                  Introduction : Empire4 Compatible Clients

NAME
   Clients - Clients which communicate well with the Empire4 Server

Level: Basic

   What follows is a list of clients which support the new Empire4
   protocol.  All of these clients may be found on the Wolfpack Empire
   Archives located at:
     http://www.wolfpackempire.com
   or
     ftp://ftp.wolfpackempire.com/pub/empire/

   empclient-2.8 and later - full support

   If you are using one of these clients, then you should type
   "toggle inform" once you have broken sanctuary.  These clients
   are fully asynchronous, which means that they are able to respond
   immediately when an unexpected message arrives from the server.  So,
   for example, if someone sends you a "flash" message, then the message
   will be printed on your screen immediately.  Similarly, with "inform"
   toggled on, you will be informed the moment a telegram arrives.  Note,
   the server remembers your toggle flags when you log out, so you do not
   have to type "toggle inform" again the next time you connect.

   Most other clients should work fine with the Empire4 server, however
   they may get confused if a flash message comes in.  Users of other
   clients should keep the "inform" flag toggled off, and ask a friend to
   send them a "flash" message to see how the client handles it (note,
   you must declare friendly relations towards them in order to receive
   the flash message).  If the flash message confuses your client, then I
   recommend you type "toggle flash" to turn flash mode off.

In  addition, there are a list of commands which have been added to the server
to help the development of clients.  They are:

      dump - Dump sector information
      ldump - Dump land unit information
      sdump - Dump ship information
      pdump - Dump plane information
      ndump - Dump nuclear stockpile information
      lost - Report lost items

See the various info pages on these for complete  documentation  on  how  they
work and how you can use them to help improve your clients.

In addition, there is a "timestamp" field on each object (sectors, ships, land
units, planes, nuclear stockpiles, lost items) that you  can  use  to  compare
against to keep data between clients and the database in sync with each other.
These timestamps are kept in systems seconds, so they should be accurate  down
to 1 second.  Every time an object is changed, it's timestamp is updated.

SEE ALSO
   toggle,  dump,  ldump,  sdump,  pdump, ndump, lost, Empire4, Communication,
Introduction

