## Gnome Mahjongg

1998
Free Software Foundation
2000
Eric Baudais (Documentation Author)

Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. You may obtain a copy of the GNU Free Documentation License from the Free Software Foundation by visiting their Web site or by writing to: Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.

Many of the names used by companies to distinguish their products and services are claimed as trademarks. Where those names appear in any GNOME documentation, and those trademarks are made aware to the members of the GNOME Documentation Project, the names have been printed in caps or initial caps.

This is version &DOCVERSION; of Gnome Mahjongg manual.

## Introduction

Gnome Mahjongg, or Mahjongg for short, is a solitaire (one player) version of the classic Eastern tile game, Mahjongg. It has all the functionality you expect from a tile or card game. You can change the type of tiles, the background, and the difficulty level, among other things, in the Preferences… dialog. Other features, like the Pause button and the ability to set the game from a user defined seed, make the game more competitive when you play against the clock. This document describes version &VERSION; of Mahjongg.

### A Brief History of Mahjongg

Mahjongg tile sets are used to play many variations of the original game. The version of Mahjongg you play is the solitaire one. Each tile also has a meaning associated with it.

Mahjongg's origins are not fully known, but many theories have been put forth. One such theory says that Noah played Mahjongg on the ark because the East hand is dominant, presumably the direction the rains came, in the flood. Another theory says that the Chinese philosopher, Confucius, made the game. The three Cardinal tiles have the same names as his three Cardinal virtues, Chung (middle) the Red, Fa (prosperity) the Green, and Po (white) the White, cooresponding with Benevolence, Sincerity, and Filial Piety. Still another theory says that Mahjongg is derived from other Chinese games. Ya Pei is played with 32 cards made of wood or ivory and have the same oblong shape as present day Mahjongg tiles. Ma Tiae is played with 40 paper cards, similar in appearance, numbering 1 to 9 in four different suits along with the flower cards. It has been suggested that two brothers made the game, around 1850 A.D., from a combination of these two games.

In the early 1900's Mahjongg was introduced into English clubs in Shanghai. Mr. Babcock started the importation of Mahjongg tiles to the Western world. He stripped down the rules to the very basics and even put Arabic numerals on the tiles. 1923 was the height of the Mahjongg craze with major gaming companies, like Parker Bros., Milton Bradley, and United States Playing Card, importing Mahjongg tile sets by the thousands.

Many different rules sprang up and in 1924 the Standardization Committee of the American Official Laws of Mah-Jongg was formed to write a rule book. Still today many clubs play by different rules and sometimes even add flower or joker tiles. Players of the computer version are becoming intrigued with the beauty and detail of the hand crafted sets of the 1920's and 1930's and are searching antique shops and flea markets for sets of their own. Many new players are being introduced to the game solely through the solitaire version and are slowly realizing the intrigue and challenge that the traditional game offers. Portions of this text was taken from the Mah Jong Cyber Museum.

## Playing Mahjongg

You start with five levels of tiles which are stacked so some are covered up by the tiles on top. The harder the level you set in the Preferences… dialog, the more tiles are covered when the game starts. The object of Gnome Mahjongg is to remove all the tiles from the game. To remove tiles you have to find matching pairs which look alike. A matching tile will usually have the same number of buttons or markings on it or will look similar to each other.

As an example, the highlighted tile, in the figure below, has six buttons. The matching tile is the one which also has six buttons. The tile is on the far left side on the bottom level. If you wanted to match the tile on the top level, you need to look for the tile with the same green and red symbol. Do you see a matching tile yet? There are three tiles, which are visible, that match the tile on the top level. On the left side, three tiles to the right of the highlighted tile, is the matching tile. You can't remove the pair yet because the tile isn't on the outside of the stack of tiles. Later I'll explain more fully which tiles can be removed and which tiles can't be removed even though they match. I'll let you find the other two matching tiles, which are visible, on your own.

### Mahjongg's Main Window

Main window

Gnome Mahongg is played by pointing and clicking on the two tiles you want matched and then they are removed from the game. If the two tiles don't match, a dialog appears telling you this.

### Information Dialog

Information Dialog

Only tiles at the far left and right edges on each level can be selected. This is because you can't remove any tiles which aren't at the far left and far right sides. If the tiles are on a different level and at the left or right sides, those can be removed when you find another matching tile.

If you can't match any more tiles, a dialog will appear telling you no more tiles can be matched.

### Information Dialog

Information Dialog

### Toolbar

The toolbar can be moved around the desktop. If you click on the far left side of it, you will be able to drag it any place on the desktop you wish. The toolbar also snaps into place at the top and left side of the Main Window in Gnome Mahjongg, but the default place the toolbar is located, and the best in my opinion, is under the menubar.

The toolbar contains the following buttons:

New

  This button starts a new game with the current settings.

Restart

  This button restarts the current game to the beginning without shuffling the tiles.

Hint

  This button gives you a pair of matching tiles to remove.

Undo

  This button replaces two tiles you removed until you reach the beginning of the game.

