BBC Run Bulletin Boards

Post by Nigel Reed
Does anyone remember the old BBC Micro bulletin boards. I would love to
track down some of the software and play around with it for old times
sake. I've recently been fiddling around with PC BBS Software and might
even try to emulate some of the old Beeb boards. OBBS and NBBS were two
I remember. There was also some software I used made by some guys in
London but I really can't remember the name of it now but it would run
both viewdata and 8N1 boards.

I'd love to get a proper old BBS running on some serious vintage hardware
- i.e. one of the setups which used big DEC or PR1ME minis at the server
end. Sadly no luck so far in finding any expertise or software (not that
I've tried seriously hard, save for putting tentative feelers out once in
a while!)

It'd just be rather cool having the PR1ME 750 humming away running a BBS,
with something like a BBC micro sat next to it and something to fake the
phone system inbetween :-)

Other vaguely similar services of the time would be fun too - MUDs,
teletext, BASICODE transmissions etc.

Nigel Reed

2007-07-22 23:50:04 UTC

Post by Jules
It'd just be rather cool having the PR1ME 750 humming away running a BBS,
with something like a BBC micro sat next to it and something to fake the
phone system inbetween :-)

Something like a serial cable? ;)

Post by Jules
Other vaguely similar services of the time would be fun too - MUDs,
teletext, BASICODE transmissions etc.

There are plenty of MUDs still in existance today. Teletext is in use in
many European counties but it didn't take here in the US. My parents
ditched all my old BBC stuff when I left the country, probably did it on
my say-so, but now I wish I had kept it. I had all sorts of gems such as
swram with realtime clock and battery backup, bulletin board software,
roms and the like. I may still have some old computer stuff there. They
might still have my 1980 Commodore PC with 256mb and green screen. There
may be old computer magazines too. If any of that is of use to you, let
me know and I'll see if there's a way to hook you up with the stuff.

I've still got HP server and umm..I think it's a Sequent box here. If
there's a way to get them shipped to the UK, they're all yours. Also got
an IBM 7009 sitting next to my filing cabinet. :)

Regards
Nigel

Jules

2007-07-23 21:14:38 UTC

Post by Jules
It'd just be rather cool having the PR1ME 750 humming away running a BBS,
with something like a BBC micro sat next to it and something to fake the
phone system inbetween :-)

Something like a serial cable? ;)

Post by Jules
Other vaguely similar services of the time would be fun too - MUDs,
teletext, BASICODE transmissions etc.

There are plenty of MUDs still in existance today. Teletext is in use in
many European counties but it didn't take here in the US.

Strange how it never took off in the US - any ideas why?

Post by Nigel Reed
My parents
ditched all my old BBC stuff when I left the country, probably did it on
my say-so, but now I wish I had kept it. I had all sorts of gems

I've got *way* too much BBC stuff... I badly need to thin things out but
never seem to get the time :-(

Post by Nigel Reed
I've still got HP server and umm..I think it's a Sequent box here.

Ooh. Now, information about Sequent is pretty much nonexistent, but I
gather they made some rather nice multi-processor crates back in the day
(the Balance I believe, but possibly other models too). It'd be nice to
find one some day, but I'm not aware of any Sequent hardware surviving in
the UK (save for one unconfirmed rumour!)

Post by Nigel Reed
Also got an IBM 7009 sitting next to my filing cabinet. :)

That's an RS/6000 isn't it? I've been screwing around with one of its
ancestors all afternoon - a rather tricked-out RT CAD setup :) (and
tearing my hair out over AIX - at least back in the days of the RT it was
a little bit quirky compared to other UNIX variants!)

cheers

Jules

Nigel Reed

2007-07-24 01:00:05 UTC

Post by Nigel Reed
There are plenty of MUDs still in existance today. Teletext is in use in
many European counties but it didn't take here in the US.

Strange how it never took off in the US - any ideas why?

