#Ukadoc

[ukagakadreamteam]

Ukadoc has been translated into English!

Ukadoc, the official documentation for SSP, has an English translation now!

For those that don't know, Ukadoc not only includes information about all the various SHIORI Events and SakuraScript tags you can use in ghosts, but also information on how to set up files like install.txt and descript.txt, information on how the overall file structure of ghosts/balloons/ etc. should be set up, guides to setting up shells, nar files, network updates, and more! There is a ton of information contained in this document, and it is an invaluable resource for developers.

And as of this month, it's available in English! No more fussing with machine translation and struggling to parse the multitude of run-on sentences and mangled terms. Our translation is readable without the extra steps, and you can view it here.

The translation isn't perfect, about half of it was done with machine translation and a lot of tenacity. If you find a wrong translation or something confusing, please report it or submit a fix on the project's repository.

A ton of work went into this project. If you'd like to learn more about the project and how it came together, there is an article here with information! Please check it out!

[zichqec]

SSP Angel v1.1.0

It's SSP Angel's release anniversary! 🥳 🎉

To celebrate, we've brought you an update with corrections to various information, additional glossary terms, a ton of new content, an optional floating animation for Angel, and more!

Some highlights from the changelog:

Added ~100 new non-tip dialogues, bringing the total to 200.

Updated some incorrect information and wording, in the tip dialogues and in the menus.

Corrected/updated glossary definitions: AYA, Dressup, Freeshell, Ghost/Ukagaka/Nanika, Interval, Kawari, MAKOTO, SHIORI, Sakura Script, Satori, Surface, Ukadoc.

New glossary definitions: Animation, Element, Middleware, Owner draw menu, and Supplement.

Added new questions to the "How do I" menu: Fast forwarding through text, Using the ghost explorer.

Added the ability to ask who they are in the question menu, to have them reintroduce themselves.

Added a new troubleshooting option related to installation trouble. This information was originally in the "How do I" menu and has been moved.

Added a dressup to Angel that allows her to float up and down.

Added a response for switching to the PH Gijinka shell, and responses to that shell's hat dressup.

See the full changelog on my website. Get the update via network update, or download them from the link above if you don't have them yet!

[ukgk]

✧LINKS✧ [under construction]

get started by downloading the baseware (SSP)⤴

▰directory▰

glossary (Ukagaka terminology and jargon, planning to add general freeware and A.I. terms that were commonly used in Japanese web 1.0 spaces as well)

Personaware VS nise-Haruna (a retelling of the beginning of the plagiarism allegations that brought a lot of attention to Ukagaka in 2000-2001 from a fan's point of view)

historical timeline

tags

ghost list

CD & floppy-disk data

scans

(↑personal research projects & translations done by myself, with the assistance of The Internet Archive)

▰guides▰

How to use a GHOST (🇬🇧)

Zarla’s ghost template & creation walk-through (🇬🇧) (Zarla has released newer templates which are even easier to use, but it's still quite a useful beginner friendly guide for how to get started on making your own ghost)

beginner guide

First guide (🇯🇵)

▰Developer Resources▰

Ukagaka Dream Team Wiki (🇬🇧)

UKADOC (🇬🇧/sadly machine translated)

UKADOC wiki

SATORI wiki

YAYA Information Wiki

Disc-2

Ukagaka Elementary

▰Windows baseware▰

SSP [available languages: 🇬🇧 ,🇩🇪, 🇨🇳, 🇷🇺, 🇰🇷 ] (recommended/most up to date/supported Ukagaka baseware for Windows)

C.R.O.W

Materia

▰non-Windows baseware & tools▰

Mac (The macOS version is barely supported, currently there isn't many active macOS developers/contributors.)

pseudoapple/NiseRingo

【Big sur,Catalina対応】MacでWineを使って伺かを動かす。

PlayOnMac+SSP (Mac OS)

Nanika on "Ringo" (Mac OS)

Nanika on Ayase for Mac (for OS X 9)

Linux

Ninix-aya for GNU/Linux

Narue no Nanika (for Linux/Wine and Windows)

how to run (first)Sakura with Ubuntu+WIne

Web + JAVA based ports

Areka? (web Sakura)

Web application (web, coming soon)

Ikagaka (web/javascript)

Nanika Manager for Ikagaka (web)

void-tan (provisional) (Java + multi-platform)

Portable/mobile (+retro systems, handhelds, PDAs, game consoles)

