Monochrome BBS
Encyclopedia
Monochrome BBS, known to users as "Mono," is a text-based multi-user bulletin board system
featuring thousands of discussion files, along with games, instant and deferred user messaging, and a talker
. It is one of the only BBS's still in operation and actively used on a daily basis by its community, with over 5000 comments in a typical month. Monochrome runs on custom software, making the platform and user experience distinct from other bulletin board systems.
, for his final year project. Monochrome BBS (big M) is a specific instance of mono; another instance of mono was used for a few years as the official user interface for students in the Information Science department, but usage declined around 1996. Once the Monochrome board was up and running, fellow students were given accounts and word began to spread. The first non-City users were admitted in 1991-1992. Eventually Mono's userbase became international, although the majority of those joining were UK university students.
By its peak in the mid-1990s, over 8000 accounts had been created, and there were often more than 150 people logged in simultaneously, making it almost certainly the most popular internet BBS in the UK
. However, with the advent of web forums and GUI
-based instant messaging
, Mono's text-only format was already seen as nostalgic even in 1994 when it appeared in the first issue of .net magazine
.
The artist Alan Sondheim
has written of his experiences of Mono:
The Mono community resisted the move to a web forum, but usage levels remained fairly strong even to the present day, when 30 or more members may be logged on during a typical day. In 2010, Mono was noted by Eileen Brown as an example of a bulletin board that is still in use. Most of those now using the system are long-time members.
Mono's animation programming language ('manim') allows for simple ASCII animations, and interactive scripts such as quizzes and 1980s-style adventure game
s.
Mono also contained a built-in Telnet
client ('mtel') that was used to provide access to MUDs such as GodWars
that were hosted on the mono servers.
As there are no other identifiers such as avatars, colour schemes, signatures etc., as used on web-based forums, personality and identity are often expressed through comments files, namelines and in personal diaries, a feature which was launched in 1997.
Early on, Monochrome established a dedicated section for "Meets," where users regularly organised weekend-long events to meet up at various places around the UK (and occasionally in other countries where there were clusters of users). These were often attended 50 or more users, with accommodation offered by local hosts. These were often the first opportunity to put a face to a name, and made other users less anonymised on the BBS. Towns with several users sometimes had local chat files and regular meets.
After 2000, large meets became less common due to family and work pressures, but there were meets around Festivals and other events, including several weddings between people who had met on the system. In 1996 a marriage between two members, one from the USA and one from the UK, was featured in the Daily Telegraph, "Good Morning with Anne and Nick" on BBC1, and a Channel 4 short film called "Get Netted" amongst other sources. This was at a time when the Internet was still new to the mainstream public and media, so such relationships were novel.
The Esc key may be pressed at any time to provide a menu of additional facilities such as the talker, messaging systems, personal profile and settings.
Files are organised hierarchically by subject into menus and submenus. A file is composed of edits (comments). While reading a file, a user may add a comment to it, send part of it to another user, email it to themselves. The entire menu system can be scanned, for new edits, and users can skip individual files and menus which do not interest them. This allows users to keep up to date with several discussions at a time, throughout the day.
The talker takes some cues from MUDs by being composed of rooms, for which users write the descriptions, and a visitor may wander through these using the cardinal directions. What you say is only relayed to people in the same room, and rooms may be locked by their owner for privacy.
The messaging system (u2u in Monochrome slang) allows sending messages directly to one or more other users. If a recipient is logged in, the message is received immediately and the recipient's client displays the message or, if they are in the middle of editing a file, beeps to alert them and displays it when they finish. Otherwise, the message is stored and shown to them when they next connect.
A Users On screen shows currently logged on users, their nameline and current activity, location and connection statistics. This information is also shown on the web page.
A number of other scripts have been written by users to maintain files, menus, generate files automatically, provide wiki-like functionality, collect and display RSS feeds within the system and even a rudimentary Twitter
client.
protocol (using the JANET
network) on address 000041002300, and later, when JANET became internet-addressable, telnet
was employed. Nowadays SSH
is the recommended option. There are a wide variety of SSH clients
, such as PuTTY
, or users can connect using the Java client on the Monochrome website.
The mono software has a client-server
architecture: users connect to the mono client
, which in turn communicates with a number of server
applications such as md.serv (the over-arching controller), md.talk (the Talker daemon) and md.file (the u2u delivery daemon).