No idea. It's such a great service too. In the US they have CC and SAP
(closed captioning = subtitles) and SAP is for alternate languages. A
baseball game, for example, will have English as the primary language
and Spanish broadcast on SAP. Not sure if there's not enough bandwidth
to carry Teletext after that. That said, program guides are available
over the air but are generally basic.

Post by Nigel Reed
I've still got HP server and umm..I think it's a Sequent box here.

The HP is a 9000/822.

Post by Jules
Ooh. Now, information about Sequent is pretty much nonexistent, but I
gather they made some rather nice multi-processor crates back in the day
(the Balance I believe, but possibly other models too). It'd be nice to
find one some day, but I'm not aware of any Sequent hardware surviving in
the UK (save for one unconfirmed rumour!)

Now, the Sequent box runs Dynix, some bastardised version of Unix which
is ugly if I recall. I have a set of Dynix/ptx tapes (look like the
250mb cartridge tapes) and a complete set of shrink-wrapped manuals
including reference manuals, installation guides, C programming guide,
etc. I even have the NFS 4.x tape lol.

I can't see what model it is because it is supporting two microwave
ovens, a couple of scanners and a rather large KVM switch amongst other
items :)

It's about the same size as the HP9000/822 but probably a touch wider.
It has a white door which has a black panel in the upper right corner
which has the disk activity lights.

Post by Nigel Reed
Also got an IBM 7009 sitting next to my filing cabinet. :)

Yup. Well, if you think AIX is bad, try Dynix. With AIX, smit is your
friend. I have a set of AIX 4.3.2 disks, The Bonus Pack, Perfoemance
Toolbox, Extended Documentation and a few other disks are unsealed :)

Are you drooling yet :)

Jules

2007-07-24 10:06:39 UTC

Post by Nigel Reed
There are plenty of MUDs still in existance today. Teletext is in use in
many European counties but it didn't take here in the US.

Strange how it never took off in the US - any ideas why?

Yes, maybe it's a bandwidth thing. Sometimes we stick the captioning on
when we're in the US - it's interesting to see how widely it varies from
what's actually being said :-)

I suppose there's not so much space available for data in a US NTSC
525-line system versus a PAL 625-line one anyway, so maybe it's just
that there wasn't the room regardless of other services they wanted to
offer.

Post by Jules
Ooh. Now, information about Sequent is pretty much nonexistent, but I
gather they made some rather nice multi-processor crates back in the
day (the Balance I believe, but possibly other models too). It'd be
nice to find one some day, but I'm not aware of any Sequent hardware
surviving in the UK (save for one unconfirmed rumour!)

Now, the Sequent box runs Dynix, some bastardised version of Unix which
is ugly if I recall.

I'm amazed you have one that works. I heard of one other runner somewhere
in the US, but that was the only running Sequent I've come across.

Post by Nigel Reed
I have a set of Dynix/ptx tapes (look like the
250mb cartridge tapes) and a complete set of shrink-wrapped manuals
including reference manuals, installation guides, C programming guide,
etc. I even have the NFS 4.x tape lol.

Wow - look after them! You possibly have the only surviving copies...
(insert standard warning about first checking that the tape drive's roller
hasn't turned to goo, should you try reading any data off them)

Post by Nigel Reed
I can't see what model it is because it is supporting two microwave
ovens, a couple of scanners and a rather large KVM switch amongst other
items :)

:-)
I *think* the Balance machines were always multiprocessor - and actually
used Natsemi 32xxx-family CPUs (I don't think anyone other than
Sequent was crazy enough to try that :-) I'm not sure what the
later hardware was like, though.

Post by Jules
That's an RS/6000 isn't it? I've been screwing around with one of its
ancestors all afternoon - a rather tricked-out RT CAD setup :) (and
tearing my hair out over AIX - at least back in the days of the RT it
was a little bit quirky compared to other UNIX variants!)

