Preferences

Preferences are per-character settings you manage with the set command. They control colour, paging, notifications, GMCP, and combat readouts. They are saved with your character.

Developers have a second, separate store managed with the env command. The two are not interchangeable — see Developer Settings below.

Setting a Preference

set                          list your current preferences
set <preference> <value>     set a preference
set <preference>             clear a preference
set <name>_colour prompt     pick a colour interactively

Any preference whose name ends in _colour accepts the value prompt to choose from the available colours instead of typing a code. The colour you pick is run through the daemon’s minimum-luminance check before it is stored, so an unreadable choice is corrected on the way in — see Colour.

Player Preferences

Preference	Default	Description
colour	on (off for ghosts)	Sends colour to your terminal. Any value other than on strips colour from everything you receive.
prompt	>	The text written before each of your commands. A space is added after it.
morelines	40	Lines shown per page before the pager pauses. Also governs how many lines the log command tails.
page_display	line	How the pager reports your position: line for line numbers, anything else for a percentage readout.
unicode	unset (off)	Set to on to receive Unicode characters where available. Always treated as off while a screen reader is active.
screenreader	unset (off)	Set to on for screen reader mode, which suppresses Unicode and message decoration. Auto-detected clients get this without setting it.
feedback	on	Whether system messages (ok, error, warn, info) carry their decoration symbol. Set to off for plain text.
gmcp	unset (enabled)	GMCP data is sent to clients that negotiate it. Set to off to stop sending it.
keepalive	unset (off)	Set to any value other than off to send periodic keepalive packets once you have been idle for five minutes.
health_bar	unset (bars)	Shows your HP, SP, and MP each combat round. Fight on past your last movement point and the bar stops printing until you have recovered some — being that exhausted costs you the readout as well as your defence. con tells you where you stand. Left unset you get the coloured bars; set it to plain for a bare numeric readout, or to off to hide it entirely.
regen_notify	unset (off)	Set to on to see your health bar again each time your HP, SP, or MP change while you recover out of combat. Obeys health_bar, so nothing is shown while that is off.
recovery_messages	unset (on)	Tells you when your health, mind, or body has finished recovering. Set to off to stay quiet.
combat_hit_colour	unset	Colour applied to combat messages where you land a hit. Unset leaves them uncoloured.
combat_miss_colour	unset	Colour applied to combat messages where you miss. Unset leaves them uncoloured.

Developer Preferences

These take effect only for characters holding the developer role. They are still set preferences, not env settings.

Preference	Default	Description
look_filename	unset (off)	Set to on to show the source filename above the description of rooms, objects, and livings when you look.
error_output	unset (enabled)	Compile and runtime errors attributed to you are echoed to your screen as well as written to your home log. Set to off to silence them.
log_level	0	Verbosity of body event logging, 1 (least) to 4 (most). 0 or unset disables it; higher levels are noisy.

ls Colours

The ls listing tints each entry by file kind, and each kind is its own preference. set ls_source 6cf recolours source files.

Preference	Default
ls_directory	5087b4
ls_source	b0cabf
ls_loaded	04e5ad
ls_header	a2c5b2
ls_save	c5baa5
ls_data	9e93d4
ls_other	bbb

Administrator Preferences

There are no preferences specific to the administrator role. Administrators use the player preferences above, plus the developer preferences if they also hold the developer role.

Developer Settings

env manages a second store, separate from set. Both persist with your character; the split is by purpose. Preferences are how the game presents itself to you. Settings are wizard shell state — where you are working, and how your presence reads to other players.

env                          list your current settings
env <setting> <value>        set a setting
env <setting>                clear a setting
env <name>_colour prompt     pick a colour interactively

Setting	Description
move_in	Replaces the arrival message shown to the room you move into. $N -> your name. Defaults to $N arrives.
move_out	Replaces the departure message shown to the room you move out of. $N -> your name, $D -> the exit taken. Defaults to $N leaves $D.
start_location	Set to last_location to log in wherever you left off. Any other value — including unset — puts you in the workroom in your home directory.
cwd	Your current working directory. Managed by the file commands (cd, ls); you rarely set it by hand.
cwf	Your current working file, updated by commands like more and mv so the next command can default to it.

Changing either store emits a signal — SIG_USER_PREF_CHANGED for set, SIG_USER_ENV_CHANGED for env — so other systems can react. See Signals.