Hello!


Is the PLEASE ADD system still in play?


--
--
../|ug

--- OpenXP 5.0.47
* Origin: (2:221/1.58)

Hello Vincent Coen!

** On Wednesday 07.04.21 - 14:37, Vincent Coen wrote to August Abolins:

Is the PLEASE ADD system still in play?

No, see the help file from ELIST etc but it requires a file in the
correct format and name to be sent to 2:25/21.

With all due respect, I cannot find anything in the ELSTxxxx.zip
files pertaining to instructions for listing to backbone.

If it is a matter of just reposting the ELISTbot response into
the Z1_BACKBONE echo, just say that. I just saw Jay H do that.

But you are also saying that a separate message to 2:25/21 is
required? Where is that mentioned in your ELLSTxxxx.zip files?


--
../|ug

--- OpenXP 5.0.49
* Origin: (2:221/1.58)

Hello August!

Wednesday April 07 2021 10:26, you wrote to me:

Hello Vincent Coen!

** On Wednesday 07.04.21 - 14:37, Vincent Coen wrote to August
Abolins:

Is the PLEASE ADD system still in play?

No, see the help file from ELIST etc but it requires a file in
the correct format and name to be sent to 2:25/21.

With all due respect, I cannot find anything in the ELSTxxxx.zip
files pertaining to instructions for listing to backbone.

If it is a matter of just reposting the ELISTbot response into
the Z1_BACKBONE echo, just say that. I just saw Jay H do that.

But you are also saying that a separate message to 2:25/21 is
required? Where is that mentioned in your ELLSTxxxx.zip files?

Look at :

Fast-Readme.txt
elisthlp.txt



Vincent

--- Mageia Linux v7.1 X64/Mbse v1.0.7.21/GoldED+/LNX 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: Air Applewood, The Linux Gateway to the UK & Eire (2:250/1)

Re: PLEASE ADD status
By: Vincent Coen to August Abolins on Wed Apr 07 2021 14:37:13

Is the PLEASE ADD system still in play?

No, see the help file from ELIST etc but it requires a file in the correct format and name to be sent to 2:25/21.

there's a difference between the backbone and the echolist and how they work... AFAIK, they are still separate and distinct entities, too...


)\/(ark
--- SBBSecho 3.11-Linux
* Origin: SouthEast Star Mail HUB - SESTAR (1:3634/12)

Hello Vincent!

Look at :

Fast-Readme.txt
elisthlp.txt

elisthlp.txt = There is nothing in elisthlp.txt about the
backbone.na/no system.

Fast-Readme.txt = only makes a reference to backbone with:

"DIST All Official Fidonet Backbones"

..in one of the examples. But that is not going to highlight
the echo to be added to the backbone.na/no system either.


--
../|ug

--- OpenXP 5.0.49
* Origin: (2:221/1.58)

Hello Vincent!

Sorry must have had an off day - seem to be getting those
more frequently these days since hitting 73+.

NO worries! I think that the Elist bot that you (re)built is
wonderful and necessary. Bottom line in Fidonet is that sysops
can pick and choose with echo they want to host. distribute or
passthru. BUT a global/universal listing of public FTN echos
that the ELIST bot provides is a good directory source.

Next, all this hobby needs is a directory that indicates WHO
carries what echo. :D

--
../|ug

--- OpenXP 5.0.49
* Origin: (2:221/1.58)

Re: PLEASE ADD status
By: Vincent Coen to August Abolins on Wed Apr 07 2021 14:37:13

Is the PLEASE ADD system still in play?

No, see the help file from ELIST etc but it requires a file in the correct

format and name to be sent to 2:25/21.

there's a difference between the backbone and the echolist and how they work..
AFAIK, they are still separate and distinct entities, too...

Ayup.. :)

Take care,
Janis

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-5
* Origin: Prism bbs (1:261/38)

Hello Sean!

there's a difference between the backbone and the echolist
and how they work... AFAIK, they are still separate and
distinct entities, too...

From what I understand, an echo cannot be put on the NAB unless it is elisted. Now this was from when I first got into Fidonet in the
mid 90s and AFAIK it's never changed.

Ah... so there *IS* a connection and not a complete distinction
per se.

