.LV Expert
.SY "xdump <TYPE|NUMBER> <RECORDS>"
.SY "xdump meta <TYPE|NUMBER>"
-.SY "xdump ver"
-.SY "xdump meta ver"
The xdump command displays information on game configuration and state
in machine readable format. It is intended for use by clients and
tools. This info page gives an overview; see doc/xdump in the source
distribution for complete documentation.
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Game configuration and state consists of a a number of tables or
-files. xdump shows only things that are \fIcertainly\fP visible to
+files. xdump shows only things that are \*(fIcertainly\*(fP visible to
you: sectors you own, ship types known, etc.
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The output of xdump is a table consisting of a header line, the table
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String fields are in C syntax. Funny characters including space,
newline and double-quote are shown as octal escape sequences. Example:
-"gold\\040mine". If a field starts with a double-quote, it's a string
+"gold\e040mine". If a field starts with a double-quote, it's a string
field.
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.L "FUTURE DIRECTIONS:"
-We might decide to support more C escape sequences, but never \\".
+We might decide to support more C escape sequences, but never \\\(dq.
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Some fields can contain null strings. A null string is the three
letters \*Qnil\*U. If a field contains nil, it's a string field.
table names and numbers. xdump accepts table numbers as well as
names.
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-There's a special pseudo-table \*Qver\*U, which collects configuration
-parameters in a single record. It is not listed in \*Qtable\*U, it
-doesn't have a table number, but it does have a meta-table.
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.L BUGS:
Still missing are game state files power, map, bmap; the list of
-commands; foreign relations and levels, contact and reject
-information, budget priorities; mortal access to sector selector
+commands; foreign levels, contact
+information, mortal access to sector selector
mines, ship selectors xbuilt, ybuilt, trade selectors xloc, yloc,
commodity selectors xbuy, ybuy, xsell, ysell. Some information is not
yet available in human-readable form: the lost file, sect-chr selector
nav, ship and land plague status (deity only), plane theta (governs
satellite movement), trade selectors xloc, yloc, commodity selectors
xbuy, ybuy.
+Incremental dump doesn't work after importing news with the empdump
+utility.
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.L "FUTURE DIRECTIONS:"
xdump is still fairly new, and experience with it may lead to changes.