From: Joerg Baumgartner (joe@sartar.toppoint.de)
Date: Sun 05 Dec 1993 - 13:24:18 EET
Geoff Gunner in X-RQ-ID: 2541
>Subject: Glorantha Council
Third council of world's friends?
>Joerg writes about getting some serious activity done on compiling RQ material.
>I for one would be glad to shove in my oar. As for what format ANYTHING on
>Glorantha should be, it's got to be a straight ASCII text file. It's most
>portable, and if you want something fancy done with it, write an output
>formatter.
Which is the way I went. I'm thinking of inserting some homemade codes for keys, short description, bibliographical info, etc., but I'm not too certain about the overall usability.
>As for profits, copyrights, etc, if possible make it free. As soon as you add
>a price, distribution will drop. If it's price-tagged, no internet, therefore
>even lower distribution. And the aim's to distribute Glorantha material, right?
>Spread the word about the One True Way of roleplaying ? :-)
Then why are the people complaining AH doesn't publish enough? There's us on the Daily/Digest, the magazines (TotRM, RQ-Adventures, non-English language ones like Free INT in German, the Oriflam house magazine in French, Magus in Finnish, and others whose readers ought to tell us about their existence. I for one am able to decipher all the languages mentioned above (with varying ease, though), and would like to get info like who distributes them etc. in a FAQ, e.g. John Medway's mini-FAQ for RQ.
>If it's already in publication, then just reference it if it's a substantial
>body of info. Otherwise, what's the copyright on paraphrasing?
I hate to see references to oeuvres I don't possess and cannot access. Although some key word like "just mentioned in the context" would certainly help, also with the rather complete index of KoS. There most Gloranthan names are mentioned, although I missed Durnsta, frex, the home city (?) of Estal Donge.
>I think that would be a damn good place to start. A timeline's possibly one
>of the most useful bits of reference material out. Look at the contradictions
>in what we've already got. It would show us what sort of problems are likely
>to crop up, how to go about accumulating data, how to edit responsibly, how
>to ultimately resolve contradictions, and so on. Anyone for it ?
An accurate timeline is hampered by the fact that a lot of dates aren't given, e.g. the Wolf Pirates article in Tales 10. I'm hunting every year number given in the Genertla box, though, and put them together to a more complete list. How to include KoS dates after the Starbrow rebellion, I have no idea, because dates and events vary mightily.
>And interesting point there about 'Do we need Greg Stafford's approval'. Yup,
>it would be nice, but it seems Greg's trying to get out of being the ultimate
>authority. So why not respect that, and become a *Democracy* (Whoever shouts
>loudest, wins) ?
A council of captains, like on Three Step Islands? or rather the Lhankor Mhy discussion round? or the Lunar Examiners? ;-)
Neil Robinson in X-RQ-ID: 2543
>In X-RQ-ID 2512, Joerg discusses an encyclopedia..
>I think it is a good idea. Too often, I have been unable to find the
>necessary information in a timely manner. I would love to be able to
>do a search on the Pure Horse Tribe, for example, and get a listing
>of where to look, if not seeing the data itself.
Would you be satisfied with the string search routine in your fave ASCII editor?
>Aren't there full-context search engines out there? I'd like a hyper-text
>engine, but adding in all the links would be a lot of work. A friend
>is currently setting up a simple database, but the entry time is emmense.
Any database that "eats" ASCII plus markers would be appropriate. Sooner or later I'm going to have every RuneQuest-related text I possess in ASCII format, For Personal Use Only, of course, but cutting out the quotes is a lot faster than shoving them in.
I'm afraid I'm no data-wizard, so I have little ideas about the difficulties with an interactive (i.e. changeable) hypertext system. If anybody has one for Atari ST and willing to share it with me, I might get experience, though.
Else a commercial database with license to publish or sell own applications would be the right tool. I have one, but it exists only for Atari (where I have the license) and MS Windows (which license I have not). A public domain (GNUish?) database would solve the problem.
I'd like to join/gather a team of contributors and editors for such a
project. Any heroquesters ready to join?
--
-- Joerg Baumgartner joe@sartar.toppoint.de
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