Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: Kaelon to All on Mon May 02 2022 07:43 am

I'm going to opt for a Windows machine, but I'm on the fence between Windows 32-Bit (which I understand will make a lot of things trivial, given some of the out-of-box support for the 16-bit DOS Doors) and other flavors of Windows.

A couple of years ago, I'd say stick to 32-bit. Now, Synchronet has 32-bit archivers by default, I think. As for doors, many are written in Javascript and run inside of the BBS.

With regards to games, I think you could skip running them locally and use one of the BBS game door servers, you'll have a larger pool of players than if you install the games locally.

32-bit XP was great, I had a lot of memory to spare. With 32-bit Windows 10, there's not as much memory available. I'd rather run 64 bit windows, ditch my DOS programs and use the additional memory.

There is a 3rd party 16-bit DOS VDM out there that'll let you run 16-bit DOS apps, but I haven't tried it yet.

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þ Synchronet þ .: realitycheckbbs.org :: scientia potentia est :.

Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: Kaelon to Digital Man on Mon May 02 2022 11:58 am

Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: Digital Man to Kaelon on Mon May 02 2022 11:15 am

Whatever you choose, it's easy to move Synchronet between computers running different OSes, so it's not a big deal/decision.

Thanks, Digital Man. I didn't realize it, but now thinking back to my days SysOp'ing a WWIV BBS, I guess it's just moving the entire directory structure from one device to the other, right?

Pretty much:
https://wiki.synchro.net/faq:misc#migration

Windows obfuscates and hides so many configuration files these days, that I have to affirmatively look for programs that are run "portably" so that I know that I can move them. Is Synchronet BBS built this way?

Yes. The exceptions are control panel settings which are stored in the Registry (easily exported and re-imported if you need to) and the virtual UART/FOSSIL driver which must reside in the Windows/System32 directory.
--
digital man (rob)

Breaking Bad quote #49:
So you do have a plan? Yeah, Mr. White! Yeah, Science! - Jesse Pinkman
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Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Kaelon on Mon May 02 2022 02:17 pm

There is a 3rd party 16-bit DOS VDM out there that'll let you run 16-bit DOS apps, but I haven't tried it yet.

I'm use it (NTVDMx64, a 2021 version) with great success. The one exception is TW2002 which has some weird numeric output issue under NTVDMx64.
--
digital man (rob)

Breaking Bad quote #20:
So who's your chief, little injun? - Hank Schrader
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Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: MRO to Kaelon on Mon May 02 2022 04:11 pm

those are sysops

Is that a problem? Given the niche art that is BBS'ing in the age of the Internet, I'd expect every user to be running their own system, too.
_____
-=: Kaelon :=-

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On 5/2/22 07:43, Kaelon wrote:

What is your favorite / recommended Operating System for setting up a
brand new Synchronet BBS? If you were to start from scratch today, and
build the most scalable canvas upon which to paint your BBS dreams,
what system specifications would you aim for?

I've been pretty happy with Linux + Docker... though I need to fix the
check scripts, now that I've updated the build scripts.

Using Ubuntu Server for my host OS... I've used Ubuntu on my pc,
raspberry pi, and WSL2 in windows, been relatively straight forward.
The bbs-io docker image is Debian based, just updated the build scripts
to the current stable release, and simplified the setup.

Now I need to get the release/check scripts updated... 3.19b is broken
on AMD currently. Next few days should have the automated build process fixed, then will build and update the 3.x releases.
--
Michael J. Ryan - tracker1@roughneckbbs.com

Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: Kaelon to MRO on Mon May 02 2022 06:15 pm

those are sysops

Is that a problem? Given the niche art that is BBS'ing in the age of the Internet, I'd expect every user to be running their own system, too. _____

My BBS gets users, and while some are sysops, I'm not convinced all are sysops.

Nightfox

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þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion: digitaldistortionbbs.com

El 2/5/22 a las 11:43, Kaelon escribió:

Hi Everyone,

I've been e-mailing a bit with digital man, and thought I would open up the conversation to the group. The BBS bug has bitten me once more, and so I'm starting a carefully-considered process of setting up my own system. Before I do, though, I want to create the right anchorage: the Operating System. I'm going to opt for a Windows machine, but I'm on the fence between Windows 32-Bit (which I understand will make a lot of things trivial, given some of the out-of-box support for the 16-bit DOS Doors) and other flavors of Windows.

What is your favorite / recommended Operating System for setting up a brand new Synchronet BBS? If you were to start from scratch today, and build the most scalable canvas upon which to paint your BBS dreams, what system specifications would you aim for?

Thanks for your thoughts!

