Now for some details about the main configuration screen. As detailed in First Look, the program should run right out the box without modifying any of the parameters in the configuration, however they're there because not everyone has a machine which will run Furbot right with the default settings. This article will explain why the settings are there.

The first setting is purely "chrome", it's a nicety of the program to close the client on disconnection. The system which attempts to do this is on a special timer event that keeps triggering until it gets an error that tells it the client is no longer there, it tends to fire at least once, maybe twice, not uncommon to see it fire more than that either. If it keeps firing after the client is no longer on the screen, then that's a local windows bug where windows is not informing it that the client is no longer available for the program to attempt to close it. Likewise if it keeps firing with the client present on the screen. Currently it attempts to close the client by using the handle returned by windows to activate the client, then sending the client the ALT+F4 key combination, will look into making this work better later on. There is a 2 second pause between attempts to close the client.

Enable multiple client support is due to finding out that some installations of windows do not release the connection created for the client to connect to properly. This attempts to work around that situation by generating a random socket in the range of 6000 to 6999, it's entirely possible for the program to either generate the same number twice in a row, or happen upon a port which is already in use by another program. Otherwise the program use the default socket number 6750 for the client connection.

Likewise, some systems don't resolve localhost properly, so there needs to be a method to ensure that you can get at the IP address's assigned to your computer and use on of them to connect with. The preference is the IP which is normally assigned to localhost itself, that is 127.0.0.1, but if that's not available, then preferably something "close" to the machine, the next one out would be the local IP address assigned to the computer in the local "in house" network (LAN IP), then only if absolutely need be, the IP address assigned to the network by the internet interface (WAN IP).

Automatically save the botscript on program exit, is something I put in so that when you need to exit the bot quickly for any reason, or the bot needs to up and shut down due to some suspected internal error, the botscript will be saved automatically without prompting you. Another purely chrome item, it might be something you want to use, especially if you're prone to hitting that there power button on the keyboard. In the case of the program itself terminating due to some internal error, this is to be considered that the program will attempt to save the script, cannot assure you that it will.

Use long paths for character selection on client launch will work only when you're using an alt file for the bot, and that file exists in the default locations which Furcadia looks in for alt files. This does not apply to when you use the -pick mode for alt selection, nor does it apply when you embed the alt information into the botscript, in the first case, there is no file, and in the second, there needs to be an assurance that the client will use the correct file for the alt.

Loading the last bot on program start, is a tad tricky to understand. That setting for the last bot, which will be listed below this checkbox, is only filled in when you save a botscript file and the checkbox is checked. That means just loading a bot with the file menu or by double clicking on a botscript file in windows does not change this value. The botscript must undergo the save in order to set this value.

Something needs to be mentioned at this point that if the botscript is an old styled botscript, referred internally as a BotSys10 file, it will prompt you about the fact that saving it will cause older versions of Furbot to not load the file because it will save it as a BotSys12 file.

There is two check boxes which govern how the program connects to the server, one selects either DNS based addressing, which relies on the name of the server being properly mapped to the IP address of the server, and when checked, tells the program to use the physical address instead as compiled into the bot. The second check box selects whether the program connects to the same port that your normal client would use, or a different one just in case you either seem to be running into some problems use the same port as the client normally does, or just to be different.

Following all the checkbox's are a few details about the configuration paths, we'll sort of skip over the Last Bot field because we kind of covered it above. The next field is where the bot expects to find Furcadia. At this time, it's fairly hard coded into the bot, it gains this information from the registry and does not load it from the ini file it creates in another hard fixed location, that is the fourth field down, Settings Folder. The Character Path is guessed by attempting to get the special folder which should point to the Furcadia folder that should be in your default Documents folder, failing that, it will attempt to fail gracefully by using it's own folder for its files and the Furcadia in program files for the Character Path. If it does find them, it will then create a folder there called "Furbot Files", and I believe I got most of the file creation functions set up to where it will default to that location if you fail to give a file the path, so there should be no more lost files on the hard drive.