                NetHack 3.4.3 -- General information

NetHack 3.4 is an enhancement to the dungeon exploration game NetHack.
It is a distant descendent of Rogue and Hack, and a direct descendent of
NetHack 3.3.

NetHack 3.4.3 is a bugfix release for NetHack 3.4.2.
 *  Several dozen general bug fixes including at least one fatal bug
 *  Correct several inconsistencies
 *  Handle level completely filled with monsters better
 *  win32tty performance enhancements when playing on Windows 98 and Windows Me
 *  win32gui player selection fixes
 *  X11 player selection fixes, one of which could be fatal
 *  Eliminated a gold-in-shop-container cheat
 *  Include bones file version compatibility info in options file

A fuller list of changes for this release can be found in the file 
doc/fixes34.3 in the source distribution.  The text in there was written 
for the development team's own use and is provided "as is", so please do 
not ask us to further explain the entries in that file.

The internal structure of bones and save files has not changed between 
NetHack 3.4.0, 3.4.1, 3.4.2 and now 3.4.3. That means that if you use the 
same compiler, the same compiler version and compiler switches, the same 
NetHack compile-time options, and you have not incorporated any additional 
source code patches that altered the save file format on your system, then 
bones and save files from 3.4.0 through 3.4.3 should be compatible.


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Please read items (1), (2) and (3) BEFORE doing anything with your new code.

1.  Unpack the code in a dedicated new directory.  We will refer to that
    directory as the 'Top' directory.  It makes no difference what you
    call it.

2.  If there is no flaw in the packaging, many sub-directories will be
    automatically created, and files will be deposited in them:

    a.  A 'dat' directory, which contains a variety of data files.
    b.  A 'doc' directory, which contains various documentation.
    c.  An 'include' directory, which contains *.h files.
    d.  A 'src' directory, which contains game *.c files used by all versions.
    e.  A 'util' directory, which contains files for utility programs.
    f.  A 'sys' directory, which contains subdirectories for files that
        are operating-system specific.
    g.  A 'sys/share' subdirectory, which contains files shared by some OSs.
    h.  A 'sys/share/sounds' subsubdirectory, which contains sound files
        shared by some OSs.
    i.  A 'sys/amiga' subdirectory, which contains files specific to AmigaDOS.
    j.  A 'sys/amiga/ship' subsubdirectory
    k.  A 'sys/atari' subdirectory, which contains files specific to TOS.
    l.  A 'sys/be' subdirectory, which contains files specific to Be OS.
    m.  A 'sys/mac' subdirectory, which contains files specific to MacOS.
    n.  A 'sys/msdos' subdirectory, which contains files specific to MS-DOS.
    o.  A 'sys/os2' subdirectory, which contains files specific to OS/2.
    p.  A 'sys/unix' subdirectory, which contains files specific to UNIX.
    q.  A 'sys/vms' subdirectory, which contains files specific to VMS.
    r.  A 'sys/wince' subdirectory, which contains files specific to Windows CE.
    s.  A 'sys/winnt' subdirectory, which contains files specific to Windows NT.
    t.  A 'win' directory, which contains subdirectories for files that
        are windowing-system specific (but not operating-system specific).
    u.  A 'win/share' subdirectory, which contains files shared by some
        windowing systems.
    v.  A 'win/Qt' subdirectory, which contains files specific to Qt.
    w.  A 'win/X11' subdirectory, which contains files specific to X11.
    x.  A 'win/gem' subdirectory, which contains files specific to GEM.
    y.  A 'win/gnome' subdirectory, which contains files specific to GNOME.
    z.  A 'win/tty' subdirectory, which contains files specific to ttys.
    A.  A 'win/win32' subdirectory, which contains files specific to the
        Windows Win32 API.

    The names of these directories should not be changed unless you are
    ready to go through the makefiles and the makedefs program and change
    all the directory references in them.

3.  Having unpacked, you should have a file called 'Files' in your Top
    directory.  This file contains the list of all the files you now SHOULD
    have in each directory.  Please check the files in each directory
    against this list to make sure that you have a complete set.

4.  Before you do anything else, please read carefully the file called
    "license" in the 'dat' subdirectory.  It is expected that you comply
    with the terms of that license, and we are very serious about it.

5.  If everything is in order, you can now turn to trying to get the program
    to compile and run on your particular system.  It is worth mentioning
    that the default configuration is SysV/Sun/Solaris2.x (simply because
    the code was housed on such a system).  It is also worth mentioning
    here that NetHack 3.4 is a huge program.  If you intend to run it on a
    small machine, you'll have to make hard choices among the options
    available in config.h.

    The files sys/*/Install.* were written to guide you in configuring the
    program for your operating system.  The files win/*/Install.* are
    available, where necessary, to help you in configuring the program
    for particular windowing environments.  Reading them, and the man pages,
    should answer most of your questions.

    At the time of this release, NetHack 3.4 is known to run/compile on:

        Apple Macintosh running MacOS 7.5 or higher, LinuxPPC, BeOS 4.0
        Atari ST/TT/Falcon running TOS (or MultiTOS) with GCC
        Commodore Amiga running AmigaDOS 3.0 or higher with SAS/C 6.x
                (but see Makefile.ami about DICE and Manx)
        DEC Alpha/VMS (aka OpenVMS AXP), running V1.x through V7.1
        DEC VAX/VMS, running V4.6 through V7.1
        HP 9000s700 running HP-UX 10.x, 11.x
        IBM PS/2 and AT compatibles running OS/2 - 2.0 and up with GCC emx
        Intel 80386 or greater (or clone) boxes running MS-DOS with DPMI.
        Intel 80386 or greater (or clone) boxes running Linux, or BSDI.
        Intel 80386 or greater (or clone) boxes running Windows 95/98/Me.
        Intel 80386 or greater (or clone) boxes running Windows NT/2000/XP/2003.
        Intel Pentium or better (or clone) running BeOS 4.5
        Sun SPARC based machine running SunOS 4.x, Solaris 2.x, or Solaris 7

    NetHack 3.4 will also run on the following, but a cross-compiler hosted
    on another platform, such as win32, is required to build from source.