Originally, the client software ran on separate machines from the server software. At the peak of its popularity in the mid-90's, there were up to five client
machines dedicated to Monochrome, all simultaneously talking to a single central server which both ran the mono server applications and served the files to the clients. This implemented a form of redundancy
, in that users could still access Monochrome even if one or several of the client machines failed; however, the server machine remained a single point of failure
.
Most of the communication between the client and the server software uses network sockets, but files still need to be directly accessible by the client; an API
for client-server file processing was much discussed but never completed. This meant that when separate client and server machines were used, the server's central file store had to be exported to all the client machines using NFS, which was a major bottleneck.
The Monochrome cluster was historically based on Sun Microsystems
machines (most often, old disused or discarded machines from universities or businesses), but has also run on DEC Alpha
and Intel x86 hardware. A variety of operating systems have been involved historically, including SunOS
and OpenBSD
, but NetBSD
has been the chosen OS for some years. As hardware speeds have increased and the number of users has declined, there is now just a single virtual machine performing both client and server roles.
Most of the core client and server code is written in C
, though a number of additional utilities have been written in Perl
.
Bulletin board system
A Bulletin Board System, or BBS, is a computer system running software that allows users to connect and log in to the system using a terminal program. Once logged in, a user can perform functions such as uploading and downloading software and data, reading news and bulletins, and exchanging...
featuring thousands of discussion files, along with games, instant and deferred user messaging, and a talker
Talker
A talker is a chat system that people use to talk to each other over the Internet. Dating back to the 1980s, they were a predecessor of instant messaging....
. It is one of the only BBS's still in operation and actively used on a daily basis by its community, with over 5000 comments in a typical month. Monochrome runs on custom software, making the platform and user experience distinct from other bulletin board systems.
History
The underlying software (mono - small m) was originally written in around 1990 by David Brownlee, then a student at City University, LondonCity University, London
City University London , is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom. It was founded in 1894 as the Northampton Institute and became a university in 1966, when it adopted its present name....
, for his final year project. Monochrome BBS (big M) is a specific instance of mono; another instance of mono was used for a few years as the official user interface for students in the Information Science department, but usage declined around 1996. Once the Monochrome board was up and running, fellow students were given accounts and word began to spread. The first non-City users were admitted in 1991-1992. Eventually Mono's userbase became international, although the majority of those joining were UK university students.
By its peak in the mid-1990s, over 8000 accounts had been created, and there were often more than 150 people logged in simultaneously, making it almost certainly the most popular internet BBS in the UK
. However, with the advent of web forums and GUI
Gui
Gui or guee is a generic term to refer to grilled dishes in Korean cuisine. These most commonly have meat or fish as their primary ingredient, but may in some cases also comprise grilled vegetables or other vegetarian ingredients. The term derives from the verb, "gupda" in Korean, which literally...
-based instant messaging
Instant messaging
Instant Messaging is a form of real-time direct text-based chatting communication in push mode between two or more people using personal computers or other devices, along with shared clients. The user's text is conveyed over a network, such as the Internet...
, Mono's text-only format was already seen as nostalgic even in 1994 when it appeared in the first issue of .net magazine
.net (magazine)
.net is a monthly Internet magazine published in the UK by Future Publishing. Founded in 1994, .net magazine is published every four weeks . The magazine is aimed at professional and amateur web designers, and a significant proportion of its readers are full-time web developers. The front cover...
.
The artist Alan Sondheim
Alan Sondheim
Alan Sondheim is an American poet, critic, musician, artist, and theorist of cyberspace.-Biography:Alan Sondheim was born in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. He holds a B.A. and M.A. in English from Brown University...
has written of his experiences of Mono:
The Mono community resisted the move to a web forum, but usage levels remained fairly strong even to the present day, when 30 or more members may be logged on during a typical day. In 2010, Mono was noted by Eileen Brown as an example of a bulletin board that is still in use. Most of those now using the system are long-time members.
Content
Mono has thousands of discussion files on a wide variety of topics, including technology, science, arts, music, sports, work, family, news as well as general chat. These are organised hierarchically by topic and individual sections maintained by different users. Each menu can be highly customised, thus each section has its own "personality," conventions and sometimes codes of conduct. Section moderators are able to create animated banner ads which rotate on the main menu.Mono's animation programming language ('manim') allows for simple ASCII animations, and interactive scripts such as quizzes and 1980s-style adventure game
Adventure game
An adventure game is a video game in which the player assumes the role of protagonist in an interactive story driven by exploration and puzzle-solving instead of physical challenge. The genre's focus on story allows it to draw heavily from other narrative-based media such as literature and film,...
s.
