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#bbs

3 posts3 participants1 post today
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vga256

back in the early and mid-90s, getting on the net meant you were a university student, or had corporate access through a big company. getting online wasn't easy.

worse, even if you had a dialup number and login, there was no such thing as a tcp/ip stack built-in to Windows 3.1.

even if you *did* have a winsock stack, you'd still need a file downloading protocol, gopher client, world wide web client, ftp client, email client. just getting your machine off the ground was nearly impossible unless you could grab these from a local BBS

to make things simpler, universities began offering dial-up internet software packages to their students and staff.

in 1994, my mom was an undergrad student at the University of Alberta. our family had just bought an IBM PS/1 with a 2400 baud modem, and i was abusing the hell out of our single phone line at night visiting local BBSes.

she somehow found out that the university was selling internet dial-up software for $10 to students, and brought home the diskette pack with her. along with a USR Sportster 14.4k modem, she gave me the install diskettes as a valentine's day gift.

it had a slick setup program that enabled SLIP using Trumpet Winsock, and provided a local (free!) dial-up number for access.

after 25 years, i finally tracked down a few versions of those diskettes. i've imaged them and uploaded them all to IA.

the first version of the dial-up package in 1994 was called WinSLIP. it had no PPP support yet, but contained some really cool shareware internet utilities like HGopher and NCSA Mosaic. this would have been the earliest programs offered for Windows 3.1

WinSLIP/MSKermit 1994/95:
archive.org/details/ua_winslip

The second version of the software was renamed to NetSurf. It stripped out most of the obscure shareware sadly, and replaced them with Netscape 2 and Eudora Light. The new version of Trumpet Winsock offered PPP which was a huge improvement:

NetSurf 1996/97:
archive.org/details/ua_netsurf

Now well into the Windows 95 era, the 1997/98 software was shipped on a CD with a hilarious "multimedia" installer/help program designed in Macromedia Director:

NetSurf 1997/98:
archive.org/details/netsurf-97

I hope this brings back some memories for fellow U of A alumni :)

The university of alberta's Computing and Network Services department home page, showing their Internet Clients and Communication Software page. It advertises the NetSurf internet communications package being sold to students for $10 on floppy disk.
#softwarePreservation#webPreservation#win31
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vga256

just found a treasure trove of extremely obscure BBS history stashed away on IA

thank you hard-working book scanners for preserving this rarity.

if you're familiar with BBSing in the 90s, you'll remember just how fast the vast majority of boards disappeared in 1995. it went from multinode 24/7 bbses to disconnected phone numbers in just a few months

this book accounts for the very small number of BBSes that made the transition from telco-only to "telBBS" or telnettable/web-accessible boards

3/4 of the book is a carefully curated list of 500 boards with screenshots of their homepages and bbs login/title screens. most importantly, the URLs of these boards is preserved so we have a chance to look them up on WBM some day.

archive.org/details/internetbb

The front cover of the book Internet BBSs: A Guided Tour, by Richard Scott Mark.
A screenshot of two pages from the book. Each page shows a screenshot of a BBS's homepage, or its login screen with ANSI graphics. Four boards are shown: Anarchy-X, The Annex!, AOP BBS and AppleWize OnLine.
The rear cover of Internet BBSs: A Guided Tour by Richard Scott Mark. It reads: . so you use the Internet. You’ve surfed some Web sites and maybe sent e-mail. But, chances are, you’ve overlooked the rich and really personal dimension of the Internet represented by the explosive growth of Internet BBSs. That’s because up till now BBS publications were limited in scope to the old era of dial-up BBSs. Until recently the world of BBSs was geographically compartmentalized: in practical terms only the BBSs within a local telephone call were accessible. Now, the Internet has made all Internet BBSs accessible to anyone in the world. Internet BBSs: A Guided Tour provides in-depth coverage of this new world of true BBSs now available world-wide. It is a valuable resource for anyone currently using the Internet. Users of the major on-line service forums and chat groups should also read it to find out how they can access a much richer variety of BBSs at less cost.
#bbs#webHistory#smallweb
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Josh Renaud

In recent weeks I've been playing "DDST," a fun adventure game for Atari ST BBSes that I had never tried before.

I *love* that it lets you save basically whenever you want. Makes it possible to avoid losing progress while exploring dungeons crowded with monsters and traps.

My wife took a quick peek while I was in a dungeon and asked if it was a QR code. Nope ... just some VT52 text art!

#atari#atarist#bbs
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T.J. Hob

Today I finally got our private #Reticulum network going. 3 full-time hosted nodes (US, EU, home) cross-propagating, one #LoRA node that will hopefully become a solar powered repeater in the middle of the property, and some clients on various phones and computers.

In theory this means:
- #OffGrid communications and location sharing around the farm and surrounding areas
- Secure-enough messaging, maybe location sharing out in the wide world

Coming soon:
- Telemetry sensors for temperature, humidity, etc around the house and farm
- Home Assistant bridge for the above and for sending alerts back to the network
- #BBS, naturally

Coming maybe someday:
- Reticulum over #Veilid, if I can get enough traction on Veilid FFI in Python & once Veilid is a bit more stable
- Something something iOS?

It's been a fun project, much better suited to my use cases than #Meshtastic so far.

Public
OCTADE
USENET IS NOT DEAD !!!!! USENET IS STILL FREE FREE FREE!

Usenet is an ever-living, Casper the friendly ghost of discussion networks.

Just a friendly reminder that Usenet still exists and access to text newsgroups is still FREE. Access is provided by volunteer sysops around the world. See links below.

Back in its glory days it seems that just about every academic institution had its own Usenet hierarchy of newsgroups.

Linux was revealed to the world via Usenet.

Open source philosophy gained its steam via Usenet.

Usenet is the original free speech network.

Usenet is the original 'social network'.

NovaBBS
https://novabbs.org

Simple and free access to text-only Usenet Newsgroups
https://www.i2pn2.org/

#Usenet #BBS #NetworkNews #EternalSeptember

@infostorm@a.gup.pe @academicchatter@a.gup.pe
novabbs.orgRocksolid Light - Available Newsgroups
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Woodoo Prod

#Playing ZORK on End of The Line BBS:
endofthelinebbs.com/

You can play a lot of Infocom games there, & save your progression.

I'm taking a lot of notes. Playing in a dark place only lightened by some diode lights. The cat sleeps in a cardboard box nearby with all 4 irons in the air. What a scene! :0)

#zork #infocom #adventure #text #games #gaming #retrogaming #retrocomputing
#BBS #BBSing #ssh #EndOfTheLineBBS #bulletinboards #textmode #ANSI #ASCII #terminal #retrocomputing #oldschool

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