MAC OS X

Compiling CG Term To Connect To Commodore BBSs via Telnet using Commodore Color Graphics.

  UPDATE!! – I am keeping this blog for instructional purposes on compiling source code in Mac OSX.  There is a pre-compiled version 1.9 in an app package available at the following link https://roxburysoftware.com/Blog/cgterm-for-os-x-10-9/ that supersedes the need for these instructions.

Time sure does fly!  Getting the inspiration to write this month’s technical blog I reflected on the exclusive article I wrong back in November of 2014.  It seems like only yesterday that I put that article together.  If you have not had a chance to read NO CARRIER!  The Lost World Of The BBS, you may do so by clicking here. The terminal program that I recommended, CG Term 1.7 unfortunately no longer works on Mac OS X versions later then 10.10 (Yosemite).  You may download and try SyncTerm, but I have found that it does not properly decode the PETSCII (C/G) graphics correctly.

  So what are us Mac users to do?  We could either use a Windows virtual machine, or boot into boot camp.  However that kind of rubs the wrong way, especially since CGTerm worked in previous versions of Mac OS.   There is a third option, and that is to take the freely available source code and compile it in a later version of the OS.  I have compiled it on my OS X Sierra desktop and 2010 MacBook Pro running Yosemite.

This is a 4 step process.

1. If you are not already using the Homebrew repositiory and installed brew, follow the instructions by  Clicking Here.
2. Download and extract the source code for CGTerm 1.7b2 beta (Version 1.6 also has C/G translation errors.) Click here to download.
   1. 1. If you do no not already have one, I would create a dev directory in your home directory.
         1. $ cd ~
         2. $ mkdir dev
      2. Move the downloaded files to the directory you just created.
         1. $ mv ~/Downloads/cgterm-1.7b2.tar ~/dev
      3. Extract the files 
         1. $ cd ~/dev
         2. $ tar -xvf cgterm-1.7b2.tar 

 3. Install sdl headers (SDL.h) from the brew repository if not already installed.
            a. $ brew install sdl4. Compile the software.

 
Normally we need to run 3 commands to compile source code, however I only had to do two for CGTerm.  These commands are

1) ./configure (Not needed for this install.)
2) make
3) make install

There is no configure script for this source code, so if you try and execute it you will receive an error, so let’s move on to step 2.

Make sure you are in your ~/dev/cgterm-1.7b2 directory by typing at the shell prompt
$ pwd   

If you are not, type.
$ cd ~/dev/cgterm-1.7b2

Now we will create the make file. Type
$ make

If all goes well, you will see a screen that looks like this.  Ignore any warnings.

now lets compile the .app files.
$ make install

You will see the following output if successful.

Lets now perform a directory listing specifically to check if we now have the 3 CGTerm executable files. (NOTE: Without configuring your shell to colorize the output, it can be difficult to find the executables in the listing.  I recommend following the link at the bottom of this blog, which will walk you through how to get colorized directory listings like Linux.)

ls -l cgchat cgedit cgterm testkbd

Finally let’s perform some housekeeping tasks, since we do not need to keep the source files around.

First lets create a new directory in the /Applications folder, then we will copy the newly compiled executables to that directory

$ sudo mkdir Applications/CGTerm-1.7
$ sudo mv cgchat cgedit cgterm testkbd /Applications/CGTerm-1.7

It is up to you if you want to keep the source files around, in this example I do not, however I will keep the compressed .tar file

$ rm –r ~/dev/cgterm-1.7b2

Perform a final test by either changing working directories in the terminal to /Applications and launching CGTerm, or launch from the finder.

$ cd /Applications
$ cgterm

Once your newly compiled CGTerm opens and you see this screen let’s connect to a BBS.

Type ESC
Type D

When you get the Connect to host [port]: box, type

cib.dyns.org 6400 <ENTER>

You should now be connected to the Commodore Image BBS

When launching from the finder, Mac OS will launch a terminal session, this is normal.

I hope you have enjoyed another Mac OS tutorial, and compiling your first application from source code!  Please try connecting to the following BBS’s running on a Commodore 64 using your newly compiled app.

Commodore Image – cib.dyndns.org:6400
Lowdown BBS – lowdown.servebbs dot net:6401

** I highly recommend coloring your directory output, it makes differentiating between Directories, Text files, and applications allot simpler.  To enable colorized directory output in Mac OS X, please CLICK HERE.

*** PLEASE NOTE!  All traffic sent via TELNET is sent in plain text, when connecting to BBSs using CGTerm or other telnet applications, DO NOT use passwords that you use for any other services.  Such as financial institutions or online shopping!

Quickie – Installing Sophos Home on OS X Sierra

You may often hear that Mac’s just don’t get virus’s. Or that there are no known malware ‘in the wild’ that effect Mac’s. While this may or may not have been true at one time ( The caveat ‘in the wild’ makes that statement suspect, as it is acknowledging that someone, somewhere is probably developing some.).

