Hey g00r00,

Apparently you can netmail 'ping' to an address on a network and if it's a synchronet board it'll send some sort of response. Seems like a pretty neat idea for Mystic to help with troubleshooting hub issues, no?

Also curious if you want to chat about the weird qwk mail display issue :)

Safe travels man. Good luck over there.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A45 2020/02/18 (Linux/64)
* Origin: monterey bbs (21:1/168)

Apparently you can netmail 'ping' to an address on a network and if it's
a synchronet board it'll send some sort of response. Seems like a pretty neat idea for Mystic to help with troubleshooting hub issues, no?

I've had a couple of people ask me about this before. I don't mind putting something into Mystic for it, I suppose. Do you have a link for the details
on how to support it?

Also curious if you want to chat about the weird qwk mail display issue
:)

Sure, chat away. I was just guessing that they use the 80 column and Mystic's reader (by default) cuts off at 79 I think because terminals auto wrap at 80. So when people create templates that use the bottom line it scrolls all over and they think Mystic is broken.

But that might not be the case at all, so yeah lets figure out a way for you
to show me/me to reproduce whatever the issue is!

QWKPOLL is circling pretty close to the MIS event horizon and it might get sucked in soon, so now is a good time to review things!

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/03/09 (Windows/64)
* Origin: Sector 7 (21:1/108)

I've had a couple of people ask me about this before. I don't mind putting something into Mystic for it, I suppose. Do you have a link for the details on how to support it?

No, but I can probably just find a synchronet board on fsxNet and send them a ping :) I can ask digital man on DOVEnet if you think that's helpful.

Sure, chat away. I was just guessing that they use the 80 column and Mystic's reader (by default) cuts off at 79 I think because terminals
auto wrap at 80. So when people create templates that use the bottom
line it scrolls all over and they think Mystic is broken.

Yeah, I'm not really sure what the deal is. I know synchronet and mystic
handle line wrapping of messages differently in FTN, but the weird thing is
how a message that originates from a qwk network in mystic displays
differently than FTN. I suppose this is another thing I can hit up digital
man about.

Thanks!

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A45 2020/02/18 (Linux/64)
* Origin: monterey bbs (21:1/168)

No, but I can probably just find a synchronet board on fsxNet and send them a ping :) I can ask digital man on DOVEnet if you think that's helpful.

If its not a FidoNet standard I can Google around and see what I can find. I can also search Synchronet's Wiki maybe there is something there.

I think my FidoNet uplink uses SBBSECHO so I could just ping his system too like you mentioned.

Yeah, I'm not really sure what the deal is. I know synchronet and mystic handle line wrapping of messages differently in FTN, but the weird thing is how a message that originates from a qwk network in mystic displays differently than FTN. I suppose this is another thing I can hit up
digital man about.

I haven't looked at it but it could even be that Mystic's QWK system has a hard 79 character limitation (but I don't think so). That QWK code is from the mid 90s and has been basically untouched so I can't remember much. Just show me an example of what you mean or give me QWK packet to illustrate it if you can and I can go from there.

Mystic has always wrapped a little bit differently because of loss of content with some systems that couldn't handle longer lines and its WYSIWYG/art focus. The same holds true quote data where other systems may truncate them or wrap them stupidly, Mystic will also rewrap the quote data and reformat it with proper initials so there is no loss of content. (You can see that in my quotes in this message for example).

These things and Mystics WYSIWYG editor are/were some of its killer features and where highly requested, but obviously it doesn't hold up as well now that there is good reason to go past the 80th column.

The good news is Mystic's WYSIWYG can also operate in a mode that sends out unformatted/unwrapped text by tracking if art was drawn and when the user pressed enter or navigated to different lines. So it can do both and if (for example) someone is typing on a 40 column display it won't send their message out wrapped at the 39th column, it'll send it out as entered with hard CRs.

I do have in my somewhat near future goals to start pushing for a different resolution (I have it written down I can't remember what it is). But its designed to offer a bit more space but still not cause too much eye strain, and its designed for wide screen displays too. I plan to have Mystic's default theme support this size and the 80 column...

People have asked me to bring back the 40 column display support too which used to be a thing, so I plan to enable all of that stuff in the future. When I
do that it would naturally address any complains some (well, one person ever really) has had about the smart formatting features.