Heh heh - you might like this RT setup too - three drives, tape, Ethernet,
Token-Ring, extral serial lines etc. - but the best bit is that it has the
5085 graphics processor cabinet, 21" display, graphics tablet, lighted
program function keypad, and Dials attachment. We've got a full set of
media and an almost-complete set of docs with it.

Takes about 20 minutes just to power the thing up :-) It looks to have a
complete copy of CATIA on there (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CATIA), so
could be quite fun to play around with.

I just got as far as breaking root access to the box yesterday. Next
task is to back the drives up (we've got various CATIA install tapes, but
I suspect they're licence-locked) - and after that I can have a proper
look at what's on there.

cheers

Jules

Little Paul

2007-07-24 08:27:18 UTC

Post by Jules
tearing my hair out over AIX - at least back in the days of the RT it was
a little bit quirky compared to other UNIX variants!

5 years ago in my last job, I had the misfortune to have to sysadmin
an aging rs6000 which was in active service as the payroll server.
(For all I know, it still is)

AIX is "interesting" at the best of times. Working blind, with
no documentation, and a disk that was so full that my predecesor
had stripped out the man pages to save space was... fun? [1]

I wish I'd taken some photos of it. There was a second one sat
next to the payroll server which was slowly being gutted and used
as spares to keep the live server limping along.

It also doubled as a warning to the other servers as to what might
happen to them if they misbehaved...

I can't remember what the model was, but google has thrown up this
picture:
Loading Image...

If anyone can tell me the model number of the larger machine in
that picture I'd be grateful.

-Paul
[1] For small values of fun

--
www.paulseward.com

Jules

2007-07-24 10:13:57 UTC

Post by Little Paul
AIX is "interesting" at the best of times. Working blind, with
no documentation, and a disk that was so full that my predecesor
had stripped out the man pages to save space was... fun?

Sounds like our RT - except we have docs, I just haven't read them yet :-)
I was struggling yesterday to find out what AIX's equivalent to the
'more' command is. I'm not even sure if a version of AIX that old supports
pipes, actually!

Post by Little Paul
http://www.torsten-brumm.de/wordpress/wp-content/rs6000.gif
If anyone can tell me the model number of the larger machine in that
picture I'd be grateful.

Hmm, the chap who gave us the RT had one which looked rather like that. I
think it was a 7013-570. Unfortunately there was just no space left
in the car to fit it in and rescue it!

Post by Little Paul
[1] For small values of fun

Ambient, background levels of fun...

Little Paul

2007-07-26 10:54:38 UTC

Post by Little Paul
http://www.torsten-brumm.de/wordpress/wp-content/rs6000.gif
If anyone can tell me the model number of the larger machine in that
picture I'd be grateful.

Hmm, the chap who gave us the RT had one which looked rather like that. I
think it was a 7013-570.

Sorry for the slow reply, I've been knee deep in Ajax this week.

Further googling based on 7013 suggests that it could also be a
7013-580 ... I think I'll just mentally flag it as 7013 and add
it to the list of battle scars.

Post by Jules
Unfortunately there was just no space left
in the car to fit it in and rescue it!

As I remember it, they're chuffin heavy as well :-)

-Paul

Josey

2007-07-25 21:38:12 UTC

Hi Jules,

I nearly bought a sequent symmetry once. It was one of the first NUMA based
machines. Actually bought a Data General AViiON instead. Whilst this wasn't
exactly mainstream it performed well and productively for around 8 years.
The Symmetry was excellent in my mind for one factor - it had an LED
barchart for each CPU showing % utilisation on the front panel.

Jc.

Nigel Reed

2007-07-26 04:00:04 UTC

Post by Josey
I nearly bought a sequent symmetry once. It was one of the first NUMA based
machines. Actually bought a Data General AViiON instead. Whilst this wasn't
exactly mainstream it performed well and productively for around 8 years.
The Symmetry was excellent in my mind for one factor - it had an LED
barchart for each CPU showing % utilisation on the front panel.

