lafe(6)

📦 version 1.1, in debian bookworm, ubuntu jammy, ubuntu noble

✨ lafe(6) ✨

okay bestie, so this is the manual page for lafe, living in the Games Manual section (section 6, iykyk — that's where the games hang out). Buckle up, it's giving extremely specific nerd energy and I'm obsessed. 💖

🌸 NAME 🌸

lafe — the Latency Free Empire client. periodt. 👑

🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

lafe country [password [host [port]]]

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

lafe is an empire client, but make it optimized for high latency links. Like, the whole vibe is: you can type in, edit, and send several commands before the server even replies with output from the first command. That's not a bug, that's the entire personality. 💅 It lets you make way better use of the bandwidth you already have than most other clients do.

Why does that matter? Because pei and eif are particularly susceptible to latency — they require a complete exchange of data before prompting you again. So rude of them. 😭

lafe could also be called LAg Free Empire. Two names, one icon.

  • Empire 2 asynch features? Supported. ✅
  • Empire 3 C_SYNC? Not supported. And that's because this is a rather dumb client (it sits in between emp_client and eif), and also C_SYNC was removed from Empire 4 (Wolfpack) anyway, so like. Why would it. 🫠

Readline is supported, and at the moment required. If you want lafe without readline, use emp_client instead. No cap.

🌈 Parameters 🌈

  • country — If this is the only parameter, it gets used as a key to look up the game name as specified by the addgame commands in the $HOME/.laferc file. Otherwise it's used as the country name on the server. Defaults to 'visitor' if you leave it out. 💜
  • password — defaults to 'visitor' if unspecified.
  • host — defaults to 149.84.128.9 if unspecified.
  • port — defaults to 6667 if unspecified.

🧚 Local commands 🧚

  • help — print a syntax summary of local commands. your lil cheat sheet fr fr.
  • addgame — game country password host port logfile directory — adds a game definition for the "lafe game" startup method.
  • execute — handles exec scripts locally.
  • runfeed — Runs the argument as a shell command, and sends the output to the server shell. Run the argument as a shell script. (yes bestie, it says both. iconic of it honestly. 💀)
  • alias — Print, delete, or define an alias. Use single quotes around the alias definition to protect $*, $1, $2, ... — do NOT let your shell eat those, that's a tragedy.
  • setvar — Set, delete, or print local variables.
  • shell — Run parameters in a subshell.
  • history — print the previous commands.
  • verbose — toggle verbosity of message. "verbose on" if you want all the error messages, C_SYNC messages, etc. Off by default. 🔇
  • waitsync — Wait for all responses from server before proceeding. Super useful in scripts before a runfeed or shell command. 🫶

💜 ENVIRONMENT 💜

Environment variables are supported for backward compatibility with emp_client. But real talk: this info is best placed in the $HOME/.laferc file using the addgame command. 🌸

  • EMPIREHOST — hostname of server
  • EMPIREPORT — TCP/IP port number of server
  • COUNTRY — Country name to log in as
  • REPRESENTATIVE — Password for country

🍓 FILES 🍓

  • $HOME/.laferc — contains any valid local commands to run before connecting to a server.

⭐ SEE ALSO ⭐

emp_server(6), emp_client(6), emp_hub(6), pei(6), eif(6), http://wolfpackempire.com/

💀 BUGS 💀

Output redirection does not work with aliases and internal commands. Simultaneous connection to multiple servers is not yet supported. Version 1.0 addresses both of these issues, but has stalled due to lack of time. 😭 (the devs are busy, be nice.)

And the big one, the price you pay for speed:

When typing well ahead of the server, lafe must guess whether a local command should be parsed locally or forwarded to the server (as part of a telegram for instance). It guesses local, which is not always correct. This is the price you pay for speed. 🏎️✨

👑 AUTHOR 👑

This manual page was written by Drake Diedrich <dld@debian.org>

okay that's the whole page, bestie!! thanks for coming to my ted talk about a latency-free empire client, lafe(6) from the Games Manual. go forth and type ahead of your server, you absolute main character. 💖🦋🎀✨

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