See www.saltairbbs.com

PCBoard v16 (currently) is online so people can see how far we are in
the rewrite. Attempts were made to migrate from MSC to GCC without
success. Stepping back and looking at the project, and our other
efforts, the decision was made to port the code to a different language
and framework. v16 is now written using Modern Pascal, and designed
using the Modern Pascal Coderunner framework. Modern Pascal is
available as a command line compiler and interpreter, along with an
Apache Mod, allowing you to code web scripts. Coderunner is a socket
server that processes your code. Coderunner is self-threading and
manages memory allocation per thread. Allowing developers to focus on
their code, somewhat like a modern DOOR-KIT.

PCBoard v16 file structures are being revised also. v15 and older were
limited in scope. For example, having an array in the USERS for
LastRead means the larger your site the slower and bulkier your USERS
file was and the memory requirement also increased. With this said, we
have migrated v16 to using the JAM message base. It has a superior
design from other message bases, while keeping the flexability
introduced by PCBoards MSGS extended headers. Currently we have build a
NNTP (Newsgroup Server) as part of PCBoard v16 Registered Suite. It
allows the sysop and users to access the message areas using their
logon credentials, from Desktop and Mobile devices. * It also allowed
us to seriously stress test the JAMmb engine before swapping MSGS for
JAM sturctures. JAM also tracks per user per message area the LAST READ
- reducing the memory requirements that previous PCBoard USERS records introduced.

PCBoard v16 is being released as Open Source. We are doing this as it
is a complete rewrite from scratch. NO previous code is used for this
new design. Opening the rights so we can release as Open Source. Note
Open Source does not mean we wave the rights to the source in any way.
PCBoard v16 is (c) Modern Pascal Solutions, LLC. PCBoard v16 is still
marketed as a commercial product. The source is being offered to help third-party developers produce new PCBoard modifications. We have
removed the kludge script engine PPE. Instead the whole produce is now
a Coderunner script. So if, for example, you had written a replacement
for the prompt... you can do it again replacing doPrompt.inc with your fancy/ANSI version.

PCBoard v16 uses the built-in features of TStringList to extend
PCBTEXT. A previous limitation was PCBTEXT allowed up to 60 characters
per prompt. This meant fancy/ANSI animations or color sequences for
prompts had to fit into 60 bytes. For some this was impossible, so they
had to embed PPE links for prompt. In the modem age, the latency was
not notable, in todays gigabit Internet age, it was noticable. So.
v16's PCBTEXT is BYTE 1 = FG color (1 to 15) (0=last color or no color change), followed by as many characters you want and terminated with
EOL (Carriage Return and/or Line Feed - depending upon your Operating
System). This change in itself truly extends the capability of making
an iCE or ACiD looking BBS... while reducing all of the overhead of PPE scripts as prompts. What if you want to replace a prompt with a script
for even more control? You simply modify the associate *.inc file with
your requirements. Coderunner uses a JIT (Just In Time) compiler, and
will merge your code change on the next connection it handles.

*** What if their is a bug in my new mod? ***

Simply start Coderunner in a terminal - using a different terminal
telnet to your BBS - the error will show on the previous terminal. We
have tried to make sure all error messages include the line number
(even relative to the *.inc file(s)), and character position on that
line - with a description of what is wrong with said line. Example:
* Invalid evaluation at line 133, column 1 in file "/var/www/BBS/pcboard/main.p"

Usually that means you forgot to put a semicolon at the end of the
previous line, or you have a stray character/invalid syntax at the
start of this line.

*** Uptime/Downtime Schedule ***

SaltAirBBS.com is linking right to our in-house source code. So, there
will be periods where you are unable to connect. Or you may be
disconnected while we rollout a change. We work on the source code 7
days a week. Once we achieve Beta status, we will move pre-alpha to a different port on the servers. This way (like the old modem days) you
can access the stable release, or the cutting edge release - depending
where you connect on our servers.

* IF YOU DO NOT HAVE ACCESS TO A TERMINAL - WWW.EXCHANGEBBS.COM
DEFAULTS TO THE ALPHA CODE IN A BROWSER *

--
.. Ozz Nixon
... Author ExchangeBBS (suite)
.... Since 1983 BBS Developer

--- ExchangeBBS NNTP Server v3.1/Linux64
* Origin: (1:1/123)

On 21 Apr 2019 at 12:01p, Ozz Nixon pondered and said...

See www.saltairbbs.com

PCBoard v16 (currently) is online so people can see how far we are in
the rewrite. Attempts were made to migrate from MSC to GCC without

perhaps x-post into fsx_bbs also Ozz?

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A43 2019/03/03 (Windows/32)
* Origin: Agency BBS | Dunedin, New Zealand | agency.bbs.nz (3:770/100)

Ozz Nixon wrote to All <=-

See www.saltairbbs.com

PCBoard v16 (currently) is online so people can see how far we
are in the rewrite.

<SNIP>

Wow! This is AWESOME! Just connected and looked around, and it
looks fantastic!

Thank you for all the effort on this, look forward to seeing it
evolve!



... Beware of programmers who carry screwdrivers.
=== MultiMail/Linux v0.51
--- SBBSecho 3.07-Linux
* Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (1:123/115)

On 2019-04-21 15:22:00 +0000, Dan Clough -> Ozz Nixon said:

Wow! This is AWESOME! Just connected and looked around, and it
looks fantastic!

Thank you for all the effort on this, look forward to seeing it
evolve!

Thank you Dan! Kudos means a lot. I spent most of last year rewriting
the setup program... and until 3 weeks ago - it felt like this was
never going to happen - mainly with the struggle of keeping the code
backward compatible. Then I said who cares!? Why be compatible with
1996 (23 yrs ago!)...

That truly helped me get a jump on getting the PAE edition to where it
is over the past 21 days (22 days ago I deleted everything and started
from scratch)... so what you saw is 3 weeks of passion!

Public Alpha is expected June 15th, Beta July 1st, Official Release by August.

Right now, I am trying to figure out what is causing a serious CPU
spike when a new user creates there account...

--
.. Ozz Nixon
... Author ExchangeBBS (suite)
.... Since 1983 BBS Developer

--- ExchangeBBS NNTP Server v3.1/Linux64
* Origin: (1:1/123)

Re: Re: PCBoard v16 (Pre-Alpha)
By: Ozz Nixon to Dan Clough on Sun Apr 21 2019 07:17 pm

Thank you Dan! Kudos means a lot. I spent most of last year rewriting
the setup program... and until 3 weeks ago - it felt like this was
never going to happen - mainly with the struggle of keeping the code backward compatible. Then I said who cares!? Why be compatible with
1996 (23 yrs ago!)...

Yeah, I connected to it too, looks really good! Brought back some great memories!
Regards,
KrUpTiOn
--- SBBSecho 3.07-Linux
* Origin: The New Frontier ][ BBS(frontierbbs.net) - [Ohio] (1:226/17)