Compuserve

[John Foust]

At 09:57 AM 1/11/2021, Ethan O'Toole wrote:
>>So how could you organize all that into a web database and interface?
>
>Could you put a text front end on it that emulates the original CIS?

I'd say the first step is defining a SQL database structure to hold
it all, then the code to display it, and sure, maybe an interactive
emulation would be nifty...  but note that CompuServe messages 
disappeared on their own.  A forum could only hold so many, and
the oldest were flushed.  So an emulation would need to pick a
moment in time to emulate.

In today's interface style, I'd say you'd want to be able to search 
it all, then view a message in context with the rest of its thread.

>>Am I going to trust my parser to have never made a mistake?
>>Or do I need to read a half-million posts to confirm it didn't?
>
>Search for your name?

Not that simple.  After you'd navigated to the email area and
asked to display a particular waiting message, it only showed
date / from / subject at the top, and at least in 1995, it
actually put the "Distribution: To: John Foust - Syndesis 
Corporation > [76004,1763]" at the bottom after the message!

For Internet gateway'd email, it showed the full message as is, 
with the raw headers and/or "Content-type:" and left you to
figure it out on your own.

- John