Commodore Free 31/Commodore_Free_Issue_31_2009_Commodore_Computer_Club.d64/bbs part 1

Text File | 2023-02-26 | 10KB | 306 lines

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 Confessions of a BBS Sysop Addict
     Lord Ronin From Qlink
************************************
              PART 1

Lenard Roach of the Kansas City
Commodore group wrote an article for
my users group A.C.U.G about his BBS,
the Pulpit. 1 received and e-mail
from him asking if it would be OK to
have it printed here in Commodore
Free. Well our policy is that
anything in our cat box liner unless
otherwise stated is open for
republication in C= related places.
That though gave my mind a bit of a
thought about all that I can achieve
these days. So going over the back
issue in the stacks, I added more to
my thought. What ever happened to the
entire C= SysOps of the past? Well
maybe with Lenard's article and the
following text we may be able to hear
from more of them. At least that is
the hope.

How did I the world's most fanatical
Commodore user set into the BBS
scene? When at the start I didn't
know what a BBS was or that they even
existed, I  was also still unaware of
the differences in PC platforms
between the C= and others. Yeah I
thought that the Apple disk would run
on the C= when I started out in I993.
Actually it was an article in the
groups newsletter, more used for a
space filler on the single side that
we had for a newsletter at that time.
Telling about a BBS called the Open
Zipper Long story about getting
started made short. I had a 300 baud
modem and Star Term and an Amber
monitor I gave it a try and was in a
load of trouble at the start. Here I
am on a heretic run BBS, in PET with
no colour. On 40c when the
presentation was 80c and in Ansi I
wasn't too happy, but impressed with
the fact a computer could talk over
the phone to another. Got really
freaked out when text started to
appear on the screen. What had I done
wrong? Well nothing the SysOp broke
into chat with me. Now I didn't know
what "chat" or a "SysOp" was at that
time, Thankfully Ben the Sysop, was
once known as IceMan and ran the Ice
House BBS in the 1980s in Portland
Oregon, on a C=64. So he helped me
set things up on my and his end, I
was hooked from then on. He ran
Spitfire and in my area here in
Astoria and Clatsop county in Oregon.
That was the most popular BBS OS for
the heretic system. In a year I was
the Commodore SysOp on his board, and
in charge of the PBEM (Play By
Electronic Mail) Role Playing Games.
Later on I was the same on 6 other
boards and on two more I was the
Doorgames SysOp, They couldn't
believe that with NovaTcrm 9.5 I was
able to do Ansi editing. Later with
the 128 and Desterm I was able to
bypass the fake out 80c screen on the
64. Yeah I was really hooked,

Then I had joined Q-Link about 10
months before the end of that beloved
service for us. I Met some of the
other diehards there and learned that
most user groups had a BBS. I learned
as well that they were called night
time boards. Operating after 6 or at
night. OK I had one phone line for
the house and the shop on the same
number. I could do that and decided
that the local group needed a BBS.
They on the other hand, were not of
the same opinion. But did that stop
me.  not in the least. Of course 1
had no idea of what I was getting
into and had no instructions for a C=
board. I didn't know that the door
games where platform specific either.

What BBS OS to run? At first I tried
out  an off line one that sounded
good; Fantasy Role Playing BBS or
FRPBBS, Looked real nice in the
opening screen. As I remember it was
a colour fantasy sword. Wow I thought
here is something that I can use for
my C= interest and my RPG interest.
The idea died real soon after that
part. Only had 10 message bases for
PBEM. That was it in total. Top speed
was 1200 and I had just gotten a 240O
baud Aprotech modem, and it was
limited to PET and 40c only. Hmm that
would kill off the Amiga users in the
local group, should they ever call.
Had to have something that was C= as
base line normal and allowed Ansi and
ASCII What to try out?

Well there were some attempts at
various offerings, but they failed
mainly for lack of support for me.
The less than lamer at doing all of
this stuff. Some had a few
documentation notes that talked in
what to me was high level ML
Programming. Not something for the
Beginner at all, I think it was on
Q-Link just before the end. Some one
told me about "Color64"and where to
score it up. OK it was free and that
fit my budget real well. Grabbed it,
opened it, printed out the
documentation and started to set it
up on a 64c, 171, 1581 with a 170
clone REU. Named it the "Two Pound
Micro Skirt". Well actually I used
the British  pound symbol for the
name on the screen. Based on what 1
paid for one for my girl friend /
fiance at the time in 1969 when I
was travelling through London. Think
I got it on Carnaby Street. Long time
ago and a lot of good British Beer at
that time. Oh she liked the skirt and
dumped me because of the war. Anyway
the board ran for about two months.
Night time 7 nights a week. I was
learning message base set up. Working
on the constant problem of space for
the U/D area and how to configure it.
as well as collecting games for the
board. At that time there were two
support boards. I logged into them,
long distance too I add. Gained some
information that helped.

