults ensure that your book's pages will fit in almost any screen configuration without having to scroll.
If you find 24 to be too cramped, 50 lines is probably reasonable for most computer screens.

ANATOMY OF A BOOK

The table of contents will have the keyword of 'contents'. To help your reader find it, you should indicate somewhere in the main description of your book that the reader needs to type: read contents

Here is an example of what that might look like.

This is a thick book bound in dark brown leather. The binding and pages are made of smooth, high quality materials. The title is proudly embossed in gold lettering on the front: TRIUMPH ON THE COAST

To read the table of contents, type: read contents

The table of contents is usually a bit of a drag to make by hand, but it's also an incredibly important part of a book. Fortunately, the generator will create the table of contents for you automatically!

The Table of Contents will indicate how many pages are in a chapter, like this:

    The Early Years ................... 01-09
    Before the War .................... 10-15
    Conflict .......................... 16-21
    Aftermath ......................... 22-25

You facilitate this by defining chapters in your book, using markdown as indicated below.

MARKDOWN

There are really only two pieces of markdown you need to know to make a book. These, along with any colors you want to use, will let you create clean, standardized books using the generator.

Note that the use of LML is NOT supported with the generator. You CAN have LML in a book that you made here, but you need to edit the generated commands to make sure all required tags are in the right place.

To start a new chapter, place three equals signs and then the chapter name:
=== The Early Years
To force a page break, place three asterisks on a line by themselves:
***
When making chapters and page breaks, the line MUST start with the equals signs or asterisks. If there is a space, color code or anything else before the symbols, it will be interpreted as part of a page body. There may be situations where this is desired. Note that chapter names can have color codes in them - just make sure the line starts with the three equals signs!
Note that when you're making new chapters and pages, you shouldn't have any empty lines between the break and the text around it. The generator will automatically space these parts out for you. If you're having weird issues with spacing, try deleting blank lines.
You should make sure that you do have a newline at the very end of your book. Otherwise, the spacing between the text and the footer on the final pace won't look right.
It is possible to have indented text, but you have to fiddle with the spacing a bit to accomplish this.

CAVEATS

No data gets saved on this site! Keep your book in a text file and copy-paste it into the box. A quick way to clear the box is to put your cursor in it, press CTRL+A (select all) and then backspace. Then you can paste updated text in. Make sure you don't accidentally paste your book more than once, or you might waste restring tokens!
You need to make sure that you DON'T paste all the commands into the MUD at once, or you WILL be disconnected!
Some MUD clients have a feature that allows you to load in a text file as a series of commands, with a short delay between each line. I recommend learning how to use this feature if your client has it. Otherwise, you'll have to carefully paste in only about 6-10 lines at a time.
Double and triple-check to make sure the keyword is correct! It's best if you have already done the basic keyword/short/long restringing or detailing on your book. You could put a super unique keyword in there, like 'mattsbookofmachines', to be certain that you won't be accidentally stringing something else in your inventory.
Another strategy to avoid messing up items is to just make sure that the only things you're carrying are the restring tokens and the book you want to string.
Testing has shown that the maximum number of lines in the in-game editor is 120. Trying to set MAX LINES above this may result in incomplete pages.
This generator does do a bit of very basic sanity checking, but it's not strenuous. You're free to make books with weird dimensions, but try to keep your audience in mind. Not all screen sizes are alike. The default is 77x24 for a reason!
This is not intended as a foolproof way for anyone to just hemmorhage random text and get a complete book back - the user is expected to study examples and practice a bit to get the hang of it. Remember, any character with 20 or more RP gets free restrings. Those are ideal characters to practice and test with!
Please CAREFULLY REVIEW the list of commands before pasting them into the MUD. I will not be held responsible for any objects that are botched as a result of using this generator!

That was a lot! Back to the generator.