NAME

       xmahjongg - colorful solitaire Mah Jongg game

SYNOPSIS

       xmahjongg [--display display] [options]

DESCRIPTION

       Real  Mah  Jongg  is  a  social game that originated in China thousands of years ago. Four
       players, named after the four winds, take tiles from a wall in turn. The  best  tiles  are
       made  of  ivory  and  wood;  they  click pleasantly when you knock them together. Computer
       Solitaire Mah Jongg (xmahjongg being one of the sillier examples) is nothing like that but
       it's  fun,  or  it  must  be,  since  there  are like 300 shareware versions available for
       Windows.  This is for X11 and it's free.

HOW TO PLAY

       The object is to remove all Mah Jongg tiles from the playing field by taking one  matching
       pair  at  a time. Generally, two tiles match if they have identical pictures on top. There
       are some exceptions: any season tile (spring, summer, autumn, or winter) matches any other
       season,  and  any  flower  tile  (bamboo, orchid, plum, or chrysathemum) matches any other
       flower. There are 144 tiles in all -- one of each season and flower, and  four  copies  of
       each  of the following: 1 to 9 dots; 1 to 9 bamboo sticks; characters for 1 to 9; the four
       winds (north, south, east, and west); and three dragons (red, green, and white).

       Only free tiles can be removed. A tile is free if its entire top face is unobstructed  and
       either its left or its right edge is open. (When looking at the left and right edges, only
       tiles on the same level count.)

       The rules are simple, but winning, it turns out, can be pretty hard. It's easy to  make  a
       move  that  causes a stalemate thirty or more moves later.  What's worse, the --any-boards
       option lets xmahjongg create boards that cannot be solved at all!

CONTROLS AND APPEARANCE

       To select a free tile, simply click it with the left mouse button and it  will  light  up.
       Click  it  again to deselect it. If you try to select a non-free tile, xmahjongg will beep
       at you. To remove a matched pair, just select one of the pair and click on the other  one.
       The  number  in  the upper left corner tells you how many tiles you have left. This is all
       you really need to know to play the game.

       Xmahjongg comes with several features that may dismay purists,  but  make  the  game  more
       pleasant  to  play.  First  is  the match count, an array of small gold coins in the upper
       middle. Each coin represents one potential match on the board. (If three mutually matching
       tiles  are  free,  it  counts as three matches, and if four are free, that's six matches.)
       This will let you know when the game is over (no gold coins means no  matches  --  a  dead
       end) and when you're getting close.

       The five buttons along the top right have the following functions:

       New (keystroke: n)
            Start a new game.

       Quit (keystroke: q)
            Quit xmahjongg.

       Undo (keystroke: u)
            Undoes your last move. You can undo multiple moves by clicking multiple times. If you
            change your mind about undoing a move, hold down  Shift  while  you  click  the  Undo
            button (or press r) to redo it.

       Hint (keystroke: h)
            Gives  you a hint by flashing a set of free matching tiles. You can cycle through all
            existing matches by clicking multiple times. If you select  a  tile  and  then  click
            Hint,  xmahjongg  will  flash  any  free tiles that match that tile, or beep if there
            aren't any.

       Clean (keystroke: c)
            Cleans the board by automatically removing obvious matches. A match is obvious if  it
            involves  all the remaining tiles of a given type. (For example, if there are 2 green
            dragons left and they are both free, they form an obvious match; but if there  are  4
            left  and only 3 are free, they don't.) Cleaning the board is guaranteed not to cause
            a stalemate later.

       Solve (no button; keystroke: s)
            If you get stuck, press the s key. After the board is restored to its original state,
            xmahjongg  will show you one way to solve it by removing tiles two at a time. Press s
            again to speed up the solution, or press Esc to stop. This won't work if you gave the
            --any-boards option (see below).

       Additionally, the Escape key deselects any selected tile.

KEYBOARD TRAVERSAL

       You  can  use  the  arrow keys and the spacebar to play xmahjongg without using the mouse.
       These keys control the cursor, which is shown as a flashing tile. The arrow keys move  the
       cursor  around  on  the board in the obvious directions. The spacebar is like clicking the
       mouse button on the cursor tile: it either selects the tile or removes a matching pair.

       The hint key, `h', is also useful for playing without the mouse. Experiment with `h',  the
       spacebar, and the Return key to see how this works. When a hint is active, the spacebar is
       like clicking on one of the flashing hint tiles, while the Return key is like clicking  on
       two of them (so it removes the tiles in one stroke). This method gives the fastest playing
       speed.

