SOM file

A SOM file is recognized by it's .som filename extension. It is the most iconic of files unique to Sword of Moonlight: King's Field Making Tool owing its initials to Sword of Moonlight itself.

History

SOM originated as a two line text file associated with a Sword of Moonlight project folder. The programs SOM_MAIN and SOM_RUN prompt the user to open the SOM file in order to work with a project. Beyond its obvious utility as a media file, since 2013 software that extends Sword of Moonlight had begun to prescribe additional meaning to the file's text, and a day may yet come when a Sword of Moonlight game can be rolled up into a single compressed SOM that could even become as ubiquitous as MP3s.

Anatomy

When a new Sword of Moonlight project is made by SOM_MAIN a SOM file is created inside the project folder. You can open this file up with any text editor. The first line of the newly created file will name the folder it was created in. The second line is a single 0:

King's Field
0

In 2013, as part of the SomEx project effort to extend Sword of Moonlight's tools to be able to work out of more than one data folder—not unlike the som_db game testing program—it was concluded that the SOM file should be able to define some environment variables for the project. The following variables were initially decided upon:

Environment Variable	Overview Main article: /list of environment variables
GAME	equivalent to the first line of the classical SOM file.
DISC	equivalent to the second line of the classical SOM file.
CD	changes directories in cases where the SOM file is located outside of its game's folder.
DATA	specifies multiple data folders. In addition to USER/data and CD/data.
DATASET	specifies a set of profiles (eg. PRF and PRT files) to be included by the project.
USER	overrides the computer files of CD. Games save their files to USER.
SCRIPT	specifies either a .mo Gettext file or a folder housing a lang and or font folder.
FONT	specifies a list of font files and or font folders.
INI	specifies a single in-game options INI configuration file.
TRIAL	specifies the name of a map file where a new game takes place. Ostensibly for testing purposes.
SETUP	selects from the player setup menu. Historically either 1 or 2 of SOM_SYS.
EX	specifies a list of SomEx INI extension configuration files.
ICON	specifies a game window and SOM computer icon.
TEXT	specifies a list of language/theme pack folders for use by the editing tools.
Environment Constant	these "variables" are mainly for substitution (care should be taken before overriding)
PLAYER	the player's save folder. For example, the Saved Games folder on Windows Vista.
TITLE	the title part of the file used to initiate the current game.
SOM	the full file system path to the SOM file.

Each variable is written on its own line, including an equal sign, and the text value to be assigned to the variable to the right of the equal sign. All written on a single line, not unlike an INI file:

TRIAL=00

As with an MS-DOS batch file, variables should be able to be substituted inside of other variables by surrounding them by percent signs:

DATA=%USERPROFILE%\data; %DATA%

However, this is where the similarity to MS-DOS batch files end.

Lines beginning with semicolons are ignored:

;This is a comment demonstrating comments

Subpages

• /list of environment variables