I guess Ben Ritchey's elist bot was a way to partially automate
things with computers that were built to automate things and
produce structured uniform announcements.

It would probably make no difference if the NAB based its echo
selection from an announcement in ECHO_ADS or some other echo
for such a purpose?

But considering that the last known post in this echo was in Nov
2020 and went unanswered until Apr 2021, means that the echo
movers are not watching this echo?
--
../|ug

--- OpenXP 5.0.49
* Origin: (2:221/1.58)

Re: PLEASE ADD status
By: August Abolins to Sean Dennis on Thu Apr 08 2021 05:12 pm

From what I understand, an echo cannot be put on the NAB unless it
is elisted. Now this was from when I first got into Fidonet in the
mid 90s and AFAIK it's never changed.

Ah... so there *IS* a connection and not a complete distinction
per se.

It is distinct. They are not the same thing. The backbone lists echo areas that are listed in the echolist but it is a different thing. The echolist may list many echoes that are not on the backbone for different reasons.

If a moderator wants an echo on the backbone they are free to do that but they might choose not too, it's a choice they make.

While the backbone is called "The North American BackBone", it is not limited in any way to North America. The backbone started as a way to mesh echoes and connect to regions and nets years ago, and it still does that today.

I am not a backbone hub, but that is my view and understanding of the backbone.

Ttyl :-),
Al

... I didn't claw my way to the top of the food chain to eat vegetables!
--- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757.2)

On 08 Apr 21 17:12:00, August Abolins said the following to Sean Dennis:

But considering that the last known post in this echo was in Nov
2020 and went unanswered until Apr 2021, means that the echo
movers are not watching this echo?

Whenever I see the phrase "echo movers" its stepping into a time machine going back to the 90's. And thats where the NAB belongs.

I really enjoyed submitting a D'Bridge release several years ago to the NAB which Janis then rudely rejected based on a false-positive from ClamAV and Ben Ritchey then happily chimed in with Captain Obvious advice on how to write Fido software... Ben of course had no problem happily running my software
as a point for many years or slamming my system with rediculous test-posts.

What utter nonsense that we must "Elist" an echo or have a "NAB" pick it up. Anyone can start an echo in 2021, announce it anywhere and within hours
someone is gonna pick it up... lather rince repeat... minutes in the case
of Wilfred van Velzen - I'll fart and within minutes he'll try to areafix what I had for dinner.

One doesn't need permission from "echo movers" and we don't need a "backbone".

Nick

--- Renegade vY2Ka2
* Origin: Joey, do you like movies about gladiators? (1:229/426)

Re: Re: PLEASE ADD status
By: Sean Dennis to mark lewis on Wed Apr 07 2021 22:39:02

there's a difference between the backbone and the echolist
and how they work... AFAIK, they are still separate and
distinct entities, too...

From what I understand, an echo cannot be put on the NAB unless
it is elisted. Now this was from when I first got into Fidonet
in the mid 90s and AFAIK it's never changed.

that's correct... in fact, at one time, all of the backbones required an echo to be listed in the echolist before deciding if the echo would be carried on the backbone in question... there were three main ones, that i
recall... they are/were the NAB, Z1B, and WWB... matt bedynek's system interfaced with all three of them to facilitate comms between them... not only routed netmail but the echos that were carried on them... his system really
put in some work in those days :)


)\/(ark
--- SBBSecho 3.11-Linux
* Origin: SouthEast Star Mail HUB - SESTAR (1:3634/12)

Hello mark,

Thursday April 08 2021 22:21, you wrote to me:

that's correct... in fact, at one time, all of the backbones required
an echo to be listed in the echolist before deciding if the echo would
be carried on the backbone in question... there were three main ones,
that i recall... they are/were the NAB, Z1B, and WWB... matt bedynek's system interfaced with all three of them to facilitate comms between them... not only routed netmail but the echos that were carried on
them... his system really put in some work in those days :)

I remember all of that quite well and posting around to get my echoes carried on all three backbones. At least it's not that crazy anymore except with netmail.

-- Sean

... Help stamp out, eliminate, and abolish redundancy!
--- GoldED/2 3.0.1
* Origin: Outpost BBS * bbs.outpostbbs.net:10123 (1:18/200)

Hello mark!