        Pocket PC devices running Windows CE 3.0 and higher
        H/PC Pro devices running Windows CE 2.11 and higher.
	Palm Size PC 1.1 devices running Windows CE 2.11

    Previous versions of NetHack were tested on the following systems,
    and we expect that NetHack 3.4 will work on them as well:

        AT&T 3B1 running System V (3.51)
        AT&T 3B2/600 & 3B2/622 running System V R3.2.1
        AT&T 3B2/1000 Model 80 running System V R3.2.2
        AT&T 3B4000 running System V
        AT&T 6386 running System V R3.2
        Data General AViiON systems running DG/UX
        DEC vaxen running BSD, Ultrix
        Decstations running Ultrix 3.1, 4.x
        Encore Multimax running UMAX 4.2
        Gould NP1 running UTX 3/2
        HP 9000s300 running HP-UX
        HP 9000s700 running HP-UX 9.x
        IBM PC/RT and RS/6000 running AIX 3.x
        IBM PS/2 and AT compatibles running OS/2 1.1 - 2.0 (and probably
           Warp) with Microsoft 6.0, and OS/2 2.0 and up with IBM CSet++ 2.0.
        Intel 80386 or greater (or clone) running 386BSD
        Mips M2000 running RiscOS 4.1
        NeXT running Mach (using BSD configuration)
        Pyramid 9820x running OSx 4.4c
        SGI Iris running IRIX
        Stardent Vistra 800 running SysV R4.0
        Stride 460 running UniStride 2.1
        Sun-3s, -4s, and -386is running SunOS 3.x
        Sun-3s and -386is running SunOS 4.x
        Valid Logic Systems SCALD-System

    Unless otherwise mentioned, the compiler used was the OS-vendor's
    C compiler.

    With the demise of Windows NT on the DEC Alpha, no attempt has been
    made to build NetHack 3.4.3 on that platform.

    Windows 98/Me have been the most problematic Windows platforms for
    running NetHack so far. Patches for 3.4.2 (courtesy Michael Lehotay)
    have been incorporated into 3.4.3 to help make them work better. Your
    results may vary.

    A build for Intel 80286 machines and DOS "real mode" overlaid versions 
    has not been produced for 3.4.3.  Nobody on the porting team has
    the time or the software to attempt the necessary tuning that will allow 
    it to achieve the balance of having just the right amount of available 
    memory, and still have acceptable performance.  The sources necessary 
    to do so are still included in the source distribution, so if someone 
    has access to a real-mode compiler and lots of spare time on their hands, 
    you may be able to get things working. Of course you do so at your own risk.

                        - - - - - - - - - - -

If you have problems building the game, or you find bugs in it, we recommend 
filing a bug report from our "Contact Us" web page at:
    http://www.nethack.org/ 

When sending correspondence, please observe the following:
o Please be sure to include your machine type, OS, and patchlevel.
o Never send us binary files (e.g. save files or bones files). Whichever 
  platform you are using, only a small minority of the development team has 
  access to it, and you will rapidly annoy the others.  If you have found 
  a bug and think that your save file would aid in solving the problem, 
  send us a description in words of the problem, your machine type, your 
  operating system, and the version of NetHack.  Tell us that you have a 
  save file, but do not actually send it.
  In the rare case that we think your save file would be helpful, you will
  be contacted by a member of the development team with the address of a
  specific person to send the save file to.
o Though we make an effort to reply to each bug report, it may take some
  time before you receive feedback.  This is especially true during the
  period immediately after a new release, when we get the most bug reports.
o We don't give hints for playing the game.
o Don't bother to ask when the next version will be out.  You will not get
  a reply.

If you don't have access to the world wide web, or if you want to submit
a patch for the NetHack source code via email directly, you can direct it 
to this address:
    nethack-bugs (at) nethack.org

If you've changed something to get NetHack to run on your system, it's likely
that others have done it by making slightly different modifications.  By routing 
your patches through the development team, we should be able to avoid making 
everyone else choose among variant patches claiming to do the same thing, to keep
most of the copies of 3.4 synchronized by means of official patches, and to 
maintain the painfully-created file organization.  (This process has been working
since the time when everyone just posted their own patches to 2.3.  At that time,
there were no archived bug-fixes to give to people who got 2.3 after its initial
release, so the same bugs kept being discovered by new batches of people.)
We have been successful in preventing this from happening since the 3.0
release.  Please cooperate to keep this from happening to 3.4.

It is inevitable that we will reject some proposed additions of new features
either because they do not fit our conception of the game, or because they
require more code than we consider they're worth.  If we reject your feature,
you are free, of course, to post the patches to the net yourself and let the
marketplace decide their worth.

All of this amounts to the following:  If you decide to apply a free-lanced
patch to your 3.4 code, you are on your own.  In our own patches, we will
assume that your code is synchronized with ours.

                  -- Good luck, and happy Hacking --
