BBS Software Development News

May 3, 1999

Windows2000 News:

While not directly BBS related, the big news this month is that Microsoft is now offering Windows2000 beta3 to the public. Win2K, originally known as NT5, is a much better suited operating system for running a multinode (or telnet) BBS then any of the previous versions of Windows, combining the power/stability of NT4 with the functionality of Win98.

Microsoft started selling Windows2000 beta3 last week for $59, which includes the CD, a manual, and a subscription to their update newsletter. The beta version is usable for 444 days before it expires.

Windows2000 is an excellent alternative to other "high performance" Operating Systems such as OS/2 and Linux, and will be a big enhancment to current and future Windows based BBS software.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/preview/order.asp

WWIV BBS News:

WWIV BBS is back in development. The original author Wayne Bell has passed the source code along to a team of programmers and WWIV sysops known as the "WWIV Software Services".

The development of WWIV 4.30 is currently underway, with many changes being added including fossil driver support. WWIV is one of the early BBS packages, which other BBS programs such as telegard and renegade were modeled after.
http://wss.wwiv.com

Galaticom News:

Galacticom Technologies, the former developer of MajorBBS and Worldgroup BBS, was sold on April 29th to TOTALe Incorporated. TOTALe purchased all of Galaticoms assets, including software and the Galacticomm name.

Galaticom Technologies had been in major financial trouble during the past two years, due to a major decline in sales of their software products.

Peter Berg, former CEO of Galacticomm Technologies said, "The acquisition will allow Galacticomm to bring its vision of the future of online computing to a realization. With TOTALe resources and Galacticomm Technology, we hope to change the Online Community as we see it today." Peter Berg will no longer be part of the new Galaticomm, and plans to become an independent consultant working with educational institutions and providing solutions using TOTALe's/Galacticomm's resources.
http://www.gcomm.com/

Telegrafix News:

Telegrafix owner Pat Clawson recently announced they are seriously re-evaluating their plans to continue serving the BBS community. According to Clawson, this is a result of the constant flaming from BBS Sysops, and a high rate of software piracy and credit card fraud by Sysops using their products illegally.

These constant attacks on Telegrafix date back to the early 1990's when they marketed their "RipPaint" package for $500. Many sysops felt their pricing and policies were out of line. Nowdays, years after their prices were lowered substantialy, the flaming still continues. Some of the more vocal critics argue that RIP will never become popular as long as Telegrafix charges $$$ for the RIPterm/RIPtel terminals.

Last year Telegrafix bought out two BBS programs, Searchlight and ProBoard BBS. Telegrafix plans to release Y2k versions of these BBS packages, and then incorporate much of the code into a future high end server product along with their RIP technology. A number of sysops running these BBS packages felt betrayed by the change in ownership.
http://www.telegrafix.com

EleBBS News:

The service release for EleBBS gamma-4 which was scheduled to be released last month to fix the remaining bugs has been postponed. Several unforseen problems became apparent during recent beta testing of EleBBS, and the author has desided that the planned G-4 service release will be skipped so that he can work towards another full gamma-release (called v0.05.g1) which he hopes to get out as soon as possible. There has not been a release date set at this time.
http://home.wxs.nl/~elevator


Old News Revisited:

Since there was not much news to report this month, lets take a look at some news from half a year ago that has yet to take place.

In the October 1998 BBS News we reported that NetModem 2.0 was finally close to being released. I spoke to Dedrick Allen again this weekend, and he confirmed that although NetModem 2.0 is still not functional, it is "very close" to being released as a public alpha. Visit the October Link for some screen shots and additional info.

Also reported in October 1998 was news that RemoteAccess BBS was going to be updated with structural changes which would break compatibility with third party doors and utilities. RA Developer Bruce Morse has desided to take a differnt approch, rather then breaking existing compatibility he will store the new date-digits in seperate (currently unused) parts of the records. Bruce is still working on getting RA 2.53 released "shortly", which will be the first update since 2.50 was released 3 years ago. Afterwards he plans to also release a Y2K complient version, which will probally be known as RA 2.60 (not 3.0 as originally announced).


If you have any additional BBS related news, please send to mike@pcmicro.com




Hits since May 3 1999:



Older News:
BBS News April 1999
BBS News March 1999
BBS News February 1999
BBS News January 1999
BBS News December 1998
BBS News November 1998
BBS News October 1998
BBS News September 1998
BBS News August 1998
BBS News July 1998
BBS News April 1998
BBS News March 1998
BBS News January 1998
BBS News December 1997
BBS News October 1997

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