Greetings fellow Quest users!

I recently attempted (unsucesfully) to transplant the text processor function of parser-games to create collapsibles into my gamebook. Since i am having no clue what i'm doing whilst messing with the libraries, i decided to stop before my PC inexplicably catches fire from my incompetence.

Yet trying to use {popup:} without any modification, i found it throws up some really odd error messages, transcribed here in full:

Error running script: Error compiling expression 'JSSafe(s1) + GetRandomInt(0, 999999999)': FunctionCallElement: Could find not function 'JSSafe(String)'

I honestly have lost track of what could possibly cause this (why a Random Integer?) and what i should do.

I am banging my head against a wall, and the wall is proving sturdier. Any suggestions? Help is as always highly appreciated!

{popup: uses random integers to identify each popup, so that the link knows which one to show/hide. This is a pretty weird way of doing it, but shouldn't be a problem.

The function JSSafe is in CoreFunctions.aslx, and it just removes any characters that would be a problem in a javascript identifier. The function used in the Text Adventure mode looks like:

  <function name="JSSafe" parameters="s" type="string"><![CDATA[
    s = Replace(s, "\"", "")
    s = Replace(s, "\'", "")
    s = Replace(s, " ", "")
    s = Replace(s, ".", "")
    s = Replace(s, ",", "")
    s = Replace(s, "!", "")
    s = Replace(s, "?", "")
    s = Replace(s, "-", "")
    s = Replace(s, "/", "")
    s = Replace(s, "(", "")
    s = Replace(s, ")", "")
    s = Replace(s, "$", "")
    s = Replace(s, "%", "")
    s = Replace(s, "&", "")
    s = Replace(s, "*", "")
    s = Replace(s, "@", "")
    return (s)
  ]]></function>

You should be able to include that function, and your popups will work.
I'm a little curious about that function, though. It seems inefficient to me; I would be more inclined to use something like:

  <function name="JSSafe" parameters="s" type="string"><![CDATA[
    output = ""
    for (i, 1, LengthOf(s)) {
      c = Mid (s, i, 1)
      if (Instr ("\"\'\\ .,!?-/()$%&*@", c) = 0) output = output + c
    }
    return (output)
  ]]></function>

or even

  <function name="JSSafe" parameters="s" type="string"><![CDATA[
    while (IsRegexMatch ("^(?<before>\\w*)\\W+(?<after>.*)$", s)) {
      parts = Populate ("^(?<before>\\w*)\\W+(?<after>.*)$", s)
      s = DictionaryItem(parts, "before") + DictionaryItem(parts, "after")
    }
    return (s)
  ]]></function>

(the regular expression engine is optimised to be very efficient at finding blocks of characters; but I'm not sure if the overhead of Quest's dictionaries would make that slower overall)

...why would anyone ever do this with random integers?

Anyway, thanks for your help. In the end, it was really as simple as adding CoreFunctions.aslx, and all my attempts of specifically adding {popup:} were ludicrously convoluted. Talking about missing the obvious.

The random Integer still baffles me.

The random Integer still baffles me.

The popup needs an ID that isn't shared with any other popup.

Quest doesn't have a list of the IDs it's already used.

Sticking a large random number on the end of the ID makes it unlikely to collide with anything.

A better approach might have been using a javascript function to generate the ID; but a lot of the text processor stuff seems to be written with an absolute minimum of JS for no obvious reason.

Oh, i get why there is an ID needed. But as a mathematician, i don't see why you would use a random int for this. Picking an element from any finite set has the chance of hitting a previously used one... Especially since we're only talking of a billion here. I haven't done the Gaußian distribution, but if your games uses enough popups, you're in peril.

Hmm, if i ever find the time and motivation (read: never) i might actually look into the code behind {popup:} and get it working properly (the lack of background transparency annoys me, for example).