Orienting Yourself

Once you have connected, your room is the first room you will see on VUW. Read the description. That’s where you are, or more accurately, that’s where you should envision yourself being. You can see already that the description provides hints about what you are supposed to do. You might want to open the door. However, if you tried typing something like “I would like to open the door,” or “Please open the door for me,” the computer won’t know what you mean. You need to drop all the articles from y our speech (the, an, a), and to issue short, terse commands. For instance, to open the door you type: “open door”. To look out the window you type "look at window". Also, you might have to keep trying until you get the right phrase. If you type “look through pane of glass” and nothing happens, it’s not because there’s no window, it’s just because the computer doesn’t realize that “pane of glass” is another name for “window,” and “through” is another way of saying “at”. Try opening your door now. Typ e “open door”. The MOO will tell you that you opened the door.

Moving Around

No matter what you are doing on VUW, you’ll want to move around, probably mostly between Hagey Hall and Student Housing. The first thing you'll need to know if you want to move, is the directions in which you are able to leave your current location. Typ e “look” to get a description of where you are again. You can always type “look” to get your bearings. The “look” command will tell you the exits you can take to get out of your current location and into another one. Once you have read which exits ther e are, simply type the name of one of them to go in that direction. Typically, MOO exits are based on compass directions, i.e. north, south, east, and west. However, some rooms will have others like “up,” “out,” “portal,” “ladder,” or anything else that can be used to get from one place to another. All exits can take abbreviations. North can be "n", north west can be "nw". You should try to develop a spatial sense of the directions you follow. If you are an on-campus student, you can use the real ca mpus as a mental guide for the layout of VUW. The online tutorial (accessed by typing "@tutorial") provides excellent practise for movement.

Telporting back to your room

If at any time you wish to return to your room, no matter where you are, just type "home". If you feel as though you are trapped, "home" will get you back to an area with which you are familiar.

Teleporting to another user's location

Often, you will want to join up with a single user or a group of users who are conversing some distance away from you. To instantly teleport to another player, type "@join" followed by the name of that user. "@join Jeremy" would take you into Jeremy's c urrent location, even if he is not logged on.

General teleportation

Teleportation takes a little more knowledge about the MOO. The command is "@go <#room>", where #room is the object number of the room you want to go to. You'll have to know the object number in advance, and you can find it out by typing "@examine here" while you are in the room.

TIP: Many commands in MOO are preceded by the “@” sign. This feature is particularly abundant in MOO’s in comparison with other MUD’s. If a command doesn’t work, you might try putting an “@” in front of it. Alternately, if you already have an “@” sign and it doesn’t work, you might try giving the command without the “@”. If you get used to MOO’s, you’ll have to train yourself to omit the “@” when you use other MUD’s. Online help is available through "@tutorial" and "help movement".

Manipulating Things on VUW

While in the virtual world, you will encounter objects and tactile features (like buttons) which you will be expected to manipulate. The first things you will see will likely be your notepad and your bulletin board. You should attempt to master these qu ickly, as they will be on of the central formats of extended communication about course issues.

Handling Objects

As a VUW student, you will already be "carrying" things when you log on for the first time. Type "inventory" to see what you've got. Whatever you are carrying, you will also be able to drop and get, though you will want to hold on to your notepad and bo ok permanently. Type "drop notepad" to drop your pad, and "get notepad" to get it again. You can also hand things to other users. Type "give to " to move something from your inventory to someone elses. This is particularly useful if you w ant to show them something like a piece of writing. Occassionally objects will be inside things like boxes or cabinets. To get a pen from a desk you would type "get pen from desk". Likewise, to put a pen into a desk you would type "put pen in desk".

Using and Examining Objects

Some objects allow you to use them in certain ways. For instance, you can take notes from your pad of paper by typing "get page from pad", and you can destroy a note by typing "tear note". You can even play a game of scrabble by using the scrabble game correctly. Most objects with special functions have a help file that you can read by typing "help ", for instance, "help pad" to learn to use your note pad. Some objects tell you how to use them by the way they look. Type "look " to get a description of it and possibly some details on its use. If neither 'help' nor 'look' returns any information on an object's use, you can also type "@examine ". Often this will tell you more than you want to know about the object, as @examine is intended for use by programmers and builders; however, you will get a list of the verbs you can try on the object, and attempt to figure out its use by typing in those verbs.

The online tutorial gives a reasonable introduction to object manipulation. Type "@tutorial" to start it. Online help can be accessed by typing "help manipulation".Click here for the quick reference list of movement and manip ulation commands.