Help with Help Common Problems, & The BotBot Online Help Functions

Detailed Help for Botbot Features

Common Trouble Spots

1. Yo Bot's Too Big
   Too many features! This one seems to bite people no matter how many warnings are added to the BotBot... the sad truth is, the Palace client has an internal limit to the size of a cyborg. This limit is a combination of the number of variables, globals, strings, and so forth defined in your cyborg, and the variables, globals, strings, and so forth defined in the palace where you happen to be visiting. The solution: make a smaller bot. Check fewer options. For the biggest win, turn off built-in help, which tends to use a lot of memory.
   Then, if the smaller bot works all right, add more features as needed.
2. No Bots Allowed
   Many users are confused by the existance of Cyborg-Free Zones in palaces great and small. Theses are rooms where cyborg scripts simply don't work, except for the local wizards and gods. Several rooms at the Communities.com Palaces have been built this way; the classic example is Mansion's Harry's Bar, which used to have a daily "happy hour" when scripting was permitted in the bar.
   A few palaces (not many!) don't permit any user cyborg use anywhere on the whole site. Be sure, if your cyborg seems dead, that you're not in one of these zones.
3. No Grafitti
   Similarly, there are some rooms where painting is not permitted. Not just painting via the client paint palette, but painting via iptscrae, such as that used by many of the "laggy" botbot outchat scripts. If you're having a lot of trouble with "scan" or programs like that, check to see if you can paint in the room. If not, move to a paintable space.
4. Blame Bill Gates
   Sometimes, Win95/98 people have told their computers Windows Registry that files of type .ipt have a particular purpose. Sometimes as palace files, but often as either "internet phone tool" files or as files attached to a text editor like WordPad or Emacs. When this happens, the prefs in the Registry override the type specified by the BotBot (that is, text/plain). When that happens, your cyborg.ipt file may be improperly handled by IE (haven't seen it happen under Netscape -- yet) or it may be stored on disk improperly. A typical error is that the file appears (in the Window display) to be named cyborg.ipt -- but actually, Windows thinks it's a file of type txt (text) and it's actual name is cyborg.ipt.txt -- the extra .txt will mess everything up. In such cases, you can quickly find and correct the problem in DOS.
5. Old File Didn't Overwrite
   When you install a botbot cyborg, you have to move or delete the previous cyborg. Sometimes, your browser will do this for you -- in some cases, it will ask if you want to overwrite, or in others it will write the new cyborg with a bogus name like cyborg.ipt(1). Rename the file to cyborg.ipt using either Windows "properties..." or in the Mac Finder or in MS-DOS.
6. Wrong Directory
   The cyborg file should be in the same folder as your Palace program (a.k.a. "the client"). Not in the IE folder, not in "My Documents," not in the folder that contains the folder named "The Palace" or "Palace..." it should be in the very same folder as your program.
7. Not the Props You Expected
   Scripts that identify props by name can be spoofed. It's better to specify unique names for each prop, names that aren't likely to be guessed by nasty spoofers. See here and here for more details.
8. Save the File, Don't Cut and Paste
   Some people just can't resist the urge to copy from a web browser window and paste into a text editor (like WordPad). Bad idea. Just save the file by using your browser's "Save As..." menu item (under "File").
9. Bad 'tude
   The computer's not psychic.
   Don't think it knows what you want without you telling it in exact detail. And especially don't think that I, poor Dr.X, will know how to help if all you have to say in your emailed complaint is "Pug diz shib mon! de botbo don' do me for it" because, frankly, I don' do dat shib.

Besides the script features you personally select (and the automatic "finger" script), every cyborg made by BotBot also has two tailor-made on-line documentation functions, to help you handle your bot. Just type these one-word commands while in the Palace to get help:

stats

Prints information about your cyborg's current state.

??

Prints online help about all your personal bot's commands (optional).