Ukagaka for Android

Mamefrasco (iOS, very barebones)

Pocket Ghost (Windows Mobile, Pocket PCs)

how to run Ninix on Linux Zaurus (for Pocket PCs)

Ukagaka-poi Nanika on PSP (Playstation Portable) (rough TL: Ukagaka-ish something on PSP)

Nise-Haruna for WonderSwan

Are Igai no Nanika with "Nini" for RZ-J90(Leje)&DL-M10 (old Japanese flipphones)

▰other▰

how to install a Language Pack (Windows) (the Japanese Language Pack might be necessary for correctly displaying certain fonts and text for some Japanese ghosts in SSP) (+ Win XP guide )

RAY-KUDRYAVKA (🇯🇵) (an indie game by Ukagaka developers and artists)

shimeji (a desktop mascot software similar to Ukagaka from 2009)

✧music player add-ons✧

FLUX

Sound Player Ghost "FLELE"

Nanika Song Player ♪

YunaSoft SexyFont Plug-in 2000 Version 7.9b21 ♪ (for WinAmp)

✧Ghost portals✧

⚠️※some external links may include links to sites and ghosts containing R-18 or explicit imagery, please proceed with caution.

Ukagaka Custom Search Engine

GHOST TOWN

GHOST TOWN (old version)

Niji

Ghostcaptor Sakura

weekly-ukagaka

sakuranavi

nkukagaka (defunct)

Nanika Ghost Center

ukagaka weebly (🇨🇳 ghosts)

ukagakadreamteam (🇬🇧 ghosts)

ghost-log

☆★dev tools☆★

Vector (🇯🇵freeware+shareware catalog containing ghosts as well)

Sakura editor (text editor)

Notepad++ (text editor)

github

tama (debugger tool for AYA)

SSTP send module for VisualBasic6

Satolist (Satori ghost editor)

☆★creating your own ghost & translating☆★

Ukadoc

GhostHowTo

Disc2

AYAYA wiki

making an animated ghost (SERIKO/MAYUNA)

SAKURA script@wiki

MAKOTO plug-in

HISTORY (under construction)

Nise-Haruna VS Personaware

Mayura

ASCII art

Nini Radio

flash animations

THE TOXIC WALTZ/Busuko profile translation

community

Ukagaka Dream Team discord

Ukadon (Mastodon instance for Ukagaka developers)

Oekaki

[ukagakadreamteam]

For the icons, when making the ukagaka, do we need to put it anywhere specific or is it alright place willy-nilly?

Assuming that you're referring to the .ico file used to create the ghost's tray icon, it should be placed in the ghost/master/ folder! You can see this on Ukadoc's description of how a ghost's file structure should be set up, specifically this section:

(Several of the files shown here are optional. There are more details about them on this page.)

If it helps, you can think about it like this. The ghost's descript.txt is where you will specify the filename of your icon file. So, you want the icon to be in the same folder as the ghost's descript.txt.

Note that you can also omit the icon if you don't want one! SSP will use a default bow & bell icon if none is specified.

[ukagakadreamteam]

Hello UDT, I have been interested in Ukagaka for a while now and I’m sure you’ve had a fair share of complete newbies asking where to start and how to start. I am aware of Zarla’s walkthrough and intro, and wiki stuff. I got only so far reading through Zarla’s walkthrough (without actual commitment just yet) and I get stuck because something isn’t clear enough or I don’t understand the tasks anymore. I have brain damage, I need a direct video walkthrough or someone to intensely coach me, and as much as I feel bad asking the UDT, I really couldn’t find any other resources because of how niche Ukagaka is! Thing is, if I don’t understand what step eight means after going so far, my knowledge of what I’m doing utterly collapses and I don’t know what’s going on! 😭

To be more clear: are there any intense walkthrough resources or updated videos?

I hope this isn’t too much trouble, and I’m sorry if you can’t help or you can’t understand me. Please say all information that you think would be helpful, no matter how useless it might be. I will need it. Thank you in advance, I never try easy new things. 🙏

Hello! No worries at all.

There are not currently any video walkthroughs that we're aware of, unfortunately. However, there are folks working on new resources and guides! I can't guarantee what will come out or give any kind of time estimate, but it's definitely worth keeping an eye out for new resources that may pop up over time.