** On Thursday 08.04.21 - 22:21, you wrote to Sean Dennis:

...at one time, all of the backbones required an echo to be
listed in the echolist before deciding if the echo would be
carried on the backbone in question... there were three
main ones, that i recall... they are/were the NAB, Z1B, and
WWB...

I found that part very confusing back in the day. I started and
moderated at least one echo IEEE for a while.

matt bedynek's system interfaced with all three of
them to facilitate comms between them... not only routed
netmail but the echos that were carried on them... his
system really put in some work in those days :)

I don't remember that detail. What did the letters in "WWB"
stand for?

--
../|ug

--- OpenXP 5.0.49
* Origin: (2:221/1.58)

Hello Sean and others!

Friday April 09 2021 11:43, you wrote to mark lewis:

Hello mark,

Thursday April 08 2021 22:21, you wrote to me:

that's correct... in fact, at one time, all of the backbones
required an echo to be listed in the echolist before deciding if
the echo would be carried on the backbone in question... there
were three main ones, that i recall... they are/were the NAB,
Z1B, and WWB... matt bedynek's system interfaced with all three
of them to facilitate comms between them... not only routed
netmail but the echos that were carried on them... his system
really put in some work in those days :)

I remember all of that quite well and posting around to get my echoes carried on all three backbones. At least it's not that crazy anymore
except with netmail.

The primary issue I see (and did then) was that there is no uniform place / file etc where you can see what Echo's are available.

Now Janis seems to keep the most as far as I can tell and I get most of them but that depends on what my downlinks request from my system and here all are held i.e., none are on passthru (as far as I know that is).

This way any downlink can connect and request a RESCAN for echo area and some do just that.

As far as a response to a message here I ingored it as I 'Assumed' that some one from North American would at the end I did but may have mis-understood
the question as a request to ADD status etc is in the wrong echo at best but as
the Elist maintainer it is not really down to me but the moderator for that echo and that only entails sending a MOD-ADD file to my system and then check in ELIST to confirm it has been added or not receiving a error message via netmail if the file has an error.



Vincent

--- Mageia Linux v7.1 X64/Mbse v1.0.7.21/GoldED+/LNX 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: Air Applewood, The Linux Gateway to the UK & Eire (2:250/1)

Hello Nick!

** On Thursday 08.04.21 - 19:08, your wrote to me:

I really enjoyed submitting a D'Bridge release several
years ago to the NAB which Janis then rudely rejected based
on a false-positive from ClamAV and Ben Ritchey then
happily chimed in with..

But you digress! ;)

What utter nonsense that we must "Elist" an echo or have a
"NAB" pick it up. Anyone can start an echo in 2021,
announce it anywhere and within hours someone is gonna pick
it up... lather rince repeat... minutes in the case of
Wilfred van Velzen - I'll fart and within minutes he'll try
to areafix what I had for dinner.

The ELIST doubles as a kind of creation and listing system. Once
an echo is created, the resultant listings provide a kind of
catalog of available echos, in one place, where anyone could
"shop" and see what's available.

The sorted and unsorted lists in the Fidogazette are pretty good
too.

The only other thing lacking from a user's pov is *where* an
echo could be requested.

One doesn't need permission from "echo movers" and we don't
need a "backbone".

It is good to know that permission per se is not required, and
the backbone is essentially the network of participating systems
or nodes.

--
../|ug

--- OpenXP 5.0.49
* Origin: (2:221/1.58)

Hello Vincent!

** On Friday 09.04.21 - 22:26, your wrote to Sean Dennis:

I remember all of that quite well and posting around to get
my echoes carried on all three backbones. At least it's not
that crazy anymore except with netmail.

The primary issue I see (and did then) was that there is no
uniform place / file etc where you can see what Echo's are
available.

The Elist bot is pretty good. Users can be steered to grab a
copy of the ELSTxxxx.xip file on their preferred fido BBS, or
they can take a look inside a recent Fidogazette for the sorted/
unsorted table.

It would be neat if there was a kind of ECHOFIND service (akin
to FILEFIND) that would return matches for a specific topic that
people are looking for.