Mono also contained a built-in Telnet
TELNET
Telnet is a network protocol used on the Internet or local area networks to provide a bidirectional interactive text-oriented communications facility using a virtual terminal connection...
client ('mtel') that was used to provide access to MUDs such as GodWars
GodWars
GodWars is a MUD engine derived from Merc, created in 1995 by Richard Woolcock, better known in the MUD community as "KaVir". GodWars MUDs are typically loosely based on White Wolf games such as Vampire: The Masquerade, and generally offer supernatural classes such as Vampire, Werewolf, Mage and...
that were hosted on the mono servers.
Community
Mono members are able to express their online identity in a number of ways:- namelines - short messages that appeared next to a users name in edits and on the main users-on screen.
- infotexts - short text sections on a users' profile which could optionally be edited and animated using Mono's animation language.
- talker customisation - including description of user, user's home room and actions within that room
As there are no other identifiers such as avatars, colour schemes, signatures etc., as used on web-based forums, personality and identity are often expressed through comments files, namelines and in personal diaries, a feature which was launched in 1997.
Early on, Monochrome established a dedicated section for "Meets," where users regularly organised weekend-long events to meet up at various places around the UK (and occasionally in other countries where there were clusters of users). These were often attended 50 or more users, with accommodation offered by local hosts. These were often the first opportunity to put a face to a name, and made other users less anonymised on the BBS. Towns with several users sometimes had local chat files and regular meets.
After 2000, large meets became less common due to family and work pressures, but there were meets around Festivals and other events, including several weddings between people who had met on the system. In 1996 a marriage between two members, one from the USA and one from the UK, was featured in the Daily Telegraph, "Good Morning with Anne and Nick" on BBC1, and a Channel 4 short film called "Get Netted" amongst other sources. This was at a time when the Internet was still new to the mainstream public and media, so such relationships were novel.
Operation
Mono's interface was designed for ease of use - most operations are performed using single keypresses, and the options available are shown on-screen wherever possible, so it is relatively straightforward for a newcomer to start making their way around without reading lots of documentation.The Esc key may be pressed at any time to provide a menu of additional facilities such as the talker, messaging systems, personal profile and settings.
Files are organised hierarchically by subject into menus and submenus. A file is composed of edits (comments). While reading a file, a user may add a comment to it, send part of it to another user, email it to themselves. The entire menu system can be scanned, for new edits, and users can skip individual files and menus which do not interest them. This allows users to keep up to date with several discussions at a time, throughout the day.
The talker takes some cues from MUDs by being composed of rooms, for which users write the descriptions, and a visitor may wander through these using the cardinal directions. What you say is only relayed to people in the same room, and rooms may be locked by their owner for privacy.
The messaging system (u2u in Monochrome slang) allows sending messages directly to one or more other users. If a recipient is logged in, the message is received immediately and the recipient's client displays the message or, if they are in the middle of editing a file, beeps to alert them and displays it when they finish. Otherwise, the message is stored and shown to them when they next connect.
A Users On screen shows currently logged on users, their nameline and current activity, location and connection statistics. This information is also shown on the web page.
A number of other scripts have been written by users to maintain files, menus, generate files automatically, provide wiki-like functionality, collect and display RSS feeds within the system and even a rudimentary Twitter
Twitter
Twitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, informally known as "tweets".Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July...
client.
Technology
When mono was first launched, users connected to Monochrome via the X.25X.25
X.25 is an ITU-T standard protocol suite for packet switched wide area network communication. An X.25 WAN consists of packet-switching exchange nodes as the networking hardware, and leased lines, Plain old telephone service connections or ISDN connections as physical links...
protocol (using the JANET
JANET
JANET is a private British government-funded computer network dedicated to education and research. All further- and higher-education organisations in the UK are connected to JANET, as are all the Research Councils; the majority of these sites are connected via 20 metropolitan area networks JANET...
network) on address 000041002300, and later, when JANET became internet-addressable, telnet
TELNET
Telnet is a network protocol used on the Internet or local area networks to provide a bidirectional interactive text-oriented communications facility using a virtual terminal connection...
was employed. Nowadays SSH
Secure Shell
Secure Shell is a network protocol for secure data communication, remote shell services or command execution and other secure network services between two networked computers that it connects via a secure channel over an insecure network: a server and a client...
is the recommended option. There are a wide variety of SSH clients
Client (computing)
A client is an application or system that accesses a service made available by a server. The server is often on another computer system, in which case the client accesses the service by way of a network....
