Articles

A Future for Fidonet?
By Michael Grant (1:134/11)

I note that those with a one sided view on Fidonet are still taking delight in using the Fidonews as a political platform to further their views and attempt to discredit those with ideas other than their preferred point of view. It's interesting to note that Luke Kolin has nothing constructive to say; his article is full of negativity and dire prognostications for the future of Fidonet.

Not all of us are so pessimistic, however. There are many bright people with lots of good ideas to improve this network, and those ideas don't have to be politically motivated or follow an agenda.

I was sitting at this computer about a week or two ago, enjoying a game of Dune (I'd just purchased the CD), when a BBS user paged me for a chat. It turns out he was a young programmer with some new ideas on messaging and Fidonet-style networks. We had a long chat, and it was mainly to do with how FTN's (Fidonet Technology Networks) can improve their visibility and participation of users from the Internet.

Basically, his ideas boiled down to using a new format to access message areas from a website. He also wants to create a method for exchanging these messages amongst many systems, similar to the way that FTN's use mailers to "echo" their messages. As the ZC of an "othernet" called WorldNet (Zone 13), that mainly gates Internet Newsgroups to an FTN format, I agreed with him when he mentioned that the NNTP servers used by those Newsgroups are far too restrictive and inflexible, and the big Usenet servers generally do not listen to the concerns of their users. The FTN way of doing things, using amateur volunteer sysops, is far more responsive and responsible to their users.

The format he has in mind to use is XML. "XML" stands for "Extensible Markup Language". It was designed to improve the functionality of web design by providing more flexibility and adaptability in the message identification code than HTML does. Unlike HTML, it is not a fixed format; it is not a single pre-defined markup language, but instead is actually a metalanguage, which is a language used for defining other languages. Thus it is pretty much unlimited in possibilities, because a programmer could use XML to design their own customized markup language for limitless different types of documents. (For more information on the XML format, please see the bottom of the article)

This programmer told me he has talked with the developers of Synchronet BBS, and I gave him information on how to contact the author of Mystic BBS. He wants to make his new format as portable as possible, and wants to incorporate seamless conversions from his new format to SMB, JAM, and Squish format message bases. I agreed to alpha-test whatever software he may come up with, and to use WorldNet as a testing ground for his ideas.

I envision the end result of this as in effect creating a multitude of web-based BBS's with message forums built-in. A user would log in via a CGI-type login, and would have access to a large number of different message areas, just as a BBS user would log in and have access to Fidonet echoes. Messages would then be echoed between these web-based system, and also be converted to the older FTN format to be further echoed to systems without web access. Message areas could still be effectively moderated, as the sysop of a web-based BBS could cut a person's access to his system upon a moderator's request.

With proper promotion on the web, there is no reason why something like this could not prove very popular. Just look at the interest in Yahoo groups as an alternative to the standard news servers. Imagine by encouraging a multitude of systems offering shared message areas, an even higher profile on the web may be attained. Also, imagine that a user of these new systems could post a message to the actual person they're addressing, instead of being forced to address their message to "All". Imagine yet again internet-based message areas that do not contain large quantities of spam and pornographic promotions.

The development of something like this may take quite a while yet, and it may take some time to see if it proves popular. I feel however, that anyone who has in mind to develop programs of this nature ought to be encouraged and assisted in every way possible. Acceptance of new ideas like this may be difficult; such changes are often resisted in Fidonet, and I cautioned this programmer not to expect immediate acceptance from Fidonet, but if it proves popular and easily convertible to the older FTN formats, I don't see any reason why Fidonet could not take advantage of this new idea to promote itself, and indeed such an idea may in fact save the old dog from an untimely demise, if we can just teach that old dog some new tricks.

Here's some links to info on XML:

The XML FAQ Page: http://www.ucc.ie/xml/

The XML specifications are documented at: http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-xml/

XML is public domain, and is a project of the World Wide Web Consortium. Their website is at: http://www.w3.org