Grr, I am going to have to do this thing out now. I know it doesn't use
the regular 110v that we have in the US. In fact, I think it might fit
in where the clothes dryer plugs in. I believe that is 220v. There's so
much going on that I don't know if I can pull this thing out in the next
week or so but if I can I'll try and take some pics and figure out
exactly what this beast is.

Regards
Nigel

Jules

2007-07-26 13:14:42 UTC

Grr, I am going to have to do this thing out now.

:-)

Post by Nigel Reed
I know it doesn't use
the regular 110v that we have in the US. In fact, I think it might fit
in where the clothes dryer plugs in. I believe that is 220v.

Wouldn't surprise me if there wasn't a link on the PSU that you could
change to run it directly at 110V actually (or for it even to be
automatic, but be careful there!). Most internationally-sold machines
tend to share the power supply design between countries and engineer them
to be able to work at the different voltages, as it's ultimately cheaper
in terms of tooling and support costs.

Post by Nigel Reed
There's so
much going on that I don't know if I can pull this thing out in the next
week or so but if I can I'll try and take some pics and figure out
exactly what this beast is.

Well no rush as far as I'm concerned - it's just nice to hear that
someone's still got some Sequent hardware.

I came across a nice article on wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sequent_Computer_Systems

cheers

Jules

Nigel Reed

2007-07-26 18:20:05 UTC

Post by Jules
Wouldn't surprise me if there wasn't a link on the PSU that you could
change to run it directly at 110V actually (or for it even to be
automatic, but be careful there!). Most internationally-sold machines
tend to share the power supply design between countries and engineer them
to be able to work at the different voltages, as it's ultimately cheaper
in terms of tooling and support costs.

I'd have thought that too, however the plug is different, it's about
twice the size as a regular 2 or 3 pin plug we have here. I couldn't
tell you if the cable is directly connected to the PSU. As I said, it's
under about 10 tons of junk but now I am curious.

Post by Jules
Well no rush as far as I'm concerned - it's just nice to hear that
someone's still got some Sequent hardware.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sequent_Computer_Systems

Nice. Shame there are no pics, but then again, I only read it for the
articles ;)

Jules

2007-07-26 13:23:28 UTC

Post by Josey

Ahh, we've got a small AViiON and the media for it - so far nobody's had
the time to do it justice though. I don't think ours is anything
particularly exciting, unfortunately - the case is about the size of
two PCs side-by-side and I think it's a lowly 4-CPU setup. I gather DG
made some pretty big multi-CPU machines in the AViiON line.

Post by Josey
The Symmetry was excellent in my mind for one factor - it had an LED
barchart for each CPU showing % utilisation on the front panel.

Very BeBox-esque :-)

Josey

2007-07-26 18:25:41 UTC

Post by Jules
Ahh, we've got a small AViiON and the media for it - so far nobody's had
the time to do it justice though. I don't think ours is anything
particularly exciting, unfortunately - the case is about the size of
two PCs side-by-side and I think it's a lowly 4-CPU setup. I gather DG
made some pretty big multi-CPU machines in the AViiON line.

The biggest we had were two 8 way servers. They were each built in two
blocks, each block with 4x200Mhz Intel pentium (pro) processors. They ran
DG/UX. Before that we had 88k based non-Numa architecture Aviions. I'm sad
to say I scrapped them all before I was in to conservation. That said I
still think I have at least one 88k processor card somewhere (from an
AV4625). I would never had room for the newer servers anyway, and the cabs
were 3 phase and they were major real-estate.

If you ever feel the need to display it some time in the future, I spent a
lot of time building dg/ux kernels.

Jc.

Nigel Reed

2007-07-26 19:40:04 UTC

Post by Josey
The biggest we had were two 8 way servers. They were each built in two
blocks, each block with 4x200Mhz Intel pentium (pro) processors. They ran
DG/UX. Before that we had 88k based non-Numa architecture Aviions. I'm sad
to say I scrapped them all before I was in to conservation. That said I
still think I have at least one 88k processor card somewhere (from an
AV4625). I would never had room for the newer servers anyway, and the cabs
were 3 phase and they were major real-estate.

