Found my old QWK mail. Anybody know how to read it? reddit / bbs ---------------------------------------------------------------------- HotCharlie · 2016-06-15 03:09 I knew I had a 3.5" disk somewhere that had my last dump of email off a board called BARK BBS, from sometime around 94-95. I recently got a few boxes from my mom's house and thought, today, to go digging for it. I did not find the 3.5", but I did find an old folder full of CDR's from around 2001, three of which were marked BACKUP (1,2,3). Damned if I didn't find a folder marked QWK on there. Also a bunch of high school papers in GeoWrite format and some shitty MP3's. The whole of my digital existence on 3 CD's. This is an update on [this old post](https://www.reddit.com/r/bbs/comm ents/3df0oi/bark_bbs_and_other_1800_boards/) (and btw, good God - didn't realize that was nearly a year ago). Well I dug all through the QWK directory and didn't find a single .QWK file. It appears I got a QWK reader for Windows sometime in the late 90's and was using that to read over them, which, if nothing else, seems to have changed the file extension to "WMI". The name of the program is, from the README: *WINDOWS MAIL MANAGER 1.31* *Copyright (c) 1994-96 Jakob Gubensek All rights reserved. This program is shareware.* The actual executable and junk is in that same folder. Win10 didn't want no part of it, even after running in compatibility mode. You all got any ideas? If I can get it open and accessible, I'd be happy to share. Come on and cringe with me. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- djdead · 2016-06-15 03:29 Try multimail: http://multimail.sourceforge.net/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- HotCharlie · 2016-06-15 03:56 Sourceforge isn't wanting to work with me right now (timed out on the download). Thank you, though. I'll revisit it. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- HotCharlie · 2016-06-15 04:02 Here's just a taste of what awaits (my tagline file): * This tagline is shareware. To register send me $10. * RAM = Rarely Adequate Memory * No, don't go! STOP! I LOV&$#? NO CARRIER * "Let's be dark," and power-plant failed to work. * There's always one more bug. * Machines should work; people should think. * All great discoveries are made by mistake. * Friends come and go, but enemies accumulate. * Nothing is as easy as it looks. * Multitasking? Several things screwing up simultaniously. * Don't step on my keybw h8; Bad kitty! No biscuit. * BBS is my second home. * Who can - do. Who can not - teach. Who can not teach - administrate. * "Women are a decorative sex." (Oscar Wilde: The Picture of Dorian Gray) * KIDS!! Please DON'T try this at home! * No words can describe... a bad program. * This message will self-destruct in five seconds... * "If you can't make it good, make it LOOK good." - B Gates I was 14. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- DeusExNoctis · 2016-06-15 04:38 Nothing to offer in the way of assistance, but now you've reminded me of how I spent hours trying to trick out my Blue Wave QWK reader, and how looooong that 200kB mail packet took to download over 2400 baud... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- HotCharlie · 2016-06-15 04:53 Yup, Blue Wave was what I used (just reminded of that while searching on "QWK"). Can't wait til I find my signature. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- beigemore · 2016-06-15 05:08 There are old Windows vmware images you can download and use with the free vmware player. https://winworldpc.com/product/windows-3/wfw-311 https://winworldpc.com/product/windows-95/rtm And as usual there is always DOSbox. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- gergles · 2016-06-15 14:43 A QWK file is just zipped, so you can unzip it and read the messsages.dat file in the zip manually in a text editor if all else fails. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Jesseroonie · 2016-06-15 22:58 There's a pearl script that will convert it to email here: https://github.com/bertogg/bwave2mbox If you'd rather, pm me and I'll convert it for you. Man, this takes me back. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ILikeBumblebees · 2016-06-16 02:55 That happens with some of the SourceForge mirrors -- you can just select a different mirror from the download page and find one that works. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ILikeBumblebees · 2016-06-16 02:56 Looks like output from `fortune`. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- denzuko · 2016-06-19 19:30 The defacto offline QWK mail reader that has worked, will worked, and always works is [BlueWave!](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Wave) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- denzuko · 2016-06-19 19:38 How does freedos/dosbox/dosemu or windows 16/32bit via a hyper visor help read offline echo mail? Don't get me wrong I know one can install a reader inside there but one still needs the reader anyways and not everyone is going to understand how to do that. Plus, one does not need to emulate a COTS from the day and learn an archaic operating system when both Linux and Cygwin has programs that can read QWK packets. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- beigemore · 2016-06-19 19:50 He said Windows 10 won't open his 16-bit Windows app. I was suggesting ways for him to run his app. Feel free to suggest other options. There at several ways to approach his issue. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- denzuko · 2016-06-19 20:06 Nice _perl_ script. Two things could made it better: - Perl's File::Temp [mktemp](http://perldoc.perl.org/File/Temp.html#MKTEMP-FUNCTIONS) - Perl's [IO::Uncompress::Unzip](http://perldoc.perl.org/IO/Uncompress /Unzip.html#Unzipping-a-complete-zip-file-to-disk) Ultimately forking sub shells to call direct commands in Perl is highly anti-pattern when Perl has n-th degree more modules to do it already. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- HotCharlie · 2016-06-20 02:12 I actually tried downloading vmware and used that old Win 98 image. It worked and I installed a new copy of that "Mail Manager" (still available, if you dig some), but I'm just not that slick. Couldn't get it to work. /u/Jesseroonie is on the job, however. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Jesseroonie · 2016-06-20 10:18 The index file in the packet is corrupt. I've found the format definition, an trying to rebuild it. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 1q2w3 · 2016-10-30 12:45 /r/im14andthisisdeep I probably had the same stuff in mine. Envious! Wish I had some record of these days.