[Freeciv] You don't need the metaserver to start the game.

[Nicolas Brunel <brunel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello Lee,

<<<to do the latter, you find yourself entering in
numerous amounts of details into the metaserver to get
the game running.>>>

   As Kmicic has said on freeciv@xxxxxxxxxxx, you don't need the
metaserver to start the game. The metaserver is only a tool when you want
to play with other players accross the net. When you want to play alone,
do these steps (1.8.0):

    1 - launch the client,
    2 - launch the server,
    3 - press the button connect in the connect window of the client,
    4 - optional : Do your settings in the server,
    5 - press 's' in the server.

For 1.7.2, launch the server (step 2) with the option --nometa.
The server won't report the game to the metaserver.

The trick here is that the default server is localhost.
Localhost is your computer. By default, you connect to your computer.
It's the expected behaviour when one wants to play alone.

The step four is optional as you can have your settings is a file.
This file will be loaded via the -r option of the server.

Here is my freeciv.preferences file:
<<<
set ysize 100
set gold 0
set huts 0
set techlevel 0
set researchspeed 30
set freecost 30 
set diplcost 30 
set conquercost 30 
set aifill 14
set scorelog 0 
set aqueductloss 50
set settlers 1
set landmass 33
set researchspeed 50
set xsize 150
set aifill 4
>>>

The step 2 becomes with 1.8.0

    - 2 - civserver -r ~/civsave/freeciv.preferences
                          
                   with 1.7.2
   
    - 2 - civserver --nometa -r ~/civsave/freeciv.preferences

I assume LOOPBACK is configured on your computer. LOOPBACK is 127.0.0.1.
It's a speudo adress which is used when you want to connect to your
computer. If you are forced to use the network, it means your LOOPBACK
isn't configured.

Best regards,