Now Janis seems to keep the most as far as I can tell and I
get most of them but that depends on what my downlinks
request from my system and here all are held i.e., none are
on passthru (as far as I know that is).

There is nothing else comparable to the list in Janis'
Fidogazette.

Good to hear that your system can process them all if needed.

This way any downlink can connect and request a RESCAN for
echo area and some do just that.

%RESCAN is a handy feature.

--
../|ug

--- OpenXP 5.0.49
* Origin: (2:221/1.58)

Re: PLEASE ADD status
By: August Abolins to mark lewis on Fri Apr 09 2021 17:20:00

...at one time, all of the backbones required an echo to be
listed in the echolist before deciding if the echo would be
carried on the backbone in question... there were three
main ones, that i recall... they are/were the NAB, Z1B, and
WWB...

I found that part very confusing back in the day.

for some people, it was kinda confusing... but remember, too, that back then one generally had only one feed... and just like with an echo, if you didn't like how the 'bone you were connected to was operating or you didn't
like something it did, there was a choice and you could switch to another 'bone... switching was likely also painless, other than changing the feed address in one's configs and the system to poll, because most all areas were
carried on the 'bones...

I started and moderated at least one echo IEEE for a while.

i carried that one for a little while... i remember the original fidonet.org email<->netmail gateway was managed by burt juda and provided/supported by IEEE...

matt bedynek's system interfaced with all three of
them to facilitate comms between them... not only routed
netmail but the echos that were carried on them... his
system really put in some work in those days :)

I don't remember that detail.

most wouldn't unless they were paying attention to the who's who of the various backbones and keeping up with all that stuff...

What did the letters in "WWB" stand for?

World Wide Backbone...



)\/(ark
--- SBBSecho 3.11-Linux
* Origin: SouthEast Star Mail HUB - SESTAR (1:3634/12)

August Abolins wrote to Vincent Coen <=-

It would be neat if there was a kind of ECHOFIND service (akin
to FILEFIND) that would return matches for a specific topic that
people are looking for.

That would be an interesting idea. If I was a better programmer, I'd
use that to read messages and put the echo info into a SQLite
database.

-- Sean

... A penny saved is a Congressional oversight.
___ MultiMail/Win v0.52

--- Maximus/2 3.01
* Origin: Outpost BBS * bbs.outpostbbs.net:10123 (1:18/200)

Vincent Coen wrote to Sean Dennis <=-

The primary issue I see (and did then) was that there is no uniform
place / file etc where you can see what Echo's are available.

There is the ECHO_ADS echo. It's really underused. I should start
advertising my echoes in there. Perhaps someone could keep a list
that could be FREQ'd or something?

-- Sean

... My ex is living proof of how stupid I can be.
___ MultiMail/Win v0.52

--- Maximus/2 3.01
* Origin: Outpost BBS * bbs.outpostbbs.net:10123 (1:18/200)

Hello Sean!

Monday April 12 2021 18:20, you wrote to me:

Vincent Coen wrote to Sean Dennis <=-

The primary issue I see (and did then) was that there is no
uniform place / file etc where you can see what Echo's are
available.

There is the ECHO_ADS echo. It's really underused. I should start advertising my echoes in there. Perhaps someone could keep a list
that could be FREQ'd or something?

I have put an idea out to Janis to add all of the available (Fido) echo such as
hosted on her system to add in to elist with myself as elistmaint as the mod with what ever little info is available to use then allow any interested parties to take over the 'mod' from me for each one.

That way the elist reporting would I hope be as complete as possible where the ELIST.NA would then reflect that.

Still waiting for a reply to that idea.

Any one else with thoughts on this ?

Note there is no reason why the elist system cannot be used for the other networks out there as the program already (generally) supports this.
Just need some minor changes to output the reporting files in the individual reporting files to match up.


Vincent

--- Mageia Linux v7.1 X64/Mbse v1.0.7.21/GoldED+/LNX 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: Air Applewood, The Linux Gateway to the UK & Eire (2:250/1)

On 04-14-21 14:43, Vincent Coen <=-
spoke to Sean Dennis about PLEASE ADD status <=-

I have put an idea out to Janis to add all of the available (Fido)
echo such as
hosted on her system to add in to elist with myself as elistmaint as
the mod with what ever little info is available to use then allow any interested parties to take over the 'mod' from me for each one.

