Hi,

I'm here for few years already as BBS consumer. I recognize various BBS server software used by you SYSOPS in the context of different User Experience and general Look and Feel, including your own unique customizations, if there are any.

I also checked some deep dive experience how it could be to manage Mystic, Enigma, Synchronet boards by trying to install one myself in a non-production environment, if I can say so.

This is still pre-packaged and mostly focused on content management, user management and rights management perspective.

Now I'm becoming curious about more lower level understanding of underlying tech stack that BBS world represents.


First pick is ECHO and mail/message sharing system present here.

I understand that there are some protocols and links between instances or servers that can communicate to share messages between boards, approve some changes (like I experienced on 20-4-BEERS that I can edit my message already posted to a local board or FTN).. There seem to be a lot of tech contracts defined by standards that are not easy to find as this is legacy tech...

Can somebody point me to starters if I wanted to understand low-level specs related to message transfering/sharing protocols used by BBSes, in more a guided tutorial way?

-h1

... Xerox Alto was the thing. Anything after we use is just a mere copy.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64)
* Origin: 2o fOr beeRS bbs>>>20ForBeers.com:1337 (21:2/150)

Re: Low level BBS tech
By: hollowone to All on Sat Dec 02 2023 02:18 pm

Now I'm becoming curious about more lower level understanding of underlying tech stack that BBS world represents.

First pick is ECHO and mail/message sharing system present here.

The term "echo" here is likely in reference to the conferences/forms of FidoNet technology networks. If you mean some other "echo", please clarify.

I understand that there are some protocols and links between instances or servers that can communicate to share messages between boards, approve some changes (like I experienced on 20-4-BEERS that I can edit my message already posted to a local board or FTN).. There seem to be a lot of tech contracts defined by standards that are not easy to find as this is legacy tech...

Can somebody point me to starters if I wanted to understand low-level specs related to message transfering/sharing protocols used by BBSes, in more a guided tutorial way?

For FidoNet technology standards and other docs, see http://ftsc.org
--
digital man (rob)

This Is Spinal Tap quote #28:
We've got Armadillos in our trousers. It's really quite frightening.
Norco, CA WX: 57.1°F, 71.0% humidity, 0 mph E wind, 0.00 inches rain/24hrs
--- SBBSecho 3.20-Linux
* Origin: Vertrauen - [vert/cvs/bbs].synchro.net (21:1/183)

Hello hollowone!

02 Dec 23 14:18, you wrote to all:

Hi,

I'm here for few years already as BBS consumer. I recognize various
BBS server software used by you SYSOPS in the context of different
User Experience and general Look and Feel, including your own unique customizations, if there are any.

Each BBS had its own configurations, but all send messages and connected using Fidonet Standards.
You can find information in the "Unofficial Fidonet Repository" on Github: https://github.com/zoomosis/ftsc

Now I'm becoming curious about more lower level understanding of underlying tech stack that BBS world represents.

You can find most of the standards that were used from early FidoNet to nowadays in the above link.
Now what changed most is that instead of using dialup we use internet. But the protocols (mostly) remain the same.

First pick is ECHO and mail/message sharing system present here.

I understand that there are some protocols and links between instances
or servers that can communicate to share messages between boards,
approve some changes (like I experienced on 20-4-BEERS that I can edit
my message already posted to a local board or FTN).. There seem to be
a lot of tech contracts defined by standards that are not easy to find
as this is legacy tech...

Messages are in the local BBS you used, then packed and sent to a "hub" which distributes them, mostly using the same fidonet standard.

Can somebody point me to starters if I wanted to understand low-level specs related to message transfering/sharing protocols used by BBSes,
in more a guided tutorial way?

I hope I had :)

Regards,
Orphan


--- GoldED+/W64-MSVC 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: Digital Asylum BBS - bbs.digitalasylum.com.ar:2323 (21:2/119)

Can somebody point me to starters if I wanted to understand low-level specs related to message transfering/sharing protocols used by BBSes, in more a guided tutorial way?

I hope I had :)

Perfect, you both (incl. Digital Man) did. Now I have a lot to read and study :)

thank you.

