X-No-Archive:Thanks for your advice. Will take a look at rickadamsadventure.org. Although I am not actually creating an adventure game, I'm sure it will be helpful.
Sorry I wasn't clear about the db part. Most of the data has already been written and/or generated and tested with the code. I do plan to finish all the database stuff before going to the front end, but am just thinking ahead about how to do the interface. On Nov 20, 4:10 pm, Martin Gregorie <mar...@address-in-sig.invalid> wrote: > On Sat, 20 Nov 2010 14:40:16 -0800, Shel wrote: > > Hello, > > > I am pretty new to all this. I have some coding experience, and am > > currently most comfortable with Python. I also have database design > > experience with MS Access, and have just created my first mySQL db. > > > So right now I have a mySQL db structure and some Python code. My end > > goal is to create a browser-based interactive fiction/game thing. My > > code is currently just using dummy data rather than pulling in data from > > the db, but I think/hope it won't be too big of a deal to interact with > > the db through Python (famous last words...). > > Wrong approach. If you're going to use a database, start with writing a > program that puts your data into it alongside the program that reads and > uses the data. Do it incrementally: if you are writing an adventure game > a good place to start would be the 'place' table and the part of the game > builder that adds/amends/removes a place from the database as well as > enough of the game program to show the place description and use the > doors to move from place to place. This way you'll have that working > before you start adding weapons, monsters, etc. or try to implement > fights. You'll also learn that writing place descriptions isn't as easy > as it sounds: if there are several doors into a room the description must > make sense no matter which way you come into it. Its quite hard at first > to avoid descriptions like "Further into the forest. Its getting darker" > which may be OK coming from a road but is pretty stupid if you're on your > way out of the forest toward the road. > > http://www.kitebird.com/articles/pydbapi.htmlwhich tells you what you > need to know about accessing SQL databases. > > > My main problem right now is how to do the web interface. I don't know > > much about web architecture, unfortunately. I think I need a CGI script? > > You're biting off quite a lot at once. It may be easier to first write a > command line Python program and get it working in that form. Once you > have the game/application logic working you can adapt it to run as a CGI > script. Development and debugging will be easier that way. > > If you're not familiar with this style of adventure game, look > here:http://www.rickadams.org/adventure/You'll find various downloadable > examples on the downloads page as DOS executables and in C or Fortran > source code. Have a play with it to see what even this very basic user > interaction can do - you'll have fun and learn useful stuff. > > > What I would really like is to find a GUI tool to design the interface > > that would have customizable templates or drag-and-drop elements or > > something, so I wouldn't have to code much by hand. Something easy, if > > such a tool exists. > > If you're doing a textual adventure of something like it a tool won't > gain you much, since you only need a few skeleton web pages than your > program can select and drop text or images into. > > > Also would prefer something that I would be able to install/use without > > having much access to the server where the site will be hosted (on a > > university server that I don't have control over). I don't fully > > understand how a lot of the tools I have been looking at work, but it > > seems like they're often things where you'd have to get an administrator > > to do stuff on the server (is that right?), which I would prefer to > > avoid. > > CGI and Python should be OK providing the server has Python available and > the admins will let you use CGI, but that's not a good development > platform. > > You really need a web server you can start, stop and fiddle with once you > get to the point of putting your code in a server. Running a simple local > web server on your computer would be a better place to start: once its > running you simply point your browser at localhost:80 and send it the URL > of the initial page of your application. > > Search on "Python web server" for details of building or downloading a > simple one. You'll also find stuff about interfacing Python programs to a > web server. > > -- > martin@ | Martin Gregorie > gregorie. | Essex, UK > org | -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list