There are echos for which the moderator intentionally does not want the
echo included in the Elist. It would be a serious mistake for anyone to
list them, claiming to be the moderator.

Note there is no reason why the elist system cannot be used for the
other networks out there as the program already (generally) supports
this. Just need some minor changes to output the reporting files in the individual reporting files to match up.

The Elist has never been a Fidonet only listing. There were always
echos from other networks included. When did that change?

Dale Shipp
fido_261_1466 (at) verizon (dot) net
(1:261/1466)


... Shipwrecked in Silver Spring, Maryland. 00:21:38, 15 Apr 2021
___ Blue Wave/DOS v2.30

--- Maximus/NT 3.01
* Origin: Owl's Anchor (1:261/1466)

On 04-14-21 14:43, Vincent Coen <=-
spoke to Sean Dennis about PLEASE ADD status <=-

I have put an idea out to Janis to add all of the available (Fido)
echo such as
hosted on her system to add in to elist with myself as elistmaint as
the mod with what ever little info is available to use then allow any
interested parties to take over the 'mod' from me for each one.

There are echos for which the moderator intentionally does not want the
echo included in the Elist. It would be a serious mistake for anyone to
list them, claiming to be the moderator.

Most definitely...

Note there is no reason why the elist system cannot be used for the
other networks out there as the program already (generally) supports
this. Just need some minor changes to output the reporting files in the
individual reporting files to match up.

The Elist has never been a Fidonet only listing. There were always
echos from other networks included. When did that change?

It has not.

Dale, you are quite correct on both your points.

Sorry Vincent, I just don't see your "vision" happening.

Take care,
Janis

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-5
* Origin: Prism bbs (1:261/38)

Hello Dale Shipp!

** On Thursday 15.04.21 - 00:19, Dale Shipp wrote to Vincent Coen:

The Elist has never been a Fidonet only listing. There
were always echos from other networks included. When did
that change?

I wasn't aware that the Elist included othernets. I don't think
I ever saw an elist publication that included anything except
Fidonet-only when Ben Ritchey produced files.

Can you point to a set that had some othernets?

--
../|ug

--- OpenXP 5.0.49
* Origin: (2:221/1.58)

Re: PLEASE ADD status
By: August Abolins to Dale Shipp on Fri Apr 16 2021 10:11 am

I wasn't aware that the Elist included othernets. I don't think
I ever saw an elist publication that included anything except Fidonet-only when Ben Ritchey produced files.

Yes, at one time the echolist was about 60% fidonet and 40% familynet with a few others mixed in.

Can you point to a set that had some othernets?

Let me have a look around..

Ttyl :-),
Al

... All real programs contain errors.
--- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757.2)

On 04-16-21 10:11, August Abolins <=-
spoke to Dale Shipp about PLEASE ADD status <=-

The Elist has never been a Fidonet only listing. There
were always echos from other networks included. When did
that change?

I wasn't aware that the Elist included othernets. I don't think
I ever saw an elist publication that included anything except Fidonet-only when Ben Ritchey produced files.

Can you point to a set that had some othernets?

Sorry, I cannot find a reference to an index of old echolists. In this
packet I see that someone else has confirmed the presence of othernets
in the Elist.
The Elist had always advertised itself as not being a Fido net
instrument, but a place for interested moderators of any network to list
and thus publize their echos.

Dale Shipp
fido_261_1466 (at) verizon (dot) net
(1:261/1466)


... Shipwrecked in Silver Spring, Maryland. 01:09:46, 17 Apr 2021
___ Blue Wave/DOS v2.30

--- Maximus/NT 3.01
* Origin: Owl's Anchor (1:261/1466)

Hello Dale!

** On Saturday 17.04.21 - 01:06, you wrote:

Can you point to a set that had some othernets?

Sorry, I cannot find a reference to an index of old
echolists. In this packet I see that someone else has
confirmed the presence of othernets in the Elist.

Thanks for checking.