Doing a simple Google  search, I was able to find a list of 51 pieces of malware targeting OS X. (Link to list by clicking here.) So while this number is nowhere near as large as what is present in the Windows world it is NOT 0. So knowing that there is malware out there and the predominant attitude is that our OS X workstations do not get malware. I would say we are actually more vulnerable than our Windows brethren.

it is ALWAYS best practice to install an antimalware application on your computer. Regardless if you are running OS X, Windows, or Linux.

Sophos offers a free anti-malware product called, Sophos Home for free. You simply need to sign up for the free account and download the installer. There is however one catch that I discovered while trying to install on OS X Sierra. The installer would exit with the following error.

I was able to find a workaround on the Sophos support forums.

1) Go to the location you downloaded Sophos Home – ie ~/Downloads /SophosInstall
2) Right click on the Sophos Installer Package 
a. Select “Show Package Contents” 
3) Go to ./Contents/MacOS/
4) Double Click Installer

Sophos will now install normally.

Once installed I recommend performing a full scan by clicking on the Sophos Icon in your menu bar, clicking on Open Sophos Home then click the Scan Now button.

Thanks for reading my blog, and safe computing. Please come back next month for our next technical post! If you wish to be notified by email of new posts please register for a free account. You may also want to check out our forums at www.catracing.org/hendrb/forum.

Fun With OS X

– Installing BASH 4 on OS X using Home Brew 

        If you have spent any time using LINUX or even other Unix variants like Solaris, you are already painfully aware of the differences that exist in various shells, commands, and utilities.  One of the more striking differences is that Apple continues to include BASH v.3.2.57 which is about 8 years old and does not support some very import features of v4 such as associative arrays and a myriad of additional types of command completion.  For a full list of BASH 4 changes click HERE. (Replace HERE with this LINK https://www.admon.org/scripts/new-features-in-bash-4-0/).  The reason that Apple does not include a newer version of BASH is that BASH4 is now under the GPL3 license, and does not conform to Apples copyright philosophy. However this does not stop you from installing it yourself.

  There are several ways to install BASH 4 on your Mac, including compiling from source if you are feeling masochistic.  The method that I used, installing the Home Brew repository will be covered in this tutorial.

  Part I – Installing the Homebrew repository.

  If you use Linux, you are already familiar with a software repository, and package management software.  Red Hat and CentOS uses yum and rpm, while Unbunto Linux uses apt-get or Synaptic.  For us OS X users, the only software respository most of us are familiar with is the App store, which allows us to purchase, install software and manage their updates.  Homebrew is basically an App Store for software packages created, compiled, and maintained by the community and are free of charge.  This is where we will be obtaining BASH version 4.  We first though must install XCode Command Line Tools (CLT), and Homebrew.

 For detailed instructions to installing Homebrew, go to brew.sh

1. Launch your terminal

 2. Copy and paste the shell command on the home page into your terminal window at the shell prompt.
    This will automatically install XCode Command Like Tools, and the homebrew repository.
 3. Once installed test by typing man brew in your terminal window.

Man entry for brew

Part II – Installing BASH 4

  1. In your shell window switch to an account with elevated privledges, brew will not execute being run using sudo

     $ su – <priledged username>5

Then type.

      $ brew install bash bash-completion

This will install both BASH 4 and BASH completion in /usr/local/bin/base

  2. We now need to add the new shell to the list of whitelisted shells, this is done in the /etc/shells file.

      $ echo “$(brew –prefix)/bin/bash” >> /etc/shells

 3. OPTIONAL Change your login shell to BASH4

       $ chsh –s $(brew –prefix)/bin/bash

NOTE:  I chose to leave my login shell at BASH3, as BASH4 can be invoked in the shebang #! at the beginning of any BASH4 script.   Here are some other personal tweaks I did for my BASH4 installation.

I created a symbolic link for /bin/bash4 to /usr/local/bin/bash.  That way I can execute BASH v4 scripts using #!/bin/bash4.

I did this by typing the following 

       $ ln -s /usr/local/bin/bash /bin/bash4

You can see that bash4 is a link to /usr/local/bin/bash

I can change to BASH4 from any shell in this manner.

            $ /bin/bash4

I can re-execute the login script next by entering the following command.

            $ source /etc/profile

PART III – BASH Version checking in login scripts.

  I also added a BASH version checking routine to be placed in /etc/profile (Login script that is executed when opening a terminal window for ALL USERS).

You may want to consider adding this to your profile script.

     3  ## BASH3 .profile (Put ALL BASH3 specific code here)
     4  function bash3 {
     5  echo -e “\nUsing BASH 3 Specific and Version Neutral login profile\n” 
     6  }
     7 
     8  ## BASH4 .profile (Pull ALL BASH4 specific code here)
     9  function bash4 {
     10  echo -e “\nUsing BASH 4 Specific and Version Neutral login profile\n”
      11  }
      12 
      13  # Default BASH version checking
      14 
      15          if (( ${BASH_VERSION%%.*} > 3 ))
      16                  then 
      17                          bash4
      18                  else    
      19                          bash3
      20      fi
      21 
      22  ## PUT ALL VERSION NEUTRAL BASH SCRIPTS BELOW THIS LINE!

That is all there is to installing BASH4 in OSX.  I hope you enjoyed the tutorial will keep returning to Brent’s world for more great articles!