Debian GNU/Linux and Sychronet, run solid as rock

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ï¿­ Synchronet ï¿­ Dock Sud BBS TLD 24 HS - bbs.docksud.com.ar

Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Kaelon on Mon May 02 2022 02:17 pm

given some of the out-of-box support for the 16-bit DOS Doors) and other flavors of Windows.

A couple of years ago, I'd say stick to 32-bit. Now, Synchronet has 32-bit archivers by default, I think. As for doors, many are written in Javascript and run inside of the BBS.

not many. and the best doorgames are still the dos ones.

There is a 3rd party 16-bit DOS VDM out there that'll let you run 16-bit DOS apps, but I haven't tried it yet.

i dont even want to touch that hack.
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Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: Kaelon to MRO on Mon May 02 2022 06:15 pm

Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: MRO to Kaelon on Mon May 02 2022 04:11 pm

those are sysops

Is that a problem? Given the niche art that is BBS'ing in the age of the Internet, I'd expect every user to be running their own system, too.

sysops are not users. why would you expect that?


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Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: Nightfox to Kaelon on Mon May 02 2022 06:47 pm

Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: Kaelon to MRO on Mon May 02 2022 06:15 pm

those are sysops

Is that a problem? Given the niche art that is BBS'ing in the age of the Internet, I'd expect every user to be running their own system, too. _____

My BBS gets users, and while some are sysops, I'm not convinced all are sysops.

are you sure? have you checked lately?
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þ Synchronet þ ::: BBSES.info - free BBS services :::

Nightfox wrote to Kaelon <=-

Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: Kaelon to MRO on Mon May 02 2022 06:15 pm

those are sysops

Is that a problem? Given the niche art that is BBS'ing in the age of the Internet, I'd expect every user to be running their own system, too. _____

My BBS gets users, and while some are sysops, I'm not convinced
all are sysops.

Same here, and I know for a fact that some are not sysops.



... Internal Error: The system has been taken over by sheep at line 19960
=== MultiMail/Linux v0.52
--- SBBSecho 3.15-Linux
* Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (1:123/115)
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Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: MRO to Nightfox on Mon May 02 2022 09:34 pm

My BBS gets users, and while some are sysops, I'm not convinced all are sysops.

are you sure? have you checked lately?

It sounds like you're picking a fight, MRO. So what if users are or aren't SysOps themselves? BBS'ing is a hobby, a passion-project, a labor of love. People should be doing this, in my opinion, because they love doing it, not because they want to convene some sort of mass-following of end-users or community-build.

That said, given the traffic that I am seeing on the active and *unique* BBS'es, I am fairly convinced that most of these users are *not* SysOps. In particular, I look at "20 for Beers," "CJ's Place," and "Valhalla" as good examples of very active, unique, valuable BBS'es that don't just look like something that someone else has done.

For that reason, if/when I set up a BBS, I would want to contribute something unique that makes people want to call and log in frequently. That will take time, passion, and commitment. And I want to learn more about it.
_____
-=: Kaelon :=-

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Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: Kaelon to MRO on Tue May 03 2022 08:19 am

Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: MRO to Nightfox on Mon May 02 2022 09:34 pm

My BBS gets users, and while some are sysops, I'm not convinced all are sysops.

are you sure? have you checked lately?

It sounds like you're picking a fight, MRO.

no, it's a question. you sound like one of those guys that joins reddit to get karma and asks a lot of questions for upvotes.

So what if users are or aren't
SysOps themselves? BBS'ing is a hobby, a passion-project, a labor of love.

it's a big difference. don't tell me what "BBS'ing" is. I've been
doing it longer than you.

For that reason, if/when I set up a BBS, I would want to contribute something unique that makes people want to call and log in frequently. That will take time, passion, and commitment. And I want to learn more about it.

whatever dude. i hate reading what you write.
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þ Synchronet þ ::: BBSES.info - free BBS services :::

no you don't.
you don't get many users at all. i just checked out your bbs a few weeks ago. you have arelor and that other guy. that's about it for your users.

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ï¿­ Synchronet ï¿­ Vertrauen ï¿­ Home of Synchronet ï¿­ [vert/cvs/bbs].synchro.net

Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: MRO to Nightfox on Mon May 02 2022 09:34 pm

My BBS gets users, and while some are sysops, I'm not convinced all
are sysops.

are you sure? have you checked lately?

Some of them occasionally send me emails saying things like they just found out BBSes still exist etc. and they say they want to thank me for running mine, etc..

Nightfox

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þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion: digitaldistortionbbs.com

Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: Nightfox to MRO on Tue May 03 2022 09:19 am

Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: MRO to Nightfox on Mon May 02 2022 09:34 pm

My BBS gets users, and while some are sysops, I'm not convinced all
are sysops.

are you sure? have you checked lately?

