Hey everyone. Long time no post. I actually rarely do post even on my own board and, now that I think about it, I'm not sure I've made more than the occasional post here.

As the title suggests, I've had a bit of a strange experience involving fido that I just wanted to share for the fact it's some reasonable sysop chat.

I've only ever been on 2 Fido networks -- micronet and FSXnet. I found even just gettig them going a few years ago to seem like more of a chore than it should have been (as in, I had trouble wrapping my mind around some aspects of it and Synchronet) but I at least succeeded in these two areas.

Flash to earlier this month, where I actually closed the BBS on a whim. 10 days later I missed it so I fired up the server, opened ports again, and got it back to normal.

I began to look over it again and noticed something -- I hadn't had a new message from FSXnet since September 28th. Turns out, for whatever reason, my board wasn't responding to them in whatever way they check, nor had any attempts to contact me been successful, and as such I was pulled from the network. That was, again, late September. Yeah, I didn't notice this until just now!

I say this not for any particular reason, as I'm nuetral to it all at this stage, but I found it interesting that there hasn't been a similar issue here. Again, I've been quite hands-off with my BBS and don't recall changing anything that should have caused an issue, but obviously something broke, or I missed a memo somewhere.

I guess it's just one of those strange aspects of running such arcane systems like BBS's are. Figured some here might have found this at least somewhat interesting or may have some insight. I guess I could just say I'm... slightly bemused by the whole thing.

Oh well, at least the unrelated event of me shutting my board down for 10 days made me grow to appreciate it again, right? That's always a plus.
_____
www.xadara.com
--- SBBSecho 3.11-Win32
* Origin: Final Zone (618:250/27)

I began to look over it again and noticed something -- I hadn't had a new message from FSXnet since September 28th. Turns out, for whatever
reason, my board wasn't responding to them in whatever way they check,
nor had any attempts to contact me been successful, and as such I was pulled from the network. That was, again, late September. Yeah, I didn't notice this until just now!

Right around that date, an IP address changed for the fsxNet hub. Presumably the hostnames should still work but if you had an IP in that configuration, that is probably the issue.

On my system, the hostname is net1.fsxnet.nz:24556

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A47 2021/12/24 (Linux/64)
* Origin: Shipwrecks & Shibboleths [San Francisco, CA - USA] (618:300/42)

I've been running mine for 27 years now, still writing BBS doiors, and still running Micronet. I've now been running a BBS for over half of my life now
and I have been partially defined by this hobby. If I completely shut down everything, my parents might commit me. LOL

-- Sean

--- ProBoard v2.17 [Reg]
* Origin: Outpost BBS * Johnson City, TN (618:618/1)

Re: Re: FIDO will forever be strange to me.
By: DustCouncil to Chris Eldridge on Thu Dec 14 2023 02:41 am

Right around that date, an IP address changed for the fsxNet hub. Presumabl the hostnames should still work but if you had an IP in that configuration, that is probably the issue.

That could have been the issue. I forget how my configuration was and deleted it last night so I can't go back and check (could check a backup, I guess, but it's a moot point at this stage) but that would make sense as being a root cause.

Messages come in, no messages go out, in a sense, so as far as the system would be concerned I'd be no bueno.

Weird they couldn't get ahole of me, though, but it is what it is.

_____
www.xadara.com
--- SBBSecho 3.11-Win32
* Origin: Final Zone (618:250/27)

Re: FIDO will forever be strange to me.
By: Chris Eldridge to All on Wed Dec 13 2023 07:26 pm

Hey Chris,

I began to look over it again and noticed something -- I hadn't had a new message from FSXnet since September 28th. Turns out, for whatever reason, my board wasn't responding to them in whatever way they check, nor had any attempts to contact me been successful, and as such I was pulled from the network. That was, again, late September. Yeah, I didn't notice this until just now!

yes, it was me trying to get hold of you via email - and your emails came back after a few days as undeliverable. I tried a couple of times over a month or two with no luck.

I run Hub 3, which is what you were connected to, and changed setup which meant you may have had to change the hostname you connected to (you were setup a long time ago when I was using leenooks.net - I no longer use that domain).

You can get back online again fairly easily if you want. Just head over to the hub's web page http://clrghouz.bbs.dege.au create a user, then let me know and I'll reactivate your BBS. You'll be able to control all your configuration from there - or reach out for any help...


...oEoN
--- SBBSecho 3.20-Linux
* Origin: I'm playing with ANSI+videotex - wanna play too? (618:510/2)

Re: FIDO will forever be strange to me.
By: Deon George to Chris Eldridge on Thu Dec 14 2023 10:40 pm

You can get back online again fairly easily if you want. Just head over to t hub's web page http://clrghouz.bbs.dege.au create a user, then let me know a I'll reactivate your BBS. You'll be able to control all your configuration f there - or reach out for any help...

Righto, began the process of registering Final Zone but the attmept errors out: Property "exists" on null. I'm sure a minor issue, could relate to me doing something silly, I dunno.

I've restored my configuration locally as best I can and can hopefully make the necessary changes on my end to trivailly get back on fsx. Just bear with me since, as you may recall from a few years ago when I originally registered, this really isn't my forte when it comes to tech.

On the email subject, I'm certain now that the issue was due to me changing domains and, more importantly, with that coming a change to the way mail is handled by my BBS. In my neglect of managing other facets I failed to update, hence the loss in communications.

At least that's figured out now, so there's that, right?

_____
www.xadara.com
--- SBBSecho 3.11-Win32
* Origin: Final Zone (618:250/27)

Re: FIDO will forever be strange to me.
By: Chris Eldridge to Deon George on Thu Dec 14 2023 10:06 am

Hey Chris,

Righto, began the process of registering Final Zone but the attmept errors out: Property "exists" on null. I'm sure a minor issue, could relate to me doing something silly, I dunno.

Yeah your BBS was still there - I need to improve that experience a bit since it probably didnt show up in the search list (as it was marked inactive).

I've linked you to your BBS - so you can check your passwords and subscribe to the areas.

Since this is about another net - feel free to email me directly
deon at bbs dot dege.au if you have any questions.

My aim is to make clrghouz easier to use, so that folks with no history (or the history has been long gone and forgotten) find it easier to get into this hobby.



...oEoN
--- SBBSecho 3.20-Linux
* Origin: I'm playing with ANSI+videotex - wanna play too? (618:510/2)

To: Chris Eldridge
Re: FIDO will forever be strange to me.
By: Chris Eldridge to Deon George on Thu Dec 14 2023 10:06 am

On the email subject, I'm certain now that the issue was due to me changing domains and, more importantly, with that coming a change to the way mail is handled by my BBS. In my neglect of managing other facets I failed to update, hence the loss in communications.

At least that's figured out now, so there's that, right?

you should use a 3rd party for that type of contact. if your bbs is screwed up and nothing works, how can we contact you?
--- Synchronet 3.19b-Win32 NewsLink 1.113
* bbses.info - http://bbses.info - telnet://bbses.info
* Origin: capitolcityonline.net * Telnet/SSH:2022/HTTP (618:250/1)