Comparison, Pros, Cons, Features, and a Question reddit / bbs ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Vloshko · 2019-12-14 18:54 Greetings, as this post will demonstrate, I'm a newb when it comes to BBS. I'm interested in the following, in order: 1. Enigma1/2 2. Mystic⸸ 3. ~~Renegade~~ I've spent the last 2 1/2 weeks browsing and searching the following documentation: * [http://www.mysticbbs.com/features.html](http://www.mysticbbs.com/fe atures.html) * [http://wiki.mysticbbs.com/doku.php](http://wiki.mysticbbs.com/doku. php) * [https://nuskooler.github.io/enigma- bbs/](https://nuskooler.github.io/enigma-bbs/) * [https://github.com/NuSkooler/enigma- bbs](https://github.com/NuSkooler/enigma-bbs) * [http://renegadebbs.info/docs/](http://renegadebbs.info/docs/) The difficulty I'm facing at the moment is figuring out specific terms to search with to see which of these fit my "wants" best. I've tried watching a video here and there, yet this isn't ideal since I retain information best when I read it at my own pace and take notes; pause/resume/rewind becomes distracting. Any way, I've consumed a lot of information about these 3 and it's become a bit confusing due to attempting to figure out proper terms. It would be quite helpful to me if anyone could give a quick comparison of the 3, a brief pros/cons list, and the most notable features that make them stand out from one another. The one term that I have tried several synonyms of that I'm having difficulty figuring out more than other terms is basically "permissions". Specifically user "levels" or "ranks" that determine if they have clearance/credentials to view or interact with "X" or "Y"... I have a VPS that runs on CentOS Linux x86, that is already hosting a few sites, and I will most likely host the BBS there as well... Unless someone has a good reason as to why I shouldn't. Since someone is bound to ask what I want to use a BBS for, I make physical mechanical puzzles as a hobby and I worked as an artist for 13 years. I would like to experiment with creating ANSI art and make a portion of the BBS into a puzzle, incorporating the two together for an interesting "story". In addition, I would like to create a few messaging boards for a group I'm part of. I'm sure I'll want to do more in the future, but for now I'll focus on those 2ish things. Chess is fun too. Once I decide on a system, my first plan of action is basically play around with the system to get some hands-on familiarity and after that will be layout. Not going to jump to far ahead in the planning department from those 2 initial steps. Since my main goal is to have fun while being challenged and learning. Finally, is there a question you think I should be asking? ​ Thank you for taking the time to read this. ​ P.S. I've also spent some time on various BBSes that use the 3 above via SyncTERM exploring and its made me feel like a kid again, tons of fun. ​ ⸸: Wary due to frequent long term hiatus by dev. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- cloverskull · 2019-12-15 07:36 I’ll break down my thoughts in terms of what makes the most sense, IMO, to run a telnet or ssh BBS in 2019, based simply on the main software capabilities themselves. Full disclosure: I use Mystic. But enigma has influenced me enough to try my hand at writing my own software. So take what I say with a grain of salt. 1. Renegade: DOS based BBS hacked together long enough to survive now with no real 21st century advantages. It has most of the problems of a DOS software with the only advantages being easy to replicate, and arguably, being completely replicated in your other examples. 2. Mystic: Closed source 21st century BBS with a single point of failure. g00r00 is a fantastic programmer but is flying solo at the helm of mystic. A lot of progress tends to happen in a spurt, and then he disappears for months. He also tends to focus on things which, IMO, aren’t necessarily all that important (like writing a from-scratch web server and bundling it with the BBS when things like qwk networking is broken and python support is super basic and stuck on 2.7). 3. Enigma: Based on node.js, opensource, responsive author, written from the get-go for the 21st century. I can’t seem to wrap my head around the way nuskooler wants file base interaction to take place, but aside from that, IMO it’s the ideal 21st century BBS software. Being able to leverage modern strategies for exposing a software service to the open internet, plus having the ability to rely on multiple sets of eyes due to the open source nature of the project, mean this software is the ideal way forward. Plus, it’s light years faster than synchronet, which I’ll certainly catch some flak for. :) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Vloshko · 2019-12-15 19:03 Your write up is enlightening and includes one thing I forgot to ask about, being: the activity of the devs. >Plus, it’s light years faster than synchronet, which I’ll certainly catch some flak for. :) I did read through a lot of Synchornet documentation and played around with that first on BBSes by others and I disliked it based on first impressions of a few hours of use. In short you confirmed some thoughts I had about each but couldn't know for sure, since I haven't been around this long enough. I think I'll cross Renegade off the list, Mystic is a possible backup plan, which I would do so warily. Enigma has moved to #1. Thank you for your thoughts ---------------------------------------------------------------------- lucidphreak · 2019-12-18 02:24 X/84 should be in there as well... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- mro_1337 · 2019-12-18 04:09 hey you crossed out the best bbs out of that bunch. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- mro_1337 · 2019-12-18 04:12 the advantage of renegade is it is user friendly [a bbs system is for the users], it is simple to configure and modify by the sysop. personally, renegade is fun to run. it's fun to mod. also why do you think enigma is 'faster' than synchronet? faster in what respect? synchronet is actually known for running fast and efficient. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- cloverskull · 2019-12-18 05:29 Synchronet feels sluggish to me compared to mystic and enigma. With the latter two, a key press results in a feeling of something happening instantaneously; synchronet has a noticeable lag. Renegade is user friendly, I don’t dispute that, it’s just a bit of a dead end :/ and the benefit of something like enigma is that not only was it written using modern technology, but it’s kept up to date. