{{Infobox software , name = McBBS , logo = , logo alt = , logo caption = , screenshot = , screenshot alt = , caption = , collapsible = , author = , developer = DMCS Technologies , released = , discontinued = , ver layout = , latest release version = 5.5.3 , latest release date = October 1999 , latest preview version = 5.5.3 demo , latest preview date = May 2000 , repo = , status = , programming language = , operating system =

Commodore 64 The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit computing, 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International (first shown at the Consumer Electronics Show, January 7–10, 1982, in Las Vegas). It has been listed in ...

DOS DOS (, ) is a family of disk-based operating systems for IBM PC compatible computers. The DOS family primarily consists of IBM PC DOS and a rebranded version, Microsoft's MS-DOS, both of which were introduced in 1981. Later compatible syste ...

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Bulletin board system A bulletin board system (BBS), also called a computer bulletin board service (CBBS), is a computer server running list of BBS software, software that allows users to connect to the system using a terminal program. Once logged in, the user perfor ...

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Proprietary {{Short pages monitor , standard = , AsOf = McBBS was a

Bulletin Board System A bulletin board system (BBS), also called a computer bulletin board service (CBBS), is a computer server running list of BBS software, software that allows users to connect to the system using a terminal program. Once logged in, the user perfor ...

developed by Derek E. McDonald and distributed by DMCS Technologies between October 30, 1989, and May 30, 2000, and operated over 18 versions.

History

McBBS started out as a project for the then High School student Derek McDonald, then attending

Charles P. Allen High School Charles P. Allen High School (CPA) is a senior high school located in Bedford, Nova Scotia, Canada. This school serves Hammonds Plains, Bedford and a section of Halifax since 2010; for three years at the original CPA and current location since 20 ...

Bedford, Nova Scotia Bedford (pop. 36,354 ) is a former town and now a district of Halifax Regional Municipality, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. It is situated on the north west shore of the Bedford Basin in the central area of the municipality. It borders the nei ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

. As an aspiring young programmer, and unhappy with the software available to him at the time, he set out to prove he could build his own stable computer communications system as a personal project. Heavily influenced by the works of Ken Spence and his Spence XP BBS system of which there were two versions written in 1985 and 1987 respectively, as well as Ed Parry's EBBS and Clarke Development's

PCBoard PCBoard (PCB) was a bulletin board system (BBS) application first introduced for DOS in 1983 by Fred Clark's Clark Development Company. PCBoard was one of the first commercial BBS packages for DOS systems, and was considered one of the "high end ...

, the McBBS software was originally developed for the

computer but was ported over to the

platform in 1992 (starting with McBBS v3.0) where it remained until the project was officially ended in May 2000. The software was written entirely in the

BASIC Basic or BASIC may refer to: Science and technology * BASIC, a computer programming language * Basic (chemistry), having the properties of a base * Basic access authentication, in HTTP Entertainment * Basic (film), ''Basic'' (film), a 2003 film ...

computer language, but starting with version 3.1 in 1992 it was compiled from BASIC into

8086 The 8086 (also called iAPX 86) is a 16-bit microprocessor chip designed by Intel between early 1976 and June 8, 1978, when it was released. The Intel 8088, released July 1, 1979, is a slightly modified chip with an external 8-bit data bus (allo ...

executable code for DOS. The program featured all the standard functions of a BBS of the time including file transfers in several competing protocols (

XMODEM XMODEM is a simple file transfer protocol developed as a quick hack by Ward Christensen for use in his 1977 MODEM.ASM terminal program. It allowed users to transmit files between their computers when both sides used MODEM. Keith Petersen made a ...

YMODEM YMODEM is a file transfer protocol used between microcomputers connected together using modems. It was primarily used to transfer files to and from bulletin board systems. YMODEM was developed by Chuck Forsberg as an expansion of XMODEM and was f ...

, YMODEM-G, ZMODEM) provided with the program or as third-party software; they connected externally to the main program itself. It also featured message boards and a primitive form of what we now call

E-mail Electronic mail (usually shortened to email; alternatively hyphenated e-mail) is a method of transmitting and receiving Digital media, digital messages using electronics, electronic devices over a computer network. It was conceived in the ...

. The program was also capable of producing simple graphics & text using both the

ASCII ASCII ( ), an acronym for American Standard Code for Information Interchange, is a character encoding standard for representing a particular set of 95 (English language focused) printable character, printable and 33 control character, control c ...

PETSCII PETSCII (PET Standard Code of Information Interchange), also known as CBM ASCII, is the character set used in Commodore Business Machines' 8-bit home computers. This character set was first used by the PET from 1977, and was subsequently use ...

, and the

ANSI escape code ANSI escape sequences are a standard for in-band signaling to control cursor location, color, font styling, and other options on video text terminals and terminal emulators. Certain sequences of bytes, most starting with an Escape character#ASC ...

character sets and color codes. McBBS also had the advanced and unique feature of a primitive sound broadcasting system allowing the BBS to program the remote computer's beeper speaker using what was essentially an extension of the ANSI Escape Code sequences used exclusively by McBBS. The net result, when used with the appropriate translation software (also supplied by McDonald and company), was audible, if low-resolution music; a demonstration given by McDonald himself once showed the BBS playing

The Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known f ...

