This page is part of the documentation on the MOOseum Tools Project, a collaboration between Kalí Tal and ConnectionsMOO. The purpose of this project is to provide a suite of tools based on a museum metaphor to humanities scholars who are interested in integrating new media technology into their courses. The tools, currently under development, will be distributed freely as a suite, and will run on LambdaCore, JHCore and enCOre MOOs. If you are interested in beta testing these tools, contact Kalí Tal.
[The generic random narrator, created by Percival/Tari, 7/31/99. Questions, problems, bug reports to Percival/Tari.]
A random narrator is loaded with a collection of cue cards. The cue cards must be children of the generic cue card, #629 (see `help #629'[1] for assistance making and using cue cards). When a user presses the button on a random narrator, the narrator randomly selects one of its cue cards and speaks the text on that card. The narrator will read all of its cards in random order before repeating any cards, unless someone resets it. Narrators will accept cue cards made by people other than the owner of the narrator, so a group can collaborate on writing the cue card collection for a narrator. The narrator will hold as many cue cards as you want to put in in.
If you want your own random narrator, make a child of the generic random narrator:
@create #625 named <name of your narrator>
To hear a random narrator read one of its cards:
press button on <narrator>
To read the provenance card on a narrator:
provenance for <narrator>
To read the reference card on a narrator:
references for <narrator>
To put a cue card in a narrator:
load <cuecard> in <narrator>
To remove a cue card from a narrator:
remove <cuecard> from <narrator>
To remove all the cue cards from a narrator:
empty <narrator>
To see the list of cue cards in a narrator:
cuecards in <narrator>
To fasten or unfasten a narrator:
fasten <narrator>
unfasten <narrator>
Only the owner and designated users of a narrator can fasten or unfasten the narrator. Fastening a narrator locks it so that no one can load, unload, or empty its cue cards. Anyone on a narrator's users list can unfasten the narrator in order to change its card collection.
To add or remove people from the users list of a narrator:
@add-user <person> for <narrator>
@rm-user <person> for <narrator>
Only the owner can add and remove users for a narrator.
To see the list of users for a narrator:
@users for <narrator>
To add a provenance field to a narrator:
@provenance <narrator> is <Whatever you want to say.>
To clear the provenance field for a narrator:
@provenance <narrator> is
(In other words, enter the command, but don't enter any text.)
If you want to use an editor to fill in your provenance field, enter:
@edit <narrator>.provenance
You'll be sent to the in-MOO note editor, or to your local editor, depending on which option you use for editing.
To add references to a narrator (only the owner can do this):
@references <narrator> is <Whatever you want to say.>
To clear the references field for a narrator:
@references <narrator> is
(In other words, enter the command, but don't enter any text.)
If you want to use an editor to fill in your references field, enter:
@edit <narrator>.references
You'll be sent to the in-MOO note editor, or to your local editor, depending on which option you use for editing.
To change the "push button" feature on the animatronic, visit John DiLorenzo's tutorial.
*The provenance of an object is the object's story: dates, makers, owners, circumstances of its discovery, testing, information on how it came to the museum, etc. The provenance of a silver tea set might say something like, "Maker: Paul Revere, 1768. Commissioned by Mrs. Robert Johns as a wedding gift for her daughter Theresa Johns Smith. Purchased by the museum from the 1975 estate sale of Thomas Brown, great-great grandson of Theresa Smith."
**The references field of a MOOseum object is intended as a place for the owner of an exibit object to refer the viewer to further sources of information on subjects related to the object; the references on a silver tea set made by Paul Revere might refer the viewer to books or URLs about Paul Revere or about tea sets of the period.
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