New and improved Easy Color v2.2
--------------------------------

This patch is based on the Easy Color patch by mud@proimages.proimages.com

It will add the & colour codes to the mud whilst still supporting the old \c
colour codes.  It will also have the ability to make things flash and get
displayed in reverse video.  (You might want to disable the flash colour
code because you will eventually end up with huge areas of your mud flashing
in horrible colours.)

I wrote this patch because I could never remember the numbers for each colour
in the Easy Color patch.

To install the patch follow the instructions in color.txt

If you have already installed the easy color patch before then all you need
to do is copy the new color.c over the existing one.  (Remembering to take a
backup before)

The mud will then have the usual \c?? codes and the new &? codes.
Reverse video, flashing colours and underline (only for mono screens) will
also be added.

Colour code list
----------------

Normal Colours
\c25 or &k = Black
\c01 or &r = Red
\c02 or &g = Green
\c03 or &y = Yellow
\c04 or &b = Blue
\c05 or &m = Magenta
\c06 or &c = Cyan
\c07 or &w = White

Bold Colours
\c29 or &K = Bright black (No real use.  Just for completeness)
\c08 or &R = Bright red
\c09 or &G = Bright green
\c10 or &Y = Bright yellow
\c11 or &B = Bright blue
\c12 or &M = Bright magenta
\c13 or &C = Bright cyan
\c14 or &W = Bright white

Background Colours
\c24 or &0 = Black background
\c15 or &1 = Red background
\c16 or &2 = Green background
\c17 or &3 = Yellow background
\c18 or &4 = Blue background
\c19 or &5 = Magenta background
\c20 or &6 = Cyan background
\c21 or &7 = White background

Misc Characters
\c22 or && = The & character
\c23 or &\ = The \ character

Special Codes
\c00 or &n = Normal
\c26 or &f = Flash (Use normal to turn off flash)
\c27 or &v = Reverse video
\c28 or &u = Underline (Only for mono screens)

Disclaimer
----------
Use this code at your own risk.

Send any improvements or any bugs to this address.

 - Trevor Man (tman@dial.pipex.com)

Original README below.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

After looking at Circle's color code, I decided something more was needed.

The following code provides an easy way to add color to text files, mob
descriptions, etc.

Here's how it works:

1. Put in the code
2. Wherever you want color, use \c followed by a two-digit number.

For example,
\c01Hello! \c10this is yellow.\c00

Will print Hello! in red, "this is yellow," in bold (extended ANSI) yellow,
and then turn off color (revert to default color).

Color sequence is red, green, yellow, blue, magenta, cyan, and white.

Color 1 is red, color 8 is bold red (just add 7), color 15 is red background.

For instance,

\c18\c07White on blue background

is just that.

NOTE that in a .c source file, you will need to specify it as "\\c##", two
backslashes, but in an external text file (motd, etc.) you only need one \.

Ex: when sending something to char --
sprintf(s,"\\c01Hi\\c00\r\n");

You can, of course, change c to whatever character you want, modify the
code, etc., to make it better suited to your needs.

Of course, like any code, this can be improved.... but hey, it's FREE!

Use it as you will, crediting me is not necessary (but appreciated).

The other great thing about it is if you're playing around with ANSI
codes a lot (like I do), you don't have to recompile a bunch of stuff
after changing a header file (screen.h).

Just make it again, which will only recompile color.c, yaay, lots of time
saved for more important stuff!

(BTW: CNUL isn't even used in the function, but it's there if you need
it...)

The other nice thing about this is that you don't have to change all your
CC macro calls (CCRED(), CCBLU(), etc.), this integrates right in.  Saves
you time adding more color later if you already have the CC's all over
the place... ;)

Now it's possible that I missed something or screwed something up in my
listing or my directions, let me know if you have any problems.
<mud@proimages.proimages.com>

BUGS:
The color code doesn't check to make sure that the buffer doesn't exceed
the maximum output buffer size, but since this is rarely a problem (would
require 6 full screens of text under bpl11) I didn't bother.

Lines getting chopped in the middle (e.g., "hi\c0" .. "1 there") and
output separately will not be colored correctly.