you can do a different take by making it into a socket script.I like that, and it doesn't require the necessity of txt to store the 8ball info, which frees up a little hard drive space.

you can do a different take by making it into a socket script. to use it you ask in the form of a question.

<~napa182> 8ball will i ever find my car keys?
<~Sick0> [The magic 8ball says:] Outlook good.

on $*:text:/^(8ball\s(.+)\?)$/S:#:{ 
  if (!%ball8flood) { 
    set -u3 %ball8flood $nick 
    if ($sock(8ball)) .sockclose 8ball 
    sockopen 8ball pages.cs.wisc.edu 80 
    sockmark 8ball # 14[04The magic 8ball says:14]
  }
}
on *:sockopen:8ball: {
  sockwrite -nt $sockname GET /~craft/8ball.cgi HTTP/1.1 
  sockwrite -nt $sockname Host: $+(pages.cs.wisc.edu,$str($crlf,2)) 
}
on *:sockread:8ball: {
  var %8ball | sockread %8ball
  if ($regex(%8ball,/<h4>(.+)<\/h4>/)) { msg $sock(8ball).mark $regml(1) | sockclose 8ball }
}

just a different take

didn't say you're wrong! I just said my opinion :)

briggy, this is the same philosophy of why we all look different in appearance. Oval, square and triangle faces; blond, brown, brunette and red hairs, as well as the eye and skin colors. As human beings, we all like things differently...and we can't make every one of us to fancy the same thing, can we?

why not use $read?

on :text:!8ball:#: { if ($2 == $null) msg $chan Specify a question!
else msg $chan $read 8ball.txt }

after that just put a file in your irc directory called 8ball.txt
every answer is separed by a new line.
Here some answers i got:
My answer is: cake.
rawr.
Yes.
No.
Maybe.
I think so.
Are you serious?
Are you kidding?
I thought that too.
Damn you're totally right!
Unfortunately, my answer is no.
Hell Yeah!
No way!
F U PAL

-hope that helped ;)

LOL

There you have it. gooshie's terse, valid point says it all.

Global variables require a harddrive write/read
local variables are held in ram. Also, by avoiding
set variables as much as possible you 'future proof'
your scripts come the day you wish to run it off a
solid state harddrive or flash memory device. I try
to only use a set global variable if I need to retain
the data across sessions and make it available to all
scripts and connections. Another nice thing about using
local variables is less likely to have variable name
collisions. They only work within that one alias, event,
or menu item. Makes it easy to use single letter variable
names.

ah okey Jethro_ thx alot man :) has been wondering over that a long time...

The thing is, if you set %an as a global variable, it'll be stored in your mirc variables at all times. With the local one, it's unset after the %an has been processed. Why add a space in your variables when you don't have to?

But does that metter Jethro_? Dont know what different it makes, does the script run faster or something? Im not complaining about your comment, I just want to know. :)

Ack, another 8-ball script with global variable, which isn't necessary, considering the fact that you can utilize the local one to achieve the same result:

var %an = $rand(1,8)