The Elist had always advertised itself as not being a Fido
net instrument, but a place for interested moderators of
any network to list and thus publize their echos.

But it *is* true that if someone moderating an echo on an
othernet participated in Ben Ritchey's echo registration system,
it then got inlcuded in the distributed archive?

Is that what the DISTrib and GROUP tags are for?

eg.

GROUP scinet
DIST worlwide

I don't remember seeing other GROUPs (or nets) in those files
other than FIDO


--
../|ug

--- OpenXP 5.0.49
* Origin: (2:221/1.58)

Re: PLEASE ADD status
By: August Abolins to Dale Shipp on Fri Apr 16 2021 10:11:00

The Elist has never been a Fidonet only listing. There
were always echos from other networks included. When did
that change?

I wasn't aware that the Elist included othernets. I don't think
I ever saw an elist publication that included anything except
Fidonet-only when Ben Ritchey produced files.

that is most likely because ben's list was started clean with no data from the previous echolist...

Can you point to a set that had some othernets?

any echolist from before ben took it over, really... my site currently has echolists going back as far as 1997... adrian walker was the maintainer at that time... unfortunately looking at a few of those old lists, i do not see
the network field... i think that was added later and possibly by adrian...


ftp://sestar.synchro.net/file.dist.net/ECHOLIST/00index.html%3Fsort=time


ELIST808.ZIP (Aug 1998) is the first one i see with the "GROUP" field where the network code (eg: FIDO, CFN, FMLY, ADS, etc) is listed...


)\/(ark
--- SBBSecho 3.11-Linux
* Origin: SouthEast Star Mail HUB - SESTAR (1:3634/12)

Hello mark!

** On Saturday 17.04.21 - 13:20, you wrote to me:

Can you point to a set that had some othernets?

any echolist from before ben took it over, really... my site currently
has echolists going back as far as 1997... adrian walker was the maintainer at that time... unfortunately looking at a few of those old lists, i do not see the network field... i think that was added later and possibly by adrian...

ftp://sestar.synchro.net/file.dist.net/ECHOLIST/00index.html%3Fsort=time

Thank you. For the longest time, FTP links like that wouldn't
work from you system. Now they do.

The one on TRMB (also Synchro) doesn't load.

ELIST808.ZIP (Aug 1998) is the first one i see with the "GROUP" field where the network code (eg: FIDO, CFN, FMLY, ADS, etc) is listed...

Thanks for that. Then the possibly for net-owners or othernet
moderators to employ the Elist system could be usable.

An ECHOFIND system (akin to FILEFIND) would be a nice
improvement to the FTN messaging experience.

Maybe the ELIST system itself could incorporate a query
mechanism that responds via netmail.

--
../|ug

--- OpenXP 5.0.49
* Origin: (2:221/1.58)

Re: PLEASE ADD status
By: August Abolins to mark lewis on Wed Apr 21 2021 08:03 am

The one on TRMB (also Synchro) doesn't load.

I just loaded ftp://trmb.synchro.net with lynx and it worked for me. I don't know why it doesn't work for you.

Ttyl :-),
Al

... As easy as 3.1415926535897932384626433832795028841
--- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757.2)

Hello Dale Shipp!

** On Thursday 15.04.21 - 00:19, Dale Shipp wrote to Vincent Coen:

The Elist has never been a Fidonet only listing. There
were always echos from other networks included. When did
that change?

It seems to have changed when sysops stopped marketing.

Or.. when fidonet and othernets were more active, maybe users
managed to do most of the legwork tracking things down? now
users (the conversationalists) have moved on to the internet
(forums/chats) and use their smartphones for that.

I hear sysops lamenting the traffic in echos is not as it used
to be. But today, I see mostly sysops chatting between sysops.

There are a few othernets that could serve users looking for conversation/info well. But there isn't any easy way for those
users to find out what those echos are.

The ELIST bot/system is a good automated way to register echos
for *any* net. Then it becomes a nice catch-all for users to
browse and explore the echos available.