OPTIONS

       If you get bored with xmahjongg's original layout and appearance,  never  fear:  it  comes
       with several tilesets (tile images) and layouts (tile arrangements). In addition to these,
       xmahjongg can read layout files from the original  xmahjongg,  KDE  Mahjongg,  and  Kyodai
       Mahjongg,  and  tilesets  in  KDE  Mahjongg,  Gnome  Mahjongg, and Kyodai Mahjongg format.
       (However, tilesets must be converted to GIF format before xmahjongg can  read  them.)  See
       the [-l] and [-t] options.

       Long option names can be abbreviated to their unique prefixes.

       --number N
       -n N Start with board number N.
       -l layout
       --layout layout
            Use  the  specified  game  layout.   xmahjongg comes with several layouts. The normal
            layout is called default; to see the other ones' names, run `xmahjongg --list'.   You
            can  also use an arbitrary layout by giving its filename.  Xmahjongg can read layouts
            in its own simple format, in KDE kmahjongg format,  or  in  Kyodai  Mahjongg  format.
            (Kyodai  Mahjongg  is one of the more popular Windows Mah Jongg solitaire games. It's
            got 3D tiles and all sorts of stuff. See http://www.kyodai.com for more  information.
            You  can  download  a zip archive with more than 100 different layouts, mostly usable
            with xmahjongg, from http://www.kyodai.com/.)

       --tileset tileset
            Use the specified tileset to draw the Mah Jongg tiles.  Xmahjongg comes with  several
            extra  tilesets,  particularly  small (perfect for smaller screens). There are others
            too; run `xmahjongg --list' for a complete listing.

       --background image
       --bg image
            The background image is set to image.  Run `xmahjongg --list' to see the  backgrounds
            that come with xmahjongg, or use an arbitrary GIF as a background image by giving its
            filename.

       [--list]
            Lists all the layouts, tilesets, and  backgrounds  that  came  with  xmahjongg,  then
            exits.

       --solvable-boards
            Always create solvable boards. This is the default.

       --any-boards
            Allow any legal board, some of which will be solvable and some of which won't.

       --display display
            Sets the X display to display.

       --name name
            Specifies  the  application  name  under  which  resources are found, rather than the
            default ``xmahjongg''. Since xmahjongg itself does not  use  the  resource  database,
            this is mostly useful for communication with your window manager.

       --geometry geometry
            This  standard  X  option specifies the preferred size and position for the xmahjongg
            window.

       [--help]
            Prints usage information and exits.

       [--version]
            Prints the version number and some quickie warranty information and exits.

BUGS

       Please email  suggestions,  additions,  patches  and  bugs  to  eddietwo@lcs.mit.edu.  The
       following features have not made it into 3.0 as of yet:

       * Tournament mode.

       * Board setup mode.

HISTORY

       xmahjongg  version  3  is  a  complete  rewrite  by Eddie Kohler <eddietwo@lcs.mit.edu> of
       xmahjongg versions 1 and 2 by Jeff S. Young <jsy@cray.com>.

       The  default   tileset   was   originally   created   in   color   by   Dorothy   Robinson
       <mokuren@teleport.com>  with  Mark  A.  Holm  <markh@aracnet.com>.  The publicly available
       version was in black-and-white. Holm copyrighted the tiles in 1988, giving  permission  to
       copy  and distribute for non-profit purposes. The significantly altered color version that
       comes with xmahjongg was created by Eddie Kohler in 1993. The `small' tileset was found at
       http://www.mahjongg.com/,  and  is  presumably  by  Berrie Bloem. The `gnome' and `gnome2'
       tilesets were created by Jonathan Buzzard and Max Watson. The  `dorothys'  and  `dorwhite'
       tilesets  were  made  by  Dorothy  Robinson <mokuren@teleport.com>. The `real' tileset was
       scanned by Mark Sanctuary <sanctuary@jps.net>.

       Many of the layouts are based on layouts designed for Kyodai Mahjongg, a fun  Windows  Mah
       Jongg  game.  In particular, `arena', `ceremonial', `deepwell', `farandole', and `theater'
       are by Naoki Haga, and `hourglass' and `papillon' are by Vincent Krebs. Kyodai  Mahjongg's
       Web homepage is http://www.kyodai.com/.

AUTHOR

       Eddie Kohler, eddietwo@lcs.mit.edu
       http://www.pdos.lcs.mit.edu/~eddietwo/

       http://www.lcdf.org/~eddietwo/xmahjongg/
       The xmahjongg home page.