Writing with Inform - an audiobook

These recordings of Writing with Inform by Graham Nelson were made thanks to the support of the Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation. The reader is me, Ryan Veeder.

The aim of this project is to make the excellent documentation for the Inform programming language more accessible and convenient for users of screen readers, people who want to listen to programming language documentation while washing dishes, and people like me who simply enjoy the sound of my voice. Mr. Nelson was not involved in the recordings, and as far as I know has not signed off on the project. I am not involved with the development of Inform or the composition of its documentation in any way.

For now, the scope of this project is limited to the first three chapters of Writing with Inform. (The book itself says it's "arranged so that the reader can, in principle, write whole works of fiction as early as the end of Chapter 3.") This includes the 42 associated examples from The Inform Recipe Book. I might record more in the future.

I've tried to arrange this RSS feed in a way that should be useful for listening to all three chapters as a podcast.

If you have any questions or suggestions regarding this resource, please email me. Thank you for your interest.

Chapter 0: An Introduction to the Recordings

Ryan's introduction to the recordings (3:18)

Chapter 1: Welcome to Inform

Section 1. Preface (2:54) (original text)

Example 1. About the examples (3:20) (1 asterisk) An explanation of the examples in this documentation, and the asterisks attached to them.

Section 2. Acknowledgements (3:18) (original text)

Section 3. The facing pages (1:38) (original text)

Section 4. The Go! button (1:43) (original text)

Section 5. The Replay button (1:26) (original text)

Section 6. The Index and Results panels (1:32) (original text)

Section 7. The Skein (2:12) (original text)

Chapter 2: The Source Text

Section 1. Creating the world (2:05) (original text)

Section 2. Making rules (3:06) (original text)

Section 3. Punctuation (5:47) (original text)

Section 4. Problems (1:39) (original text)

Section 5. Headings (2:20) (original text)

Section 6. Why using headings is a good idea (2:10) (original text)

Section 7. The SHOWME command (2:07) (original text)

Section 8. The TEST command (4:08) (original text)

Section 9. Material not for release (1:52) (original text)

Section 10. Installing extensions (3:39) (original text)

Section 11. Including extensions (0:54) (original text)

Section 12. Use options (2:51) (original text)

Section 13. Administering classroom use (3:43) (original text)

Section 14. Limits and the Settings panel (4:10) (original text)

Section 15. What to do about a bug (1:40) (original text)

Section 16. Does Inform really understand English? (3:05) (original text)

Chapter 3: Things

Section 1. Descriptions (4:21) (original text)

Example 2. Bic (2:07) (1 asterisk) Testing to make sure that all objects have been given descriptions.

Example 3. Verbosity 1 (3:23) (1 asterisk) Making rooms give brief room descriptions when revisited.

Example 4. Slightly Wrong (2:33) (2 asterisks) A room whose description changes slightly after our first visit there.

Section 2. Rooms and the map (3:41) (original text)

Example 5. Port Royal 1 (4:55) (1 asterisk) A partial implementation of Port Royal, Jamaica, set before the earthquake of 1692 demolished large portions of the city.

Example 6. Up and Up (2:34) (2 asterisks) Adding a short message as the player approaches a room, before the room description itself appears.

Example 7. Starry Void (4:23) (3 asterisks) Creating a booth that can be seen from the outside, opened and closed, and entered as a separate room.

Section 3. One-way connections (2:22) (original text)

Example 8. Port Royal 2 (2:14) (1 asterisk) Another part of Port Royal, with less typical map connections.

Example 9. The Unbuttoned Elevator Affair (2:07) (1 asterisk) A simple elevator connecting two floors which is operated simply by walking in and out, and has no buttons or fancy doors.

Section 4. Regions and the index map (1:53) (original text)

Example 10. Port Royal 3 (6:54) (1 asterisk) Division of Port Royal into regions.

Section 5. Kinds (2:23) (original text)

Example 11. First Name Basis (4:06) (1 asterisk) Allowing the player to use different names for something.

Example 12. Midsummer Day (1:03) (1 asterisk) A few sentences laying out a garden together with some things which might be found in it.

Section 6. Either/or properties (1:51) (original text)

Example 13. Tamed (4:35) (1 asterisk) Examples of a container and a supporter that can be entered, as well as nested rooms.

Section 7. Properties depend on kind (1:22) (original text)

Example 14. Disenchantment Bay 1 (3:10) (1 asterisk) A running example in this chapter, Disenchantment Bay, involves chartering a boat. This is the first step: creating the cabin.

Section 8. Scenery (2:15) (original text)

Example 15. Disenchantment Bay 2 (2:47) (1 asterisk) Disenchantment Bay: creating some of the objects in the cabin's description.