Some of them occasionally send me emails saying things like they just found out BBSes still exist etc. and they say they want to thank me for running mine, etc..

yeah i get that too but we have really lost like 99.99% of our users.
it's been bad and getting worse over the last 3 years or so.

I'm not sure how to bring in new people or bring the old ones back.
i thought having web clients would help a lot, and now we have a bunch.

We need some type of new draw. years ago i suggested that we incorporate torrent technology into synchronet so we could share our file bases. that might be helpful to expand synchronet into a torrent site community software.

The thing is, i know a lot of sysops would mess with the files, or not have their ports open for the transfers. if we had networked msgs bases and someone messed with the files, that would mess it up for their sharing in the swarm.

Also, when i had bbstorrents i had a lot of sysops who downloaded files and just couldnt get it. some even didnt know where the files were going when they downloaded them, so they ended up getting 160 gigs 2 or 3 times.
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Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: MRO to Kaelon on Tue May 03 2022 11:02 am

whatever dude. i hate reading what you write.

I don't get the hostility; not sure what I did to offend you, but don't worry, I won't interact with you further.

Enjoy your sandbox.
_____
-=: Kaelon :=-

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þ Synchronet þ Vertrauen þ Home of Synchronet þ [vert/cvs/bbs].synchro.net

Digital Man wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

I'm use it (NTVDMx64, a 2021 version) with great success. The one exception is TW2002 which has some weird numeric output issue under NTVDMx64. --

That's good to know. I'm on my last 32-bit junkyard system to run the BBS
on, the next junker has more than 4 GB of memory and I'd like to use it all.


... All of my certifications are self-signed.
--- MultiMail/DOS v0.52
þ Synchronet þ .: realitycheckbbs.org :: scientia potentia est :.

Nightfox wrote to Kaelon <=-

My BBS gets users, and while some are sysops, I'm not convinced all are sysops.

I see more new user emails coming through nowadays, I should check and see if/when they call back, how often they're calling.


... A journey of a thousand sandwiches begins with a single cut.
--- MultiMail/DOS v0.52
þ Synchronet þ .: realitycheckbbs.org :: scientia potentia est :.

Kaelon wrote to MRO <=-

whatever dude. i hate reading what you write.

I don't get the hostility; not sure what I did to offend you, but
don't worry, I won't interact with you further.

Recommend you ignore "MRO". He's the resident troll/asshole, and is a complete moron to boot. Doesn't even have the balls to use his real
name anywhere. Doesn't even run a BBS.



... All hope abandon, ye who enter messages here.
--- MultiMail/Linux v0.52
þ Synchronet þ Palantir BBS * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL

Jas Hud wrote to Gamgee <=-

no you don't.
you don't get many users at all. i just checked out your bbs a
few weeks ago. you have arelor and that other guy. that's about
it for your users.

You forget how to quote, doofus? Or did you do that on purpose to avoid proper context?

If you *HAD* quoted, we'd all see that I didn't say I got "many" users.
What I did say was that I was sure that not all my users are sysops. So
your stupid comment doesn't even have any relevance to the topic being discussed.

How many users do you have that aren't sysops? OH! WAIT! That's
right, YOU DON'T RUN A BBS...

FOAD, troll-boi.



... Ignorance can be cured. Stupid is forever.
--- MultiMail/Linux v0.52
þ Synchronet þ Palantir BBS * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL

Re: Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: Gamgee to Kaelon on Tue May 03 2022 05:42 pm

Recommend you ignore "MRO". He's the resident troll/asshole, and is a complete moron to boot. Doesn't even have the balls to use his real
name anywhere. Doesn't even run a BBS.

Thanks for the heads up. Will definitely follow your advice!
_____
-=: Kaelon :=-

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On 5/3/2022 1:16 PM, Kaelon wrote:

Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: MRO to Kaelon on Tue May 03 2022 11:02 am

> whatever dude. i hate reading what you write.

I don't get the hostility; not sure what I did to offend you, but don't worry, I won't interact with you further.

Enjoy your sandbox.
_____
-=: Kaelon :=-

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� Synchronet � Vertrauen � Home of Synchronet � [vert/cvs/bbs].synchro.net

It's not you.

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Re: Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: dragon to Kaelon on Tue May 03 2022 08:03 pm

I don't get the hostility; not sure what I did to offend you, but don't worry, I won't interact with you further.

Enjoy your sandbox.

It's not you.

I appreciate that. Thanks. :)
_____
-=: Kaelon :=-

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Re: Rec'd Operating System for SBBS 3.19c+
By: Nightfox to MRO on Tue May 03 2022 09:19 am

Some of them occasionally send me emails saying things like they just found out BBSes still exist etc. and they say
they want to thank me for running mine, etc..

I got one of those a few weeks ago. Guy named Nick I think? Nice guy.
--
Android8675@ShodansCore
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