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- nolageek · 2019-12-18 14:34 1. I don't have much experience with Renegade, so I can't really comment on it. I remember it being around 'back in the day' but my area didn't have many (if any) that I was aware of. 2. Mystic /u/cloverskull summed up Mystic pretty well. It's popular for a reason; it's easy to use, easy to configure via menus and is flexible. You can do a lot with it without a ;lot of programming, but you can do even more if you dig into the files. I like it's default menu structure a lot, and I based my synchronet board's shell on it; kind of. 3. Enigma. Again, /u/cloverskull had a good summary. My only addition is that then I used it about two years ago there wasn't a configuration UI, so everything had to be done via hjson files and text editors. Enigma is great if you like getting your hands dirty. You'll need to know, or learn, a bit about hjson, javascript, node.js and git in order to really make it your own beyond changing the ansi menus. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- NuSkooler · 2019-12-21 22:50 (ENiGMA 1/2 author here, so obviously I'm biased) First, thanks everyone on the positive enig feedback, very much appreciated! Running Renegade or any other "retro" BBS packages certainly has it's merit and I absolutely love to visit those boards, but I think goals are probably different there. If you want something you can expand upon, it's probably not the target. If you want to run on old or emulated hardware/software for pure nostalgia, it may be the way to go. You can always have a "sub" board that users can drop into for stuff like this as well (ie: basically run a older DOS package as a "door"). I'm not 100% sure what you're looking for in terms of permissions, but I can explain how ENiGMA's work: The system drops the idea of user levels and instead uses groups (a user can belong to any number of arbitrary groups such as "users" or "scene", ...whatever). In addition to that, ACS strings can then be applied to various areas of the system (and more to come - especially if they are of particular interest to anyone). For example, one can make a ACS string of "GM\[leet\_peeps\]SC" which means "Only users in the 'leet\_peeps' group on a secure connection). See [https://github.com/NuSkooler/enigma-bbs/blob/0.0.11- beta/docs/configuration/acs.md](https://github.com/NuSkooler/enigma- bbs/blob/0.0.11-beta/docs/configuration/acs.md) Other docs cover \_where\_ you can use such ACS strings. Basic examples being file and message conf/area access, access to areas/menus in the system, so on. Speaking of the file base, it's certainly a different take (at least out of the box) on file areas than most classical systems. It's designed more for searching, filtering, etc. than browsing. This came about as at least personally I have a huge file base and browsing through pages of 50k+ files would be pretty useless. You can page through areas, or do free form searches (searches apply to filenames, descriptions, info extracted from archives, etc.). Full lists can also be exported and files can be batch downloaded via HTTP(S), etc. ...with that said: Nothing in enigma is set in stone. You can simply create a mod to browse files how you like (such as the "classic" style). Finally the configuration in ENiGMA: Yup, no UX yet. You gotta edit HJSON files (text files with a minimal amount of structure; it's like JSON but allows more styles, comments, and goofs). Hope that helps! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- mro_1337 · 2019-12-23 06:07 maybe your issue is with the computer you are using it on. i dont notice any lag with key presses. if you notice any issue with something specific, please let rob swindell know. i actually switched to synchronet 19 years ago because of its speed and stability. i dont know what you mean about modern technology with bbses and dead ends. we are running bbses; it's old technology. no matter what it is written in, it's still old tech and the old way of thinking. they are a place for users to post msgs, play games and download files. scraping a website for weather doesnt impress me. nor do web interfaces that provide a less than enjoyable interface than the real bbs experience. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- cloverskull · 2019-12-23 07:51 Well, you’re certainly entitled to your own opinion. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- TheLimpingNinja · 2019-12-25 23:55 If you were considering Renegade why wouldn't you consider Elebbs - while it may be a bit longer in the tooth it is telnet capable, scriptable, and has a web front-end. Virtual Advanced (VADV32) is probably in the same boat, not touched in a while but working and has telnet, scripting, and a web front-end. Most of this is going to be purely subjective for you - Mystic, Enigma, x84 - all good options for newer services; but since this is a passion (even for us) you can run on anything you want. I'm fond of both Mystic and Enigma - personally hate Renegade (rather run Telegard!); though another currently developed is WWIV5. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Vloshko · 2019-12-26 18:19 Thanks for your reply. I have been messing around with ENiGMA 1/2 since I last posted here. The one question I have that I'm unable to find: is there a way to limit the user to have a read only permission for certain message areas? edit: I have been referencing this [part of your documentation](https://nuskooler.github.io/enigma- bbs/messageareas/configuring-a-message-area.html) but for some reason I'm having difficulty with configuring read only ACS for message areas. ​ My main goal once I get a better handle on modifying and all the "little" stuff is to: create cryptograms and possibly other types of puzzles. Using boards and files primarily. The original idea was to attempt to have each solve unlock a new board and file system (the "how" is not figured out yet). It may be the final, long, progression based puzzle to a multi- step puzzle chest I've been creating. ​ The above is subject to change once I figure out the limits of the BBS, my ability, and how far my determination may go in regard to both. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Vloshko · 2019-12-26 18:22 I'll play around with your suggestions. I tried Mystic for a bit while using Enigma, but Enigma won with being a bit more "flexible". ---------------------------------------------------------------------- NuSkooler · 2019-12-27 01:15 Are you using 0.0.10-alpha or higher? 0.0.9-alpha does not support ACS for message conf/areas. Feel free to hop on #enigma-bbs or what not and I can try to go through it with you. EDIT: Oh, and for the cryptograms and what not you describe, that should be fully doable. The entire system is very flexible.