#8 Electronic Guildsman & HTML

[David Eyk]

Part of what really sets Starmap apart from the rest of
the bunch is its almost fully interactive menus and
text, which makes use of the Electronic Guildsman, a
user-editable quasi-hypertext menuing system which
serves as middleman between the main components
(starmap, sysmap, worldmap, etc.) and texts both
provided and user-definable. This allows any user to
attach campaign notes or even graphics, in a crude
manner, to any part of the map. The system was also
used to view and provide easy access to the extensive
notes and musings that Jim included with the package.

It seems to me that it would make the most sense to
replace the text and menus with some implementation of
HTML, the most commonly used and most accessible form
of hypertext. Whether these documents are viewed and
modified internally or externally is up for debate.

The value-added benefit of this approach, which I
failed to make clear earlier, is that all the attached
notes can be easily put to other purposes. For
instance, a savvy user could design the site for his sf
rpg within StarMap itself using relative links and be
able to transfer all his campaign directly to the web.
We could even expedite this process with some sort of
"Export to HTML" tool, perhaps generating GIF
screenshots of systems and planets embedded in the HTML
campaign notes.

Please note that this really has nothing to do with any
motive of mine to make this into a networked program.
:) Believe me when I say that idea is on the back
burner. I see from the initial design document that
we've already considered HTML. It would make the most
sense, imo-- no need to reinvent the wheel.