Making Your OS X Terminal Look And Feel More Like Linux

If you are a Mac OS X power user who has spent any time in the terminal, and also used Linux. You will know firsthand that the OS X terminal can look kind of, well dull by comparison. One of the first things that you will notice is missing is the colorized directories, colorized grep output, as well as some of the directory listing shortcuts such as ‘ll’, and ‘l.’

Linux ll command

In this article we will explore how to modify your OS X terminal experience to match what you are used to seeing when using Linux.

First let’s take a look at the expanded List Directory Contents ‘ls’ command functionality in Linux.

We all know that to list the contents of a directory, in both Unix and Linux you use the ‘ls’ command. We can specify additional options on the command line. Like this

-a displays all files, including hidden files.
-l displays a long directory listing, displaying more information such as POSIX permissions, owner, group and file size information
-h displays “human readable” file sizes in a long listing.

These options can be combined in a single command, so typing ‘ls –lah’ will display a long listing, displaying all files, with “human readable” file sizes.

As mentioned above, most Linux distributions (RHL/CentOS, and Ubuntu), allow you to use the ls command to display a short list, ll to display the long list. Without specifying any options.

How is this done? How can I add the same functionality to my OS X terminal session?

In actuality it is quite easy, and done the same in OS X as it is done in Linux (Linux just happens to already have it in your login script.). It is done using the alias comman.

Alias allows you to set up alias’s for any command, with options, and use the normal command name, or you can choose a different name.
If you have access to a Linux box, open up a terminal windows and type ‘alias’ at a shell prompt. On CentOS 7, you will see the following output.

$ alias
alias egrep=’egrep –color=auto’
alias fgrep=’fgrep –color=auto’
alias grep=’grep –color=auto’
alias l.=’ls -d .* –color=auto’
alias ll=’ls -l –color=auto’
alias ls=’ls –color=auto’
alias which=’alias | /usr/bin/which –tty-only –read-alias –show-dot –show-tilde’

As you can see, in Linux when you use the ls command, it is not just ‘ls’ that is being executed but ls with the –color=auto option <colorizing OS X listing is done differently> which we will cover in the second part of this blog. Stay focused on the alias command for now.

Let’s add the l. and ll functionality right now.

The alias command is pretty straight forward.
Alias <COMMAND>=‘command string’

If you do not still have your OS X terminal window open, please open it again now.

At the command prompt type.
alias l.=’ls –d *’ <Hit Enter>
alias ll=’ls –l’ <Hit Enter>

Now let’s verify that it took your alias entries.
At the command prompt type alias

If the system accepted the alias’s you should now be able to do the following in your shell environment.

l. – Will display only directories in your current working directory
ll – Will display a long listing.

Here is the ll alias working.

Go ahead and test the functionality, while also play around with some of the other options. If you type ll –h for instance, you will see a long directory listing with the filesizes presented in “Human Readable Form” one of the great things about the BASH shell, is that you still have full command substitution available within an alias.
Part II – I also made reference to the ability to colorize the OS X directory listings. This is also done within the alias command, however it is done a bit differently.

OS X uses the –G option in the ls command to output the listing in color.

Here is the color ls output.

So let’s add some color to the standard ‘ls’ command

At your shell prompt type,

Alias ls=’ls –G’ <ENTER>

Type alias and <ENTER> to make sure your alias has been entered into the system.

Now let’s go back and add color to the other alias’s we created.

We can simply use command history to go back to the previous commands we have entered. Keep pressing your up cursor key until you see ‘alias ll=’ls –l’. Then use your left cursor key to move your cursor to the right of the single ‘ quote. Simply add the dash – and capital G and hit <ENTER>.

Now if you type the alias command by itself at your shell prompt you should see the modified ll alias.

Let’s try it out by typing ll at your shell prompt.

Here is the ll alias working.

Use command history and go back and add – and capital G to the l. command.
Use the alias command by itself to make sure it took
Test the l. alias.

Very good! You now have color directory listings in your OS X terminal environment.
Part III – Making these changes permanent.

Now that we have made the OS X terminal environment a little more colorful for your everyday use, and made it a perform more like the Linux systems you have been using there is one catch.

These changes are not yet permanent, in fact if we simply closed down our terminal window right now all our aliases would be lost! We do not even need to reboot or shut down our system!

So how do we make these changes stick?