's "

You Can't Always Get What You Want "You Can't Always Get What You Want" is a song by the English rock band the Rolling Stones from their 1969 album '' Let It Bleed''. Written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, it was named as the 100th greatest song of all time by ''Rolling Sto ...

", and the

William Tell Overture The ''William Tell'' Overture is the overture to the opera '' William Tell'' (original French title ''Guillaume Tell''), composed by Gioachino Rossini. ''William Tell'' premiered in 1829 and was the last of Rossini's 39 operas, after which he w ...

, coded using a simple text editor.The Emperor Product Archives: THE DMCS YEAR
McBBS Technical Specifications and History
''Emperor Multimedia Corp.'', retrieved October, 2007 As far as speed goes, McBBS was one of the first to adopt what was (then) high speed modems exceeding 14400 bit/s, the program itself was small and efficiently written, allowing it great speed. The program was also

Y2K Y2K may refer to: * Y2K problem, a computer issue related to the year 2000 * Year 2K, the year 2000 2000 was designated as the International Year for the Culture of Peace and the World Mathematics, Mathematical Year. Popular cultu ...

and survived the century changeover. The last version "McBBS v5.5 rev.3" was featured on the Alliance CD as the multimedia component in a last effort to promote the program when Emperor Multimedia Corporation took over the assets of DMCS Technologies when the companies merged. McBBS was marketed exclusively to operators and users of BBS systems over those same BBS public message forums. From time to time advertisements were posted over various BBS networks promoting its virtues. Since McBBS seemed to be a robust product and yet had a small footprint on the computer's memory and disc this feature was heavily exploited. In the early Commodore days the slogan was, "''McBBS; The Little BBS That Could''", a spoof off the Children's book ''The Little Engine That Could''. In the PC years the slogan was, "''Sometimes Big Things Come In Small Packages''"; this second campaign proving to be the most successful. When networking was introduced the ad gleefully played on the product name saying, "''You can now do more than just order fries and burgers with it!''", clearly answering the critics who teased the product's name by spoofing McDonald's restaurants. The Market for the old-style BBS software was eroded by the arrival of the Internet and the Windows GUI operating systems during the late 1990s, and although McBBS had primitive networking capabilities via the

FidoNet __ / \ /, oo \ (_, /_) _`@/_ \ _ , , \ \\ , (*) , \ )) ______ , __U__, / \// / FI ...

, and its own proprietary McNET, it was not enough to compete with the internet E-mailing systems, nor could McDonald program a new version fast enough to compete with the arrival of the GUI operating systems. McBBS was terminated a short time after. For sometime the official history of McBBS was available at the Emperor Multimedia website. Emperor Multimedia has since moved on to invest in the entertainment industry, specializing in Multimedia, with assets in internet applications,

e-books An ebook (short for electronic book), also spelled as e-book or eBook, is a book publication made available in electronic form, consisting of text, images, or both, readable on the flat-panel display of computers or other electronic devices. A ...

databases In computing, a database is an organized collection of data or a type of data store based on the use of a database management system (DBMS), the software that interacts with end users, applications, and the database itself to capture and ana ...

and web design. McDonald (with Emperor Multimedia) later releases of Polishing of Metal, and the Diskery music distribution firm, would once again see him and his company with commercial success. A scripting language known as "Viking", as well as a remote communications terminal called Comterm were also developed for McBBS as add-ons for the system; Comterm going on to be a product in its own right that has since been discontinued also.

Statistics

McBBS's sold for $40 U.S. originally on the Commodore 64 and the later 5.x set, all versions in between were free. It is unknown how many copies of McBBS were sold, but it is known that installations existed in Asia, North America and Europe. The largest concentration of McBBS installations was in the Mid-West USA and Eastern Canada. On August 12, 2007, the

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...

(a division of the United Nations) "Great Library of Alexandria" (

Bibliotheca Alexandrina The Bibliotheca Alexandrina (Latin, 'Library of Alexandria'; , ) (BA) is a major library and cultural center on the shore of the Mediterranean Sea in Alexandria, Egypt. It is a commemoration of the Library of Alexandria, once one of the larg ...

) confirmed and accepted receipt of a shipment that would be archived on its shelves. The shipment was sent from Derek McDonald himself, included with this shipment was a single copy of the last version of McBBS released thus far. The version nomenclature is as follows: v0.95, v1.0 - Never published. v1.1, 1.2, 1.5, 2.0, 2.5, 2.6 - Released for Commodore 64/128. Starting with v2.0 all programs were "modular" meaning the components were controlled by a central program and swapped in and out of memory as needed. 2.0 was also the first to feature the Modem "Hayes" instruction set. v3.0, 3.1, 3.1C, 3.5, 4.0, 5.0, 5.1, 5.1A, 5.5, 5.5.1, 5.5.2, 5.5.3 - All published for IBM-PC. v3.1C was the first compiled into direct executable code. 4.0 was the first to feature networking. 5.1A was the first "high speed" modem version that could exceed 9600 bit/s using a supplied driver written in compiled Pascal language. It also had the file transfer protocols supplied with it. 5.5 had the high speed routines within the program itself, it also featured the integrated terminal program and scripting language.

References

External links

Emperor Multimedia product website
Bulletin board system software DOS software Commodore 64 software