However the President of the A.C.U.G.
at that time came by the shop, (where
things had been set up.) He wanted my
support to make the A.C.U.G. a multi
platform group. Opening up to Mac and
the heretic as well. He gave me a
newsletter from the Multnomah County
Computer Club. Or better known at
that time as MC-3. They had started
as a C= group and then opened up to
Amiga and the other platforms. Well
they listed their BBS. I decided to
give that a ring and see what they
had to offer.
Did that several times, in Ansi. As I
had expected it to be a heretic run
board. One night as I was on the
board. The SysOp came into chat with
me. I guess it was because of the
fact that I had sent feedback to him,
and had said things about my little
board and being in the users group.
Lo and behold, the board was running
on a C= 128! He walked me through the
steps to change my account online to
Commodore, and I adjusted my term
programme as well. Hey it looked
great. Better than that DMBBS that
RMSoftware had on line. Being the
only other one I had contacted. As I
am not certain what Approtech ran in
Rouge River Oregon. So we talked a
good thing that my daily time was
suspended for the chat. He gave me
some facts about the BBS OS and the
author's name. I was taken right off
the bat.

So I contacted the author. Dr. Midi
a.k.a. Brian Bell in Washington
State. He said I had to have a CMD HD
to make it work right. Or at the
least for a small BBS, a FD-2000.I
scored up the HD. took some time to
pay back the money. And waited for
the disks to arrive. At that time I
converted as best as possible the
Colour 64 BBs onto the HD. As I also
used it for my Geos work. I had to
make a lot of 1581 partitions for my
Geos files on the HD. Being the way
things worked before Wheels. And did
I mention that after spending $80 for
the BBS OS I waited? Like three
months, then an apology came to me.
Brian had left the envelope on a
table at his parents place and spaced
it out. Well there where the disks,
three 1581s AIR. Which seem to have
been stolen from me as of this
writing. My registration number #65
was on the labels. I was now the
proud owner of Omni-128 BBS. Many in
the states and one outside of Munich
Germany called Omni Germany. I even
called that one once. Tell you right
now that the long wait should have
been a clue. But hey I was as polite
as possibly said a novice.

Well I followed the set up as best as
possible, as I paid for a manual,
that to this day 15 or so years later
1 have not seen. I had a disk of SEQ
files that had been taken from the
SysOps message base. No help did I
get from Brian. Outside of some
connection work on setting up the
nodes for the hub. Which at that time
was either call his board Omni World
and have the entire thing automated.
Which is what I did; or send the
proper created file as an attachment
to him via email and gain the packet
in reply. If as a C= user on GEnie I
could do that sort of thing. I never
found out how. So 1 just called once
a week to the main board. Dropped off
my packet and picked up the new one.
Oh yeah it took over a year and help
from another Omni Sysop Mad Max of
the Pink Panther BBS and head of the
MH1 crew to get me to figure out how
to set up the nodes for the hub
files. In fact he came from Idaho
twice to help me. That is several
hundred miles to drive. I also was
missing files. Game files and some of
the operating files. Like the BBS
lister. Yeah I was getting the
impression that something was wrong.
Brian only told me to contact one of
the SysOps Mushashi at the Civic BBS
for the Civic users group in Calif.
on how to edit and to programme
online games. There were only 22 of
them, and most where not open to non
C= users, and many where limited as
to a baud rate to play. 98% of them I
found out later where hacks from
Color64 games.

That was the birth of the, and again
because of font differences. The two
pound 10 and 6 Vacuum Tube BBS. Named
in honour of my English mother and
the fact that I studied electronics
in the Vacuum Tube/Valve days. That
board ran until about April of
20COcc. Sure it was C= graphics,
though not exactly I must state. Took
ASCII and Ansi. Also took a couple of
other formats that I can't remember
as no one used them. And something
called SupeRcs or something like
that. Which I learned much later was
a specific to Omni term style. That
would have made the colour and
characters look better and be more
accurately represented. Oh 1
contacted The Coffee Shop and Huggy
Bear's Den in Washington state. As
they also ran Omni 128. My own
callers dropped when I didn't have
the games they wanted to play. Game
play is the most favourite thing in
my area. That and they didn't use a
C= so on Omni most of the games they
couldn't play. Save for the new
members that I had recruited for the
users group. The others never called
either board. In fact they left me
holding the bag for the group and
all.

         CONTINUED IN PART 2