Redo

  This button replays your previous move, the Undo button took back. When you reach the state you started undoing, the message No more redo! appears at the bottom left corner of the Main Window.

Pause

  This button pauses the game. When the game is paused, the clock, at the bottom right corner of the Main Window, stops and you cannot see any of the tile's faces.

Shuffle

  This button sorts the tiles randomly. It does not restart the game. You remain at the same point in the game with the same tiles removed, but the tiles are just resorted.

Prefs

  This button displays the Preferences… dialog.

Tiles Left:

  This part of the Toolbar shows the number of tiles remaining to be matched.

Moves Left:

  This part of the Toolbar shows the number of possible matches you can make.

#### Mahjongg's Toolbar

Toolbar

### Menus

The menu bar, located at the top of the Main Window, contains the following menus:

Game

  The menu contains:

  - Ctrl-N New game — This item starts a new game with a predefined seed.

  - New game with seed… — This item brings up a dialog asking for a new seed.

    #### Select Game seed

    Select Game Dialog

  - Restart game — This item restarts the game with a predefined seed.

  - Ctrl-Z Undo move — This item takes back two tiles you removed until you reach the beginning of the game.

  - Ctrl-R Redo move — This item replays your previous move the Undo button took back. When you reach the state you started undoing the message No more redo! appears at the bottom left corner of the Main Window.

  - Hint — This item gives you a pair of matching tiles to remove.

  - Shuffle tiles — This item sorts the tiles randomly. It does not restart the game. You remain at the same point in the game with the same tiles removed, but the tiles are just resorted.

  - Scores… — This item brings up a dialog showing you the ten best scores. The dialog has the scores identified by user name, score, the time it took to complete the game, and the date the game was completed.

    #### Top Ten Scores Dialog

    Scores Dialog

  - Ctrl-Q Exit — This item allows you to quit the game.

Settings

  The menu contains:

  - Show Tool Bar — This item determines whether the toolbar is shown or not. If the box is depressed, the toolbar is shown in the last place you put it. If the box is raised, the toolbar is not shown.

  - Preferences… — This item brings up the Preferences… dialog.

Help

  The menu contains:

  - About… — This item gives you some basic information about Gnome Mahjongg, such as the author's names and the application version number.

  - Manual — This item shows this manual.

## Customization

To change the application's settings, select Preferences… from the Settings menu. This opens the Preferences… dialog.

### Preferences… Dialog

Preferences dialog

The box labeled Make it the default can be toggled to make the option above it the default. This will make your customized settings appear everytime you start Gnome Mahjongg. If the box is depressed and you click the OK button, the option will become the default setting. When you enter the Preferences… dialog again, the box will be raised. If the box is raised, the default settings do not change.

The properties in the Preferences… dialog are:

- Select Tiles: — This item changes the design on the face of each tile.

- Select Tile Background: — This item changes the type of tile displayed, but not the pattern on the face.

- Select Map: — This item changes the difficulty of the game by altering how the tiles are stacked. The more spread out (easy) version lets you see more of the tiles while the more compact (hard) version does not let you see many tiles.

- Background: — This item lets you change the color of the background by bringing up the color dialog to choose a custom color.

  ### Color Dialog

  Color dialog

- Warn when tiles don't match — This box toggles whether you see an Information dialog, when the two tiles you selected don't match. If the box is depressed, the Information dialog appears. If the box is raised, a message appears in the lower left corner of the Main Window saying, Tiles don't match !

- Confirm before quitting game — This box toggles whether you see a Confirmation dialog, when you try to quit the game. If the box is depressed, the Confirmation dialog appears asking you, Really exit Gnome Mahjongg? If the box is raised, you exit the game automatically when you click the Exit menu item.

  ### Confirmation Dialog

  Confirmation dialog

## Known Bugs and Limitations

This application has no known bugs.

## Authors

Gnome Mahjongg was written by Francisco Bustamante (pancho@nuclecu.unam.mx), Michael Meeks (mmeeks@gnu.org), Max Watson, Heinz Hempe, and Philippe Chavin. Tiles for Gnome Mahjongg were made by Jonathan Buzzard and Max Watson. Please send all comments, suggestions, and bug reports to the GNOME bug tracking database. (Instructions for submitting bug reports can be found on-line.) If you are using GNOME 1.1 or later, you can also use Bug Report Tool (`bug-buddy`), available in the Utilities submenu of Main Menu, for submitting bug reports.

This manual was written by Eric Baudais (baudais@okstate.edu). Please send all comments and suggestions regarding this manual to the GNOME Documentation Project by sending an email to docs@gnome.org. You can also add your comments online by using the GNOME Documentation Status Table.

## License

This program and tile artwork is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

A copy of the GNU General Public License is included as an appendix to the GNOME Users Guide. You may also obtain a copy of the GNU General Public License from the Free Software Foundation by visiting their Web site or by writing to

        Free Software Foundation, Inc.
        59 Temple Place - Suite 330
        Boston, MA 02111-1307
        USA