If the walkthrough you're looking at isn't working for you, you might consider Kawari no Kawari, which is another ukagaka walkthrough and was written more recently. It's also written in a different programming language though, so some portions of it will likely be unfamiliar. But, perhaps it will gel with you better!

You can also find various guides for different aspects of ukagaka on Ukadoc, such as this guide for creating shells. Ukadoc in general is one of the best resources you can use, since it is the official documentation.

Something else you might consider is breaking things down into smaller tasks. Ukagaka is very modular: shells exist independently of ghosts, and so do balloons. And the "ghost" portion (the code and writing) can be written in a variety of programming languages (called "SHIORI"). So, you might start with creating just a balloon, and get a feel for that. Then try something a bit bigger, like creating just a shell. If you create a shell for a ghost like Hydrate, this can be a super tiny project, but you can also build up and use it to experiment with more complex things like dressups and animations. You can also create shells for more involved ghosts, like FLELE or SSP Angel, for example.

Once you know how to create a shell (and, optionally, a balloon), then that's already half of the mechanics of ghost-making that you know how to do, and can do independently from the writing and coding portion. From there, you might experiment with different SHIORI to see what works better for you. If you're just experimenting and don't want to commit to a SHIORI until you're feeling comfortable, you could grab a freeshell to work with and try out writing dialogue. That way it's much quicker to try out the different options, and you don't have to sink time into the shell portion at all until you've figured out how you're going to write the thing. (Or you can always skip the drawing part entirely by using a freeshell! Creating ghosts with freeshells can be very fun.)

Ukagaka can really be broken down and attacked a bite at a time, and hopefully with each bite you're learning something fun that you can make use of later. A lot of folks take on a whole ghost as their first project, but you can absolutely take time to build up to it if that will help you!

I think it's also worth bearing in mind that ukagaka do not need to be complex to be fun and wonderful. Some of my personal favorite ghosts are ones that don't have any fancy mechanics, they just sit there and talk at me, and have interesting stuff to say that keeps me entertained for hours. So don't feel like you need to make something super complicated for it to be worthwhile, it can be just a simple shell and a pool of dialogue, and be great. Everything else is completely optional and can be skipped. I really mean that, I'll happily go into detail about how much can be omitted from ghosts if anyone is curious about it.

If you're comfortable with it, you might try joining our Discord server. I recommend it in this case because some folks there volunteer as mentors, and you might find it useful to be able to ask for help from experienced devs! Even if you mute most of the rest of the server, you might be able to find some help asking for mentorship and bringing up any specific questions you have, especially if there are points in the walkthroughs that are unclear to you. It's all on a volunteer basis, so we can't make guarantees that anyone will be able and willing to help, but it's the best place you can ask at the moment.

And of course, you're more than welcome to send more asks here. It will be a slower response time, but we're always happy to help if we're able! Especially if there's anything in this response that you need clarification on. Just let us know!

[ukagakadreamteam]

Check out these new resources for Ghost Jam!

Ghost Jam time is getting closer! If you're considering joining us for the event, don't delay!

Did you know that there have been big advancements in the resources available to the English community since last year? There's been a lot going on!

Ukadoc, the documentation for Ukagaka, is now partially in English! The SakuraScript and SHIORI events pages, two of the ones that you'll use the most often, have been translated entirely to English thanks to volunteers in our Discord server! This is great news for all English devs, since now it is easier than ever to understand how each event and tag works! (Psst, if you'd like to help with the translation effort for the rest of the pages, you're welcome to contribute! Join us on Discord or check out our repository on GitHub to learn more.)

There are multiple new templates you can use! Different templates may have different features, catering to different needs! Check out our list of approved templates for the jam, and see which one suits your ghost idea the best! It's highly recommended to download any of them that seem interesting to you, and take a peek inside of their files so you can see what you'll be dealing with on the inside. You can also check out pages for some of them on our wiki, to learn a little more about them!

There's a new guide to the YAYA ghost coding language! If you've struggled with YAYA before, or if you're an experienced dev that had trouble making sense of YAYA, or if you want to just quickly skim to learn some of the syntax, this guide might be for you! It's very long, and covers just about every facet of the language, though you don't have to read it all. If you want to give it a go, now is the best time to start learning, before jam is upon us!

Ghost dev is becoming more and more accessible, so if it's seemed intimidating to you in the past, there's never been a better time to jump in and try it!

[ukagakadreamteam]

hi! i've downloaded quite a few ukagaka's before but i really want to try making one myself. i was just wondering if you had any good resources to help?

