                            MUD Bot Classes
                              Jeff Blaine
                           jblaine@kickflop.net

General
=======

    As a "learn Python" project, I set out to rewrite some quick PERL
    code I had written which connected to a MUD (see Glossary below
    if you don't know what a MUD is) and checked to see whether or not
    certain web pages had updated every half hour.  If 1 or more web
    pages had updated, the "bot" would say which one(s) and then go
    back to sleep for 30 minutes.

    This project taught me quite a bit about Python and myself as well.
    It taught me that I know a lot more about OOP than I tend to
    acknowledge and also that Python's regular expression mechanism
    (even with the addition of the 're' module in Python 1.5) along
    with its OO system can be quite cumbersome when compared to the
    ease with which PERL handles these tasks.

    At any rate, I didn't just rewrite my PERL bot as a one-off.  I
    started from the ground up and made building blocks to assemble
    into my new Python bot.

    Have fun, and let me know if you find this code useful.  In addition
    to this documentation, there is also quite a bit of commenting in
    the source code (surprise!)

Classes
=======

    Class Hierarchy
    ---------------

        MUDBot
           |
           |--- WebWatcherBot
                     |
                     |--- SmartWebWatcherBot

Bugs
====

    None that I am aware of

Acknowledgments
===============

    I had a look at Lyn Headley's Lyntin code to learn how to do
    select() stuff in Python.

Copyright
=========

    Please see the file COPYRIGHT in this distribution.