Example 16. Replanting (1:40) (1 asterisk) Changing the response when the player tries to take something that is scenery.

Section 9. Backdrops (1:54) (original text)

Example 17. Disenchantment Bay 3 (0:49) (1 asterisk) Disenchantment Bay: adding a view of the glacier.

Section 10. Properties holding text (2:10) (original text)

Section 11. Two descriptions of things (1:40) (original text)

Example 18. Disenchantment Bay 4 (3:41) (1 asterisk) Disenchantment Bay: fleshing out the descriptions of things on the boat.

Example 19. Laura (7:44) (2 asterisks) Some general advice about creating objects with unusual or awkward names, and a discussion of the use of printed names.

Section 12. Doors (4:39) (original text)

Example 20. Disenchantment Bay 5 (0:51) (1 asterisk) Disenchantment Bay: adding the door and the deck to our charter boat.

Example 21. Escape (3:28) (2 asterisks) Window that can be climbed through or looked through.

Example 22. Garibaldi 1 (3:27) (3 asterisks) Providing a security readout device by which the player can check on the status of all doors in the game.

Section 13. Locks and keys (1:47) (original text)

Example 23. Disenchantment Bay 6 (1:24) (1 asterisk) Disenchantment Bay: locking up the charter boat's fishing rods.

Example 24. Neighborhood Watch (6:39) (2 asterisks) A locked door that can be locked or unlocked without a key from one side, but not from the other.

Section 14. Devices and descriptions (1:36) (original text)

Example 25. Disenchantment Bay 7 (0:43) (1 asterisk) Disenchantment Bay: making the radar and instruments switch on and off.

Example 26. Down Below (3:56) (2 asterisks) A light switch which makes the room it is in dark or light.

Section 15. Light and darkness (1:46) (original text)

Section 16. Vehicles and pushable things (2:00) (original text)

Example 27. Peugeot (1:40) (1 asterisk) A journey from one room to another that requires the player to be on a vehicle.

Example 28. Disenchantment Bay 8 (1:24) (2 asterisks) Disenchantment Bay: a pushable chest of ice for the boat.

Example 29. Hover (4:01) (3 asterisks) Letting the player see a modified room description when he's viewing the place from inside a vehicle.

Section 17. Men, women and animals (1:49) (original text)

Example 30. Disenchantment Bay 9 (0:37) (1 asterisk) Disenchantment Bay: enter the charter boat's Captain.

Section 18. Articles and proper names (3:37) (original text)

Example 31. Belfry (1:16) (1 asterisk) You can see a bat, a bell, some woodworm, William Snelson, the sexton's wife, a bellringer and your local vicar here.

Example 32. Gopher-wood (1:46) (2 asterisks) Changing the name of a character in the middle of play, removing the article.

Section 19. Carrying capacity (1:38) (original text)

Section 20. Possessions and clothing (2:35) (original text)

Example 33. Disenchantment Bay 10 (1:01) (1 asterisk) Disenchantment Bay: things for the player and the characters to wear and carry.

Section 21. The player's holdall (1:44) (original text)

Example 34. Disenchantment Bay 11 (1:29) (1 asterisk) Disenchantment Bay: making a holdall of the backpack.

Section 22. Food (1:00) (original text)

Section 23. Parts of things (3:04) (original text)

Example 35. Fallout Enclosure (3:37) (3 asterisks) Adding an enclosure kind that includes both containers and supporters in order to simplify text that would apply to both.

Example 36. Brown (4:32) (3 asterisks) A red sticky label which can be attached to anything in the game, or removed again.

Example 37. Disenchantment Bay 12 (12:09) (4 asterisks) A final trip to Disenchantment Bay: the scenario turned into a somewhat fuller scene, with various features that have not yet been explained.

Section 24. Concealment (3:23) (original text)

Example 38. Search and Seizure (6:50) (3 asterisks) A smuggler who has items, some of which are hidden.

Section 25. The location of something (3:14) (original text)

Example 39. Van Helsing (2:27) (2 asterisks) A character who approaches the player, then follows him from room to room.

Section 26. Directions (4:10) (original text)

Example 40. The Prisoner's Dilemma (2:19) (2 asterisks) A button that causes a previously non-existent exit to come into being.

Example 41. The World of Charles S. Roberts (13:26) (2 asterisks) Replacing the ordinary compass bearings with a set of six directions to impose a hexagonal rather than square grid on the landscape.

Example 42. Fore (5:18) (3 asterisks) Understand "fore", "aft", "port", and "starboard", but only when the player is on a vessel.