Zuul is the modbot I've written for Bitmines. It
allows users to share the powers of the moderator by allowing anyone with
a modbot password to give it commands, which it then performs. This
is so that as long as at least one responsible user is active in the
group, there is an active moderator. In the past, users in the group
have suffered when an outsider wandered in and made themselves annoying
while the moderator was afk. I wrote modbot because certain annoying
individuals have started making Bitmines their "eliteness" proving ground,
grabbing modship when the last bitminer signs off and so on.
The way Zuul works is fairly simple. Anyone with a
modbot password sends it a message of the form: /m Zuul [password] [command]
Zuul checks the name of the user against the password,
and then ''types'' the given command, eg: /m Zuul mylamepassword /topic THERE IS NO MOD
Zuul also announces to the group who has asked it to
perform a command and what that command was, eg: <Zuul> {ttk} /topic THERE IS NO MOD
This was done to avoid abuse; not everyone in bitmines
is as mature as I'd like, and last time I tried setting up a modbot there
was some trouble.
There are also some special commands which Zuul
knows how to perform. They may be used by anyone with a modbot
password. They take the place of the [command] part of the message
sent to Zuul.
add [user] [pass] Add a new user with the given password.
change [user] [pass] Changes the user's password.
quit Cause Zuul to exit.
save Obsolete; causes Zuul to save its user list
to disk. Currently Zuul always does this
whenever a new user is added.
reload Cause Zuul to reload its user list from disk.
Zuul does a few other things. It logs everything
that happens in Bitmines (as well as some debugging information) and adds
timestamps periodically. It also keys on a few public messages and
says funny things. Finally, ''/m Zuul help'' will point you to this
web page. I may add more stuff to Zuul later as I have time and
inclination.