Anybody know how to use ZIL please?

Hi all,

I’m learning ZIL with help from Jesse McGrew. It’s going ok, not the big scary language it’s gained a rep for!

I’ll be sharing my learning soon in the form of *.zil files which will make life easier for anyone wishing to follow in these foot steps. However I am very much the Learner at this stage, and with this in mind i’m hoping to find other people who may be familiar with the code?

I’m trying to implement VERBS that allow the player to ask questions to NPCs (Actors) in the same way that was done in the detective games that Infocom released. It’s a non-standard thing so needs to be created and added, i’m nearly there I think - i’ve created a new zil file called verbs_plus with the code shown below but currently it errors.

If anyone can spot any mistakes in the code then please point them out! Thank you! Adam.

“Verbs Plus”

<SYNTAX ASK OBJECT (FIND PERSONBIT) ABOUT OBJECT = V-ASK-ABOUT>

<ROUTINE V-ASK-ABOUT ()
<TELL CT ,PRSO " doesn’t seem to understand. ‘Sorry, ask me that again please?’." CR>>

<SYNTAX OBJECT (FIND PERSONBIT) TELL ABOUT OBJECT = V-TELL-ABOUT>

<ROUTINE V-ASK-ABOUT ()
<TELL CT ,PRSO “‘Sorry, ask me that again please?’.” CR>>

lol - i tried to attach my verbs_plus.zil file to this post and it rejected it saying “.zil file types not allowed” … the irony!! :smiley:

Update::

This code works!

<SYNTAX OBJECT (FIND PERSONBIT) TELL ABOUT OBJECT = V-TELL-ABOUT>

<ROUTINE V-ASK-ABOUT ()
<TELL CT ,PRSO “‘Sorry, ask me that again please?’.” CR>>

So… It’s the syntax for “Bob, tell me about foo” that I need help with.