Man sorry about that I really rambled on in this response haha

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/03/09 (Windows/64)
* Origin: Sector 7 (21:1/108)

Man sorry about that I really rambled on in this response haha

Haha nah very informative, thanks :)

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A45 2020/02/18 (Linux/64)
* Origin: monterey bbs (21:1/168)

Apparently you can netmail 'ping' to an address on a network and if it's
a synchronet board it'll send some sort of response. Seems like a pretty neat idea for Mystic to help with troubleshooting hub issues, no?

There are plenty of FTN nodes out there that do this. I do it here but not through Mystic.

Any node in an FTN network that flies the "PING" flag is capable of this.

|15frank |08// |15netsurge
|07disksh0p|08!|07bbs |08% |07bbs.diskshop.ca |08% |07mystic goodness |11SciNet |03ftn hq |08% |07https://scinet-ftn.org

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A45 2020/02/18 (Linux/64)
* Origin: % disksh0p!bbs % bbs.diskshop.ca % SciNet ftn hq % (21:4/154)

If its not a FidoNet standard I can Google around and see what I can
find. I can also search Synchronet's Wiki maybe there is something
there.

It's not a standard per say, but it is described in FTS-5001:

5.10. Robot flags
-----------------

PING
----

Specified as exactly "PING" with no arguments. Nodes flying this
flag will adhere to the following functionality:

1) PING-function:

If a message destined to "PING" arrives at its final destination
and this final destination flies the "PING"-flag, then the
receiving node will bounce the message back to the original sender
clearly quoting all the original via-lines.

If a message destined to "PING" arrives at its final destination
but this final destination does _not_ fly the "PING"-flag then the
message may be deleted from the inbound-queue without further
follow-up.

2) TRACE-function:

If a message destined to "PING" arrives at a node which flies the
PING-flag but is merely passing-through to another destination
then the in-transit node will notify the sender of this occurrence
and will forward the original mail unaltered towards its final
destination.

WARNING: the sender's name (in either direction) must *NEVER* be
"PING".

To boil it down, if your get a netmail addressed to PING, send a copy of it back with all the headers and vias.

BTW, have you gotten any of my netmails or emails?

|15frank |08// |15netsurge
|07disksh0p|08!|07bbs |08% |07bbs.diskshop.ca |08% |07mystic goodness |11SciNet |03ftn hq |08% |07https://scinet-ftn.org

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A45 2020/02/18 (Linux/64)
* Origin: % disksh0p!bbs % bbs.diskshop.ca % SciNet ftn hq % (21:4/154)

To boil it down, if your get a netmail addressed to PING, send a copy of it back with all the headers and vias.

BTW, have you gotten any of my netmails or emails?

I knew someone with a nickname of PING once, so I guess anyone with that name could literally not exist within the Netmail system. They should have used a little more than just the name (maybe a specific subject too) to avoid this issue.

I haven't checked e-mail in days I did get Netmail regarding network setup I just haven't got to it yet
.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/03/09 (Windows/64)
* Origin: Sector 7 (21:1/108)

I knew someone with a nickname of PING once, so I guess anyone with that name could literally not exist within the Netmail system. They should have used a little more than just the name (maybe a specific subject
too) to avoid this issue.

Yeah, better yet, like 5001 says, don't name the return message as coming
from PING. It could cause the 1000 year netmail loop.

|15frank |08// |15netsurge
|07disksh0p|08!|07bbs |08% |07bbs.diskshop.ca |08% |07mystic goodness |11SciNet |03ftn hq |08% |07https://scinet-ftn.org

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A45 2020/02/18 (Linux/64)
* Origin: % disksh0p!bbs % bbs.diskshop.ca % SciNet ftn hq % (21:4/154)

I knew someone with a nickname of PING once, so I guess anyone with t name could literally not exist within the Netmail system. They shoul have used a little more than just the name (maybe a specific subject too) to avoid this issue.

Yeah, better yet, like 5001 says, don't name the return message as coming from PING. It could cause the 1000 year netmail loop.

Right, that would be hilarious to see all of those ping replies going everywhere. But poor Ping the user can never read Netmail!

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A46 2020/03/10 (Windows/64)
* Origin: Sector 7 (21:1/108)

Right, that would be hilarious to see all of those ping replies going everywhere. But poor Ping the user can never read Netmail!

'Ping' always gets the short end of the stick.

|15frank |08// |15netsurge
|07disksh0p|08!|07bbs |08% |07bbs.diskshop.ca |08% |07mystic goodness |11SciNet |03ftn hq |08% |07https://scinet-ftn.org

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A45 2020/02/18 (Linux/64)
* Origin: % disksh0p!bbs % bbs.diskshop.ca % SciNet ftn hq % (21:4/154)