, such as PuTTY
PuTTY
PuTTY is a free and open source terminal emulator application which can act as a client for the SSH, Telnet, rlogin, and raw TCP computing protocols and as a serial console client...
, or users can connect using the Java client on the Monochrome website.
The mono software has a client-server
Client-server
The client–server model of computing is a distributed application that partitions tasks or workloads between the providers of a resource or service, called servers, and service requesters, called clients. Often clients and servers communicate over a computer network on separate hardware, but both...
architecture: users connect to the mono client
Client (computing)
A client is an application or system that accesses a service made available by a server. The server is often on another computer system, in which case the client accesses the service by way of a network....
, which in turn communicates with a number of server
Server (computing)
In the context of client-server architecture, a server is a computer program running to serve the requests of other programs, the "clients". Thus, the "server" performs some computational task on behalf of "clients"...
applications such as md.serv (the over-arching controller), md.talk (the Talker daemon) and md.file (the u2u delivery daemon).
Originally, the client software ran on separate machines from the server software. At the peak of its popularity in the mid-90's, there were up to five client
Client (computing)
A client is an application or system that accesses a service made available by a server. The server is often on another computer system, in which case the client accesses the service by way of a network....
machines dedicated to Monochrome, all simultaneously talking to a single central server which both ran the mono server applications and served the files to the clients. This implemented a form of redundancy
Redundancy (engineering)
In engineering, redundancy is the duplication of critical components or functions of a system with the intention of increasing reliability of the system, usually in the case of a backup or fail-safe....
, in that users could still access Monochrome even if one or several of the client machines failed; however, the server machine remained a single point of failure
Single point of failure
A single point of failure is a part of a system that, if it fails, will stop the entire system from working. They are undesirable in any system with a goal of high availability or reliability, be it a business practice, software application, or other industrial system.-Overview:Systems can be made...
.
Most of the communication between the client and the server software uses network sockets, but files still need to be directly accessible by the client; an API
Application programming interface
An application programming interface is a source code based specification intended to be used as an interface by software components to communicate with each other...
for client-server file processing was much discussed but never completed. This meant that when separate client and server machines were used, the server's central file store had to be exported to all the client machines using NFS, which was a major bottleneck.
The Monochrome cluster was historically based on Sun Microsystems
Sun Microsystems
Sun Microsystems, Inc. was a company that sold :computers, computer components, :computer software, and :information technology services. Sun was founded on February 24, 1982...
machines (most often, old disused or discarded machines from universities or businesses), but has also run on DEC Alpha
DEC Alpha
Alpha, originally known as Alpha AXP, is a 64-bit reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by Digital Equipment Corporation , designed to replace the 32-bit VAX complex instruction set computer ISA and its implementations. Alpha was implemented in microprocessors...
and Intel x86 hardware. A variety of operating systems have been involved historically, including SunOS
SunOS
SunOS is a version of the Unix operating system developed by Sun Microsystems for their workstation and server computer systems. The SunOS name is usually only used to refer to versions 1.0 to 4.1.4 of SunOS...
and OpenBSD
OpenBSD
OpenBSD is a Unix-like computer operating system descended from Berkeley Software Distribution , a Unix derivative developed at the University of California, Berkeley. It was forked from NetBSD by project leader Theo de Raadt in late 1995...
, but NetBSD
NetBSD
NetBSD is a freely available open source version of the Berkeley Software Distribution Unix operating system. It was the second open source BSD descendant to be formally released, after 386BSD, and continues to be actively developed. The NetBSD project is primarily focused on high quality design,...
has been the chosen OS for some years. As hardware speeds have increased and the number of users has declined, there is now just a single virtual machine performing both client and server roles.
Most of the core client and server code is written in C
C (programming language)
C is a general-purpose computer programming language developed between 1969 and 1973 by Dennis Ritchie at the Bell Telephone Laboratories for use with the Unix operating system....
, though a number of additional utilities have been written in Perl
Perl
Perl is a high-level, general-purpose, interpreted, dynamic programming language. Perl was originally developed by Larry Wall in 1987 as a general-purpose Unix scripting language to make report processing easier. Since then, it has undergone many changes and revisions and become widely popular...
.
