doc/recover.6: Fix style and markup nits

* Identify NETHACKDIR and HACKDIR as environment variables.
* ...and set them italics, not roman.
* Set default playground directory name in italics, not roman.
* Set command names in italics.
* Refer to command operands as such, not as "options".
* Use man page cross reference on first occurrence of "nethack" when
  referring to the command executable as opposed to the overall game.
  Because some text is commented out (`ig`nored), meaning the "first"
  occurrence appears twice (what's lexically present vs. what's
  formatted) do this twice as future-proofing.
* Set file names in italics, not roman.  Set variable parts of file
  names in roman.
* Refer to "single-user systems" instead of "microcomputers"; the latter
  is becoming antiquated terminology.
* Favor present tense over future.
* Tighten wording.
* Spell "save files" consistently as two words.
This commit is contained in:
G. Branden Robinson
2026-05-06 04:53:12 -05:00
parent 2d3f9b8c21
commit 61a16e6983
+44 -26
View File
@@ -27,32 +27,38 @@ recover \- recover a NetHack game interrupted by disaster
.I base
\&.\|.\|.
.SH DESCRIPTION
Occasionally, a NetHack game will be interrupted by disaster
when the game or the system crashes.
Prior to NetHack v3.1, these games were lost because various information
Occasionally, a NetHack game is interrupted by disaster
when the program or the system crashes.
Prior to NetHack v3.1, these games were lost because information
like the player's inventory was kept only in memory.
Now, all pertinent information can be written out to disk,
so such games can be recovered at the point of the last level change.
.PP
The
.I base
options tell
.I Base
operands tell
.I recover
which files to process.
Each base option specifies recovery of a separate game.
Each
.I base
specifies recovery of a separate game.
.PP
The
.B \-d
option, which must be the first argument if it appears,
supplies a directory which is the NetHack playground.
It overrides the value from NETHACKDIR, HACKDIR, or the directory
supplies the directory housing the NetHack playground.
It overrides the value of the environment variables
.I NETHACKDIR
and
.IR HACKDIR ,
and the directory
specified by the game administrator during compilation
(usually /usr/games/lib/nethackdir).
(usually
.IR /usr/games/lib/nethackdir ).
.ig
.PP
\*^?ALLDOCS
For recovery to be possible,
.I nethack
.IR nethack (6)
must have been compiled with the INSURANCE option, and the run-time option
.I checkpoint
must also have been on.
@@ -71,26 +77,34 @@ was created without support for recovery.
\*^.
\*^.
..
NetHack normally writes out files for levels as the player leaves them,
.IR nethack (6)
normally writes out files for levels as the player leaves them,
so they will be ready for return visits.
When checkpointing, NetHack also writes out the level entered and
When checkpointing, it also writes out the level entered and
the current game state on every level change.
This naturally slows level changes down somewhat.
This procedure slows level changes.
.PP
The level file names are of the form base.nn, where nn is an internal
bookkeeping number for the level.
The file base.0 is used for game identity, locking, and, when checkpointing,
The level file names are of the form
.IR base. nn, where
.I nn
is an internal bookkeeping number for the level.
The file
.I base.0
is used for game identity, locking, and, when checkpointing,
for the game state.
Various OSes use different strategies for constructing the base name.
Microcomputers use the character name, possibly truncated and modified
Single-user systems use the character name,
possibly truncated and modified
to be a legal filename on that system.
Multi-user systems use the (modified) character name prefixed
by a user number to avoid conflicts,
or "xlock" if the number of concurrent players is being limited.
or
.I xlock
if the number of concurrent players is being limited.
It may be necessary to look in the playground to find the correct
base name of the interrupted game.
.I recover
will transform these level files into a save file of the same name as
transforms these level files into a save file of the same name that
.I nethack
would have used.
.PP
@@ -105,13 +119,16 @@ through setuid or setgid is tantamount to leaving the playground
world-writable,
with respect to both cheating and messing up other players.
For a single-user system, this of course does not change anything,
so some of the microcomputer ports install
so some of these ports install
.I recover
by default.
.PP
For a multi-user system,
the game administrator may want to arrange for all .0 files in the
playground to be fed to recover when the host machine boots,
the game administrator may want to arrange for all
.I .0
files in the playground to be fed to
.I recover
when the host machine boots,
and handle game crashes individually.
If the user population is sufficiently trustworthy,
.I recover
@@ -126,7 +143,7 @@ Like
.I nethack
itself,
.I recover
will overwrite existing savefiles of the same name.
will overwrite existing save files of the same name.
Savefiles created by
.I recover
are uncompressed;
@@ -143,8 +160,9 @@ If multiple machines share a playground, this would be impossible to
determine.
.PP
.I recover
should be taught to use the nethack playground locking mechanism to
avoid conflicts.
should be taught to use the
.I nethack
playground locking mechanism to avoid conflicts.
.SH COPYRIGHT
.\" All troffs and nroffs support `\(co` except Plan 9 nroff, but Plan 9
.\" offers no test for special character availability, and its feature