MUDs (Multiple User Dungeons)

A MUD (Multiple User Dimension, Multiple User Dungeon, or Multiple User Dialogue) is a multi user , object oriented and programmable platform in which users can log into and explore( mudFAQ). Each user takes control of a computerized persona/avatar/incarnation/character. Users can walk around, chat with other characters, explore dangerous monster-infested areas, solve puzzles, and even create their very own rooms, descriptions and items.

Fifty years ago Vannevar Bush posed the idea for a machine that would give an individual the ability to rapidly manipulate large volumes of information. The Memex as he coined it, would allow documents to be linked together with cross references that could be easily followed. Memex would provide the means to create new documents by seamlessly compositing citations from other documents together at the direction of the operator. The Memex is constructed using mechanical storage and retrieval systems based on the microfilm technology of the time. But it addressed many of the problems of information overload and the importance of timely and flexible data retrieval.

Ivan Sutherland developed a program(Sketchpad) that allowed on screen manipulation of simple objects, as well the ability to describe certain properties of the objects to create as well as simulate electric circuits. His work was the first attemp for the the generations of interactive user interfaces that would follow.

Douglas Engelbart tried to address the issue of people working together, or collaborating, to deal with large volumes of information. The basic premise of his work deals with the issue that one individual is becoming increasingly unable to deal with the levels of complexity that are often present in many real life problems. The goal of collaborative computing tools is to facilitate people working together to create solutions better and faster than a single individual can, if at all. His work, as embodied in The Internet and his oNLine System (NLS) provide a real time interactive interface allowing groups of people to communicate, cross-reference, quote and deal with large amounts of information as a team, even remotely over long distances.

Theodor Nelson identified a new form of media, coined Hypertext, in the nineteen sixties. He described a world spanning network of information repositories containing all the information in the world cross-referenced, linked and transcluded. He designed the Xanadu( short/ long version )

Picosof iDrive was developed primarily as a virtual device interface and process controller. iDrive provided a device independent output layer in the form of an application program interface (API) allowing new output devices to be supported with the creation of a relatively straightforward device drivers. Further, iDrive provided a system level message passing mechanism encouraging parallel object oriented designs running in a preemptive multitasking operating system.

Applications built with iDrive typically comprise many instances of a few simple component objects wired together into an event driven data flow network. Input is acquired through polled and interrupt driven sensor and transducer objects and output is rendered by various device independent component output objects. iDrive allows very efficient event driven applications to be created from libraries of component objects. System level message passing supports encapsulation and compatibility between components implemented using a variety of compiled or interpreted platforms. Device independence allows rapid integration of new and different forms of hardware as it becomes available without requiring the modification of application software.

Adventure is a text simulation of a collection of rooms or interconnected caves and outside areas that can be virtually explored and navigated by the virtual solo adventurer using simple commands like go north, pickup ax, read sign. Each player receives a certain number of points for discovering each room, and bonus points were awarded when special puzzles are solved. Two significant directions emerged from the early Adventure simulations: Multi User Domains and User Extensible Domains.

Multi User Domains allow groups of people to explore as a team or even against each other in virtual battle.

User Extensible Domains allow users to extend the environment by creating new rooms and objects to their specification.

Then, these two directions recently converged along with the maturing of dynamic object oriented programming environments creating the object oriented multi user domain known as Multi User Object Oriented Domain (MOO).

MOO was developed by Stephen White and enhanced by Pavel Curtis as an advanced multi-user, user-extensible domain to the extreme, requiring that a virtual environment must be constructed first before any game can be played. Indeed, the inherent open endedness and flexibility of the MOO environment caused the focus to shift from creating Multi User Domains for cave type games to creating virtual on line communities where the focus of the thousands of participants becomes socialization as well as the growth or extension of the environment itself. MOO provides a highly malleable and rich interactive collaboration space providing interactive(chat), store and forward(mail) as well as posting(mailing list) and news features to its virtual denizens.

Early in 1994, Samuel Latt Epstein incorporated the World Wide Web, into the MOO interactive object oriented environment led to the development of the Web MOO(WOO). WOO enhancements allowed a MOO server to function as a collaborative hypermedia server and WOO Transaction Protocol(WTP) a specification for issuing object/verb requests to a WOO server through the standard URL. WOO server provides

• collaborative environment
• interactive media rich environment
• a dynamic object oriented web server