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	[VAXS82.MTREK]AAAREADME.DOC

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 ^^MULTI-TREK\\ IS A GAME SIMILAR TO TRADITIONAL ^STAR-^TREK GAMES EXCEPT THAT
IT INVOLVES SEVERAL PLAYERS (CURRENTLY UP TO 8), WHO PLAY AGAINST EACH OTHER
IN REAL TIME
RATHER THAN AGAINST IMAGINARY ^KLINGONS, ^ROMULANS OR WHATEVER. ^THE
^^MULTI-TREK\\ UNIVERSE CONSISTS OF A 100 BY 100 MATRIX, OF WHICH AN
APPROXIMATE 20 BY 20 MATRIX OF EACH PLAYER'S IMMEDIATE AREA IS DISPLAYED AND
CONTINUOUSLY UPDATED AT THEIR TERMINAL. ^^MULTI-TREK\\ WAS ORIGINALLY
SUBMITTED TO THE ^NEW ^ORLEANS ^^RSX/IAS\\ SIG TAPE,
THEN TO THE 1979 ^SAN ^DIEGO ^^RSX/IAS\\ SIG TAPE WITH THE ADDITION OF ROBOT SHIPS.
^SINCE THEN IT HAS BEEN RECODED IN ^^RATFIV\\ AND HAS SIGNIFICANT
ENHANCEMENTS AND IMPROVEMENTS, MOST NOTABLY
THE ADDITION OF ENERGY NETS,
AN IMPROVED SCREEN DISPLAY,
MUCH BETTER INPUT-OUTPUT (ANY TERMINAL WITH CLEAR SCREEN AND
CURSOR POSITIONING MAY BE USED AT SPEEDS FROM 1200 BAUD ON UP),
USE OF DEFAULT SHIP AND DIRECTION WITH MOST COMMANDS ("^L" SETS
THE DEFAULT DIRECTION),
MORE COMPETITIVE SCORING,
SMARTER ROBOT SHIPS,REVERSE POLISH COMMAND SEQUENCES (FEWER 
KEYSTROKES),
AND FEWER BUGS.
^THIS VERSION IS BEING SUBMITTED TO THE ^SPRING 1982 ^^VAX tapes\\
AND FEATURES THE RPN COMMAND SEQUENCES AND FADES THAT DON'T EXACTLY
SHOW UP ON RADAR LOCATES.
^COMPLETE INSTRUCTIONS FOR
STARTING AND PLAYING ^^MULTI-TREK\\ ARE IN THE FILE ^^MTREK.DOC\\.
 ^THE GAME CONSISTS OF A DRIVER TASK (^^MTREKD)\\, A PLAYER TASK (^^MTREK\\)
FOR EACH TERMINAL, AND A SHARED GLOBAL COMMON AREA FOR INTER-TASK COMMUNICATION.
^THIS VERSION RUNS ON ^^VAX VMS\\,
HOWEVER, IT SHOULD RUN UNDER ANY SYSTEM WITH SHARED GLOBAL AREAS AND
RUDIMENTARY TASK SWITCHING OR TIME-SHARING.
^REAL-TIME SYSTEMS WITHOUT TIME-SHARING MAY HAVE TO PLAY WITH
PRIORITIES TO INSURE THAT THE DRIVER TASK GETS SUFFICIENT ^^CPU\\ TIME AND
THAT ALL PLAYERS GET AN EQUAL AMOUNT OF TIME.
 ^^MULTI-TREK\\ WAS WRITTEN WITH A STRUCTURED ^FORTRAN CALLED ^^RATFIV\\.
^THE ^^IAS\\ VERSION CONTAINS ALL OF THE ^FORTRAN PRODUCED BY
^^RATFIV\\, AS WELL AS THE ^^RATFIV\\ SOURCE (FILE TYPE
^^.RAT\\).
^THE ^^VAX VMS\\ VERSION DOES NOT INCLUDE THE ^^.FOR\\ FILES,
HOWEVER THE ^^RATFIV\\ COMPILER IS INCLUDED ON BOTH DISTRIBUTION TAPES.
 ^^MTREK\\ WILL WORK PROPERLY WITH ANY TERMINAL WITH CLEAR SCREEN
AND CURSOR POSITIONING.
^THE SOURCE CODE IS SET UP TO DRIVE
^^ADM3-A\\'S OR ^^VT100\\'S AND ^^VT52\\'S.
^IF YOU ARE USING DIFFERENT TERMINALS, YOU SHOULD MODIFY
THE FILE "^^TERMINAL.RAT\\" (YOU COULD MODIFY
"^^TERMINAL.FTN\\")
TO DRIVE YOUR TERMINAL.
^MODIFICATION SHOULD BE STRAIGHT-FORWARD AS THE CODE IS COMMENTED
ON WHERE TO CHANGE IT.
.SKIP 1
^TO BUILD ^^MTREK\\, DO
.SKIP 1
^^@BUILD\\
^^
.skip 1
 The VAX VMS version places the common area, LEDFOR, on SYS$SHARE and installs
it /WRITE/SHARE. It also puts MTREK.EXE, the player task, and MTREKD.EXE,
the universe manager task, on SYS$SYSTEM, and installs MTREK.EXE with
DETACH and ACNT privileges, so that anyone can start up MTREKD as
a detached process (only one copy of MTREKD runs at a time, however).
 After building MTREK, first run MTREKINI.
Then, on VAX VMS systems, say MCR MTREK
and you are off and running.
On IAS systems, the universe manager MTREKD must be started
by hand before MTREK is run. You can run MTREKD on a dedicated terminal
or install it and run it /REAL.
\\