I know what you mean about scrapping computers. I worked for Convex (now
HP Convex) and they scrapped a bunch of old machines. A shame, it was.

Andrew Gabriel

2007-07-28 16:05:54 UTC

Post by Nigel Reed
might still have my 1980 Commodore PC with 256mb and green screen.

Amasing how easy it is to slip up by 3 orders of magnitude ;-)

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

Jules

2007-07-29 12:23:28 UTC

Post by Andrew Gabriel

Post by Nigel Reed
might still have my 1980 Commodore PC with 256mb and green screen.

Amasing how easy it is to slip up by 3 orders of magnitude ;-)

I don't know, with the lack of capitalisation and no 'i' character,
I'm not quite sure... ;-)

Dominic Beesley

2007-07-23 10:56:07 UTC

I'd try over at the BBC Micro mailing list. I'm fairly sure theres plenty
of the old BBS Software knocking about and you should be able to run
it straight from one of the emulators.

There were some folks even talking recently about making these run over
econet over TCP/IP or something similar.

On a seperate point does anybody know how to get Linux to run its console
in viewdata mode? I've just connected my bbc micro up as a terminal for use
in my workshop. Its ok in vt102 mode but it would be a lot quicker and more
readable in proper viewdata mode!

Next task: VNC client that runs on a Master - possible?

Cheers

Dom

Little Paul

2007-07-23 11:32:51 UTC

Post by Dominic Beesley
On a seperate point does anybody know how to get Linux to run its console
in viewdata mode? I've just connected my bbc micro up as a terminal for use
in my workshop. Its ok in vt102 mode but it would be a lot quicker and more
readable in proper viewdata mode!

My knowledge of both viewdata and termcap are sketchy and incomplete at
best, but I had an incling that viewdata was also known as videotex and
googling for that threw up the appended termcap entries which *might*
get you somewhere.

I'd be interested to hear more about this stuff, so if I'm on completely
the wrong track, feel free to correct me! I only learn by getting things
wrong :-)

-Paul

#### Videotex and teletext
#
# standard-issue France Telecom minitel terminal (made by Philips)
# (m2-nam: had unknown ":zd=\E[1m:zb=\E[5m:zc=lkmjqxtuwvn:";
# also deleted unnecessary ":ug#0:sg#0:"; mapped ":pt:" to "" -- esr)
m2-nam|minitel|minitel-2|minitel-2-nam|France Telecom Minitel:\
:am@:bs:pt:xn:\
:co#80:it#8:li#24:\
:ae=\E(B:al=\E[L:as=\E(0:cd=\E[J:ce=\E[K:cl=\E[H\E[J:\
:cm=\E[%i%d;%dH:dc=\E[P:dl=\E[M:ei=\E[4l:ho=\E[H:\
:im=\E[4h:ip=7:is=\E[1;24r\E[24;1H:k1=\EOP:k2=\EOQ:\
:k3=\EOR:k4=\EOS:kd=\E[B:kh=\E[H:kl=\E[D:kr=\E[C:\
:ku=\E[A:nd=\E[C:se=\E[m:sf=^J:so=\E[7m:sr=\EM:\
:ue=\E[m:up=\E[A:us=\E[4m:
# From: Joel Rubin <***@coral.berkeley.edu>
# This is a preliminary TERMCAP for VIDTEX, a terminal program sold by
# Compuserve. Line and column numbers are computer-dependent (I have a
# Commodore '64); you should use the meta-B option to shut off clean-breaking
# of lines. No key codes included since some of them are programmable and
# most are machine-specific. Works on vi if you don't use clean-breaking.
# Very similar to the IBM 3101 termcap. Escape-D used for backspace because
# control-H is destructive backspace. There seem to be a few weirdnesses
# (especially at the beginning of a wrapped line), and the cursor does not,
# unfortunately, flash.
# (vid: mapped ":pt:" to default tabs; changed :bc: to :le: -- esr)
vid|vidtex|Compuserve vidtex program:\
:am:pt:\
:co#40:li#25:\
:cd=\EJ:ce=\EK:cl=^L:cm=\EY%+ %+ :ho=\EH:le=\ED:\
:nd=\EC:up=\EA:
# This (inherited from the Emacs termcap.dat file) is probably *way* obsolete!
rsvidtx|Radio Shack VIDEOTEX:\
:co#32:li#16:\
:cd=\EJ:ce=\EK:cl=\EH\EJ:..cm=\EY%+ %+ :cr=^M:do=^J:\
:kb=^H:kd=^J:kl=^H:nd=\EC:nw=^M^J:sf=^J:ta=^I:up=\EA:

