Fleshed out welcome page, added README.

[microbotany.git] / README

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+μBotany
+=======
+
+μBotany is an experiment to see what can be done in gemini without
+employing client-side TLS certificates. In place of these, we rely on
+an account identifier (a SHA-1 hash of the account name and some
+random salt) transmitted in the query portion of the URI to uniquely
+specify accounts.  Because this identifier is difficult to guess from
+the account name, and because the URI is transmitted to the server
+over TLS, I don't think this is a _terrible_ way of managing sessions.
+
+μBotany is inspired by (i.e. a flagrant ripoff of) Mozz's Astrobotany,
+which can be found at gemini://astrobotany.mozz.us/.  However, it's
+best thought of as a cut-down implementation of Jacob Funke's original
+Botany game, the source for which can be found at
+https://github.com/jifunks/botany.
+
+All of the plant descriptions and ascii art have been copied directly
+from the original, while the logic has been entirely reimagined and
+implemented as Chicken Scheme extension scripts to my RAGS gemini
+server.
+
+Installation
+------------
+
+To install and run μBotany you'll first need to be running the RAGS
+gemini server. (Source available at
+gopher://thelambdalab.xyz/1/scripts/browse-git%7Crags.git.)
+Then, simply move this directory to a directory named "microbotany" within the content
+root of your server.  You should then be able to create new gardens by
+visiting gemini://your.server/microbotany/.
+
+Licence
+-------
+
+μBotany is derived from Jacob Funke's Botany game, which he released
+under the ISC free software license.  Thus μBotany is also distributed
+under the same license, which can be found in the file named LICENSE.
+