BBS software for the PDP 11

[devin davison]

I did not expect so much feedback, thanks to everyone who responded. I am
still reading over all the replies.

I am indeed looking to run the hardware for a extended duration or non stop
if I can manage to get a good bbs up and running.

Power consumption and heat output is not an issue. The machine is set up in
its own climate controlled area where it can be left to run for long
periods of time.

I am not much of a programmer. I thought about writing my own little dinky
bbs in assembly or something, but worried i would not understand how to get
information stored in a sane manner on the disks or backup to a common
format to tape. If i were to run something under 2.11bsd, i could just dump
something to tape with tar, which seems alot easier that writing everything
from scratch. It would be interesting to write it all from scratch, but i
lack the knowledge to do so at them moment.

I would like to be able to possible run other tasks on the machine while it
is running, i have a couple of terminals attached, so unix looks like it
may be the way for me to go. I have a heavy investment in RSX too though, i
have all the documentation for it here in large binders, it certainly would
be interesting to run it on an os ive not seen much of.


Still looking over my options, i will post back after i read over all the
replys better.

--Devin



On Thu, May 18, 2017 at 6:45 PM, Bill Gunshannon via cctalk <
cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:

>
> ________________________________________
> From: cctalk [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] on behalf of geneb via
> cctalk [cctalk at classiccmp.org]
> Sent: Thursday, May 18, 2017 4:23 PM
> To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
> Subject: Re: BBS software for the PDP 11
>
> On Thu, 18 May 2017, allison via cctalk wrote:
>
> > Never forget, BBS were about storage and cheap which at that time were
> mostly
> > opposed (disks weren't cheap!).  The amount of Ram and CPU were less
> > important
> > considering what had to be done.  Often the modem and hard disk were as
> > costly
> > as the basic system and we didn't exceed 2400 baud till '85or later.
> Most
> > anything
> > could keep up with IO at under 4800 baud.
> >
> Here's what amounts to a canonnical(sp?) list of BBS programs for a number
> of different platforms:
>
> http://software.bbsdocumentary.com/
>
> _____________________________________
>
> UNAXCESS
>
> That's the one I ran on SYSTEM III based XENIX on a Tandy Model 16.
>
> bill
>