Wm...

2007-07-23 12:40:46 UTC

Mon, 23 Jul 2007 11:32:51

Post by Little Paul

Was viewdata / teletext the late 70's / early 80's one that re-wrote
left to right, top to bottom continuously in an attempt to mimic what
you could get on a television screen, just very slowly?

As should be clear from the above I don't know much about TV or BBC
Micros and such but have played with more than one termcap.

Post by Little Paul
I'd be interested to hear more about this stuff, so if I'm on completely
the wrong track, feel free to correct me! I only learn by getting things
wrong :-)

The essence of termcappery is to work out or know what the _term_inal is
_cap_able of (sounds obvious and I don't mean that in a teaching granny
to suck eggs way, just that I've seen too many people trying to use a
termcap that won't work because they thought it had better
_cap_abilities than the _term_inal they had).

Most termcaps are additive; i.e. you start with stuff you know works and
then chuck things at it in the hope that they might work, best done with
a manual and a pot of tea at your side.

The question for Dom might be: do you really want to emulate viewdata or
is your _term_inal _cap_abale of more? i.e. there might be a nice warm
feeling when you see the slow L2R T2B but is that the best it can do?

--
Wm ... Reply-To: address valid for at least 7 days
Recently read and recommended:
Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art - Scott McCloud
The Sandman: The Kindly Ones - Gaiman et al

Nigel Reed

2007-07-23 18:40:04 UTC

Post by Wm...
left to right, top to bottom continuously in an attempt to mimic what
you could get on a television screen, just very slowly?

It's not a matter of re-writing left to right top to bottom, that is how
the text was displayed since that's how it came in via the modem, that
said you could use TAB control codes to move the cursor within the 40x20
grid to place text and graphics and specific points, thereby making
dynamic content (drawing a logo for example). The reason it was slow was
because it was via modem. If you did videotex (or viewdata same thing
really) over ethernet, it's be blazingly fast. It's as if you were
dialing up a BBS or accessing it over telnet.

Post by Wm...
Most termcaps are additive; i.e. you start with stuff you know works and
then chuck things at it in the hope that they might work, best done with
a manual and a pot of tea at your side.
The question for Dom might be: do you really want to emulate viewdata or
is your _term_inal _cap_abale of more? i.e. there might be a nice warm
feeling when you see the slow L2R T2B but is that the best it can do?

It wouldn't be slow via a directly connected cable.

Regards
Nigel

Nigel Reed

2007-07-23 18:30:04 UTC

Not sure how that'd be possible in viewdata mode, it's a whole different
thing. You could possibly try setting the getty entry to 7E1 rather than
8N1 but I expect the scrolling will kill you. Viewdata was never meant
to scroll.

Post by Dominic Beesley
Next task: VNC client that runs on a Master - possible?

If you have a Master based web browser you could always access your VNC
server through the http port. Port 5801 is usually the default, if I
recall correctly.

Dominic Beesley

2007-07-24 09:19:07 UTC