We have many resources to help! Your best resource will always be Ukadoc, since it is the official documentation. (Albeit, this is a translated version, so do mind that there might be translation errors!) You can find documentation of all the things handled by SSP there, as well as guides for various things such as creating shells and setting up network updates. It covers every aspect of ghost making except the parts handled by the SHIORI.

When it comes to picking a SHIORI (the programming language your ghost will use), we have a little guide here on our wiki that you can use to see which ones we've explored so far, and resources for them (official documentation, walkthroughs), as well as English ghosts you can use as reference, etc. Most English ghosts are currently written in YAYA, but we're starting to explore other options, and they're definitely worth having a look at to see what gels with you!

Speaking of our wiki, this is the best place to find the accumulated knowledge of the English ukagaka dev community! There's a page linking to various other resources you might want to explore, a glossary of terms, templates, guides, freeshells, and also a link to our Discord server where you can chat with other devs to get direct help, join in events, and more.

If there's something in particular you're looking for and you're not sure where to find it, feel free to send us another ask and we'll point you in the right direction! There are so many resources and tools available now, and I'm certain there are more on the horizon.

[ukagakadreamteam]

For the ukagaka surfaces, are we only limited to the 25 available, or is there some sort of way to make more surfaces?

The only limit to how many surfaces you can make in SSP is the 32-bit integer limit! That means you can make surfaces from 0 to 2147483647. Quite a few more than 25!

All you need to do is write a new surface definition in surfaces.txt with the number you desire, like so:

surface1000 { //Surface code here }

That's all there is to it!

There is a list of recommended surfaces on Ukadoc, which is helpful both to give you a starting point, and because having a standard set of expressions means that external programs can attempt to call specific expressions that suit what they're doing. But this is only a rough outline, and you are not constrained to these expressions nor this number of surfaces.

[ukagakadreamteam]

i wanna write some if-statements based on weather, what would the function for that be? or is there a plugin for checking weather? i’ve googled a bit but haven’t been able to find anything, thanks in advance! ^__^

SSP itself does not have weather events implemented by default, but there is a new plugin you can use to get weather info right here! Install this plugin to SSP, and your ghost will be able to recieve weather-related events. You'll also need your users to install the plugin as well for them to have access to the weather events.

You can find information about the events included with it on the external SHIORI events page of Ukadoc. And if you have any questions, we would be glad to help you out in our Discord server!

[ukagakadreamteam]

Hello! I just found out about ghosts a few days ago and I'm interested in making one! However I'm not great at code... Any chances there are tutorials for coding the ghosts? One that can, hopefully, give a full rundown of what the codes mean and such?

Your best bet would be Zarla's Ukagaka Walkthrough! It has everything you need to know to create a basic ghost, including a template that you can fill in.

If you want to learn more about ghost coding, the best resources are available are Ukadoc, which covers everything that SSP affects (like SHIORI events and SakuraScript), and you can find here:

Original Japanese page Same page but through google translate

And the AYAYA wiki, which covers everything about YAYA, the coding language the english community generally uses:

Original Japanese page Same page but through google translate

If these pages look intimidating to you, you're more than welcome to join us on our Discord server, and we'll do our best to help you understand them and answer any questions you may have!

[zichqec]

This has been a long time coming. It used to be something we dreamed about, but now it's reality and I'm so glad.

Please please check this out, and read my article about it as well. I contributed to this and put so much work into it.

I think this will do a lot to make English ghost development easier!

Ukadoc has been translated into English!

Ukadoc, the official documentation for SSP, has an English translation now!

For those that don't know, Ukadoc not only includes information about all the various SHIORI Events and SakuraScript tags you can use in ghosts, but also information on how to set up files like install.txt and descript.txt, information on how the overall file structure of ghosts/balloons/ etc. should be set up, guides to setting up shells, nar files, network updates, and more! There is a ton of information contained in this document, and it is an invaluable resource for developers.

And as of this month, it's available in English! No more fussing with machine translation and struggling to parse the multitude of run-on sentences and mangled terms. Our translation is readable without the extra steps, and you can view it here.

The translation isn't perfect, about half of it was done with machine translation and a lot of tenacity. If you find a wrong translation or something confusing, please report it or submit a fix on the project's repository.

A ton of work went into this project. If you'd like to learn more about the project and how it came together, there is an article here with information! Please check it out!