There are two solutions that consolidate fidonet and othernets
that exist quite well:

[1] Rob Swindell's list of participating Synchronet BBSes in
the "Networks" column, here:

http://synchro.net/sbbslist.html

[2] Bryan Ashby's initiative called FTN Networks

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/
17pmf7cS9ocU99Rm6qlJD_OncqmbDI5Qj8Yw99A5bgVc/edit?usp=sharing

https://tinyurl.com/yhnw56n2

Both are excellent one-stop places that document available
othernets and fidonet.

But what is lacking is something the summarizes echomail areas
within those nets and where they are available - from a USERS
point of view.

I see that ELIST could do that. An entry for FSX_GEN could
look like this for example in its most minimal form:

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Echo Successfully Identified

TAGname: FSX_GEN Group: fsxNET

TITLe: Chat, Testing + More..

MODerator: UNSPECIFIED

ORIGIN: 21:1/100

-=:{ End of Report }:=- ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

And the info could be gleened from an available FSXNET.NA file.

The ELIST system could include copies of the fsxNET info kit.

Then the ELIST echo becomes a good one-stop shop to find
available echos.

--
../|ug

--- OpenXP 5.0.49
* Origin: (2:221/1.58)

On 05-10-21 08:17, August Abolins <=-
spoke to Dale Shipp about PLEASE ADD status <=-

Or.. when fidonet and othernets were more active, maybe users
managed to do most of the legwork tracking things down? now
users (the conversationalists) have moved on to the internet (forums/chats) and use their smartphones for that.

I would agree with you that is the case in many echos. However, it has
not been true for the only echo I really care about -- COOKING. Most of
the participants there have been users over the past decade. The number
of participants and the number of messages have declined, but the echo
remained to be an echo of people talking to people about common
interests, mostly food. As such it was usually in the top five echos
for volume among the echos that were not basically robot posts (e.g.
weather).

Unfortunately, I have concern that even that echo is in the throes of
death. It has received two blows in the past few months that are
causing it to possibly drop below critical mass. The first was the
death of the moderator (who was not a sysop) a few months ago. The
second blow was Ed Koon pulling the plug on DOCSPLACE, which was used by
many of the users. I think that all of those who are regulars have now
found other BBSes they can use, but it was nevertheless a serious blow.
Time will tell whether of not the echo will survive. I hope it does.

Dale Shipp
fido_261_1466 (at) verizon (dot) net
(1:261/1466)


... Shipwrecked in Silver Spring, Maryland. 00:33:39, 11 May 2021
___ Blue Wave/DOS v2.30

--- Maximus/NT 3.01
* Origin: Owl's Anchor (1:261/1466)

Hello August!

Monday May 10 2021 08:17, you wrote to Dale Shipp:

-!- cut ----

And the info could be gleened from an available FSXNET.NA file.

The ELIST system could include copies of the fsxNET info kit.

Then the ELIST echo becomes a good one-stop shop to find
available echos.

I have no objection to include BASIC other net info archives which includes a list of areas, and a contact list to obtain such.

While I am happy to host as I do get all of the available FIDO based one's (as far as I know), I would prefer not to end up with too many AKA's to do so
such as nnn/10/1 where nnn is the zone for the network.

I will allow the elist system to continue using the normal ELIST.RPT as the global list but could also do special lists for .RPT and .NA for each if needed. Will involve some small changes to the elist code.

The idea of using ELIST to hold ALL available echos appeals to me as a one stop
location for ALL available echos a decision regarding the current processes for
Moderator/CoMod and list time line before renewal has to be decided as at the moment each echo has to be updated once every six months with a 4 month gap
for warnings 1 through 4 and a following 1 month grace period so 11 months in all as a minimum.

The only benefit of this to me is to stop dead echo's remaining in list.
This has been a feature for ELIST since Dana Bell designed the original s/w around 1994 as ECHOBASE for FamilyNet and no there is no sources available !

Although a slightly better idea would be able to check each echo for posts and then only flag them for possible deletion if there is less than 13 posts over year which allows for a monthly rules type posting but this assumes I have s/w library (in C or similar) that can check my JAM message base that has all of the listed echos available, which I have not located.

Any one with thoughts on the above,

Vincent

--- Mageia Linux v7.1 X64/Mbse v1.0.7.21/GoldED+/LNX 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: Air Applewood, The Linux Gateway to the UK & Eire (2:250/1)