-h1

... Xerox Alto was the thing. Anything after we use is just a mere copy.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64)
* Origin: 2o fOr beeRS bbs>>>20ForBeers.com:1337 (21:2/150)

Re: Re: Low level BBS tech
By: hollowone to Orphan on Sun Dec 03 2023 02:34 pm

Can somebody point me to starters if I wanted to understand low-level specs related to message transfering/sharing protocols used by BBSes, in more a guided tutorial way?

I hope I had :)

Perfect, you both (incl. Digital Man) did. Now I have a lot to read and study :)

thank you.

You're welcome. I also curate a collection of BBS-related technical references here: https://wiki.synchro.net/ref:index
--
digital man (rob)

Steven Wright quote #34:
If at first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you.
Norco, CA WX: 67.0°F, 47.0% humidity, 1 mph E wind, 0.00 inches rain/24hrs
--- SBBSecho 3.20-Linux
* Origin: Vertrauen - [vert/cvs/bbs].synchro.net (21:1/183)

Hello hollowone!

03 Dec 23 14:34, you wrote to me:

Can somebody point me to starters if I wanted to understand

low-level

specs related to message transfering/sharing protocols used

by BBSes,

in more a guided tutorial way?

I hope I had :)

Perfect, you both (incl. Digital Man) did. Now I have a lot to read
and study :)

Cool if you need anything else just ask.

thank you.

you're welcome!

-h1

... Xerox Alto was the thing. Anything after we use is just a mere
copy.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64)
* Origin: 2o fOr beeRS bbs>>>20ForBeers.com:1337 (21:2/150)

Regards
Orphan


--- GoldED+/W64-MSVC 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: Digital Asylum BBS - bbs.digitalasylum.com.ar:2323 (21:2/119)

You're welcome. I also curate a collection of BBS-related technical references here: https://wiki.synchro.net/ref:index

Bookmarked! Thank you!

-h1

... Xerox Alto was the thing. Anything after we use is just a mere copy.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64)
* Origin: 2o fOr beeRS bbs>>>20ForBeers.com:1337 (21:2/150)

Cool if you need anything else just ask.

Sure. What I have done ATM is a small telnet server that helps me test various basic communication between itself and the BBS orientated client (testing mostly on SyncTerm 1.1 for Mac and IcyTerm 0.6.8).

I know how to draw ansi, clear screen, set position, set colors (16c, 24bit)
I loaded ansi file propely to show on the screen (IcyDraw comes with a lot of garbage, so I needed to turn back to Moebius to receive reasonable and predictable rendering results).

I need to assume terminal size as I found no way I could read terminal's row/col sizing properly. I have some clues how to maybe obtain this information as a part of telnet's DO command during initial negotiation. I found that SyncTerm sends this information through the command in its source code.. but this is still not addressed by me very well, yet.

Is there any standard way how server may optain information about telnet client's current size and resize window events?

Ansi POS is also not working as expected. regardless if I turn cursor onto 0,0 or 1,1 it is still in the second row from the top.

Also when I keep posting lines client terminal keeps scrolling to leave last line empty. Effectively instead of 25 rows, I have 23 at my disposal with ANSI POS escape code commands.

I lost the ability to render header and footer properly and I see various BBS server software achieves that correctly. Is there some trick that can help me have character cell positioning control for whole 80x25 space without risking that the terminal will scroll down?

My ansi_pos function looks like this:

puts "\e[#{row};#{col}H"

-h1

... Xerox Alto was the thing. Anything after we use is just a mere copy.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64)
* Origin: 2o fOr beeRS bbs>>>20ForBeers.com:1337 (21:2/150)

Ansi POS is also not working as expected. regardless if I turn cursor
onto 0,0 or 1,1 it is still in the second row from the top.
My ansi_pos function looks like this:
puts "\e[#{row};#{col}H"

I resolved the problem. This is me stupid who forgot that puts sends \r\n at the end, automatically.

Please disregards this issue. I keep learning myself :)

-h1

... Xerox Alto was the thing. Anything after we use is just a mere copy.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64)
* Origin: 2o fOr beeRS bbs>>>20ForBeers.com:1337 (21:2/150)