				Empire 3.0


The Empire2 project had five main goals:

1) Easy installation.
	The Empire2 server comes with a "configure" script (see INSTALL),
	which makes installing the server simply a matter of answering a
	questionaire.  Also, much of the server is now run-time configureable.
	That is, you don't need to recompile to change which OPTIONS are
	turned on, or to change the values of various global constants (see
	doc/configuration).

2) Data integrity
	The Empire2 server is fundamentally different from past Empire
	servers in that it exists all in one "monolith" process.  The amount
	of memory that this new emp_server process takes up ranges from 3 meg
	(64x32 map with 10 countries) to 12 meg (128x128 with 100 countries).
	With everything happening in one process, there is no longer the
	danger of two threads simultaneously changing the same data.

3) Improved interface
	Many of the Empire commands were given a "face-lift" to make them
	easier for the players to work with.  For example, all comands which
	move things now have the same syntax:
	  command <WHAT> <FROM> <AMOUNT> <TO>
	and the sub-prompts and output of many commands were improved to make
	them more informative and clear.

4) Documentation.
	The "info" pages are now organized into "Subjects".  If you type
	"info", then you will get a list of subjects which you can query.
	All of the info pages were either updated or completely
	rewritten.  Also, the deity documentation has been completely
	rewritten.

5) Consistency
	About 3000 lines of code was consolidated into 500 lines.  In the
	process, many formulas were standardized.  For example, there used to
	be about 12 different formulas for a plane or missile hitting its
	target.  Now there is only one (see info bomb).  Also, the way that
	damage is calculated is standardized (see info Damage).  Other code
	consolidations were navi/sail/order, and attack/assault/board/paradrop.
	The new code has the double advantage of being more fair, and easier
	to maintain.

The Empire3.0 server fixes a number of bugs that were in the Empire2
server, and it implements the server side of the C_SYNC client-server
database synchronization protocol.

Empire 3.0 has been ported to the following platforms:
	SUN4
	Unixware (svr4.2 on i386)
	AIX
	DEC Alpha
	IRIX
	Linux
	Ultrix
	FreeBSD

It is also supported (but not tested) on:
	SUN3
	BSD386
	MIPS
If you have succeeded in compiling it or porting it to another
platform, then please contact us!


The most recent version of the Empire2 server may always be found at:
  http://www.empire.net/~children/PEA/deity/server/
or
  ftp://ftp.empire.net/pub/empire/deity/server/
or
  ftp://ftp.rr.ualberta.ca/pub/empire/

The Empire3 server is in a subdirectory of the above three locations
called "experimental".

Questions or comments about Empire2 should be directed to Ken Stevens.
Also, if you'd like to join the empire-server mailing list, then you
should also contact him.

Ken Stevens <children@empire.net>
