Newsgroups: rec.arts.int-fiction
Path: gmd.de!ira.uka.de!howland.reston.ans.net!wupost!uwm.edu!caen!destroyer!cs.ubc.ca!newsserver.sfu.ca!sfu.ca!neilg
From: neilg@fraser.sfu.ca (Neil K. Guy)
Subject: Re: Physics
Message-ID: <neilg.735985999@sfu.ca>
Sender: news@sfu.ca
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
References: <735884762snx@hinrg.starconn.com> <C66DH3.51t@cantua.canterbury.ac.nz>
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 1993 08:33:19 GMT
Lines: 25

greg@huia.canterbury.ac.nz (Greg Ewing) writes:

>This has an interesting side effect which confused me when I was
>playing Ditch Day Drifter. If you enter "type 1 on keypad" it
>says something nonsensical like "You can only type numbers on the
>keypad"! The reason is that "1" is used as an adjective for the
>"one dollar bill".

>So if you use a number as an adjective you lose the ability
>to use it as a number!

 I've noticed this problem also. And once I used the word "in" as an
adjective for an object. Then, if the user typed "Put the white card
in the slot" the game would say "I don't see any white card in here."
I ended up taking "in" out of the adjective list. As for numbers, you
can always type "001" and that works fine. I'm hoping that people will
catch onto that for a combination lock that appears in my game.
Probably not, though. They'll still get "You can't turn the
combination lock to footnote one." and other strange responses.

 Oh, well. Disambiguation of words is difficult enough for people,
let alone machines. I find TADS pretty darn good for the most part.
This is one of the few major problems I've had this way.

 - Neil K. (n_k_guy@sfu.ca)