There are a few files we need to modify, and depending on if you want it to apply to only a single user (Your account), or to any account that is on the system and opens a terminal shell or might ssh remotely to the computer.

If you only want the alias’s to be assigned to your shell environment, you need to add your alias commands to the ~\.bash_profile.

NOTE: ~\ is shorthand for YOUR home directory. So ~\.bash_profileis actually located in /Users/<shortname>

So let’s add the alias commands to the .bash_profile file

At your shell prompt enter alias
Select the output of the alias command
Copy the output

Now type nano ~\.bash_profile
Move the cursor to the bottom of any entries already in the file.
Paste your text in the file
Enter CTRL-X
Answer YES to save changes
Hit <Enter> to keep the same filename

Test functionality by typing exit then closing and reopening the terminal window.

Type alias, and you should see that the aliases you added are still there.

If you want to assign the alias’s to all users on the system, then add the above lines to the \etc\profile file.
PART IV – Modifying shell color output

You can specify how to color the specific componate in an ls output by using the LSICOLORS= option in your login script.

Adding LSICOLORS=<COLOR Colorcode> will modify the colors used for outputting the 11 functions.
The default value is, ‘exfxcxdxfxegedabagcad’

I have created this chart for ease of use.

Best practice calls for placing the line CLICOLOR=1 and LSCOLORS=exfxcxdxfxegedabagcad into your login script, but this is not necessary.

There you have it!  thanks for reading another Brent’s World OS X terminal / Linux blog!  We hope that you enjoyed learning a little more about your system!  Please remember, while using alias’s or system customization to make your system easier to use.  These modifications will not be available on other system, so practice the original functionality.

This weekend I thought I would again do something different, I have done a couple of reviews on game ports to the iPad from one of my favorite historical computer platforms, so this week I thought I would share something that I came across when looking at some of the files I have stored on my MacBook Pro as I get ready for my big cruise.

Before the Macintosh, and the Amiga the good ol Commodore 64 (Later a Commodore 128D and flat 128) had its place on my computer desk. The Commodore 64 is known for not only being the top selling single computer model of all time, with something like 2 million units sold, but for it’s exhaustive game library.

I came across the disk images for a game that holds a very very special place in my heard, I think this is because it was the first and ONLY graphical text adventure game I have actually successfully completed. I remember fondly my older brother and I working together to complete the game, but somewhere along the way he gave up, and I ultimately finished it. It also prompted me to check out the book from the school library (I think I was in the 3rd at All Hallows Academy then.)

The game that is bringing back such fond memories, is Robert Luis Stevensons Treasure Island, by Windham classics.

Windham classics formally Telarium, made a name for itself with its line of graphic/text adventures for the Commodore 64 and other computers. Titles such as Rendezvous with Rama, Nine Princes in Amber, and Fahrenheit 451. After being purchased by Spinnaker Software, the new name was acquired, and they produced adventures for classic children’s stories. Besides Treasure Island their other titles include.

Below the Root
Swiss Family Robinson (I owned this as well but never completed it)
The Wizard of Oz
Alice in Wonderland
Treasure Island

Let’s go ahead and take a brisk walk down memory err… Through the game.

We start by launching our Commodore 64 Emulator WinVice x64

The only 2 settings you will need to concern yourself with are.

1) Make sure the emulator is set to use NTSC
a. Options > Model Settings
i. C64 model: C64 NTSC
ii. VIC II model: NTSC-M

You can change the SID model here is you would like, I will leave as is at 6581 (ReSID).
Click OK (x64 will perform a hard reset.)

2) Due to copy protection, you need to be using either 1541 emulation, or 1571 emulation, True drive emulation
a. Make sure Options > True Drive Emulation is checked
b. Settings > Drive Settings
i. Drive 8 1541 or 1541 II (There is no reason to use a 1571).
Press OK

Next let’s “insert our disk”
1) Select File > Attach Disk Image > Drive 8
Once the dialogue box comes up just find your .d64 image (Treasure Island has 4 disks)
2) Double click the .d64 or select the image and click OK

You can now proceed to load Treasure Island as you would any ol Commodore 64 game, while getting yourself a cup of coffee.. Unfortunately unlike having a real 1541, you can’t keep said coffee warm, by putting the cup on the vent.  NOTE: You do have to type RUN after the first file has loaded.

After a couple of minutes, you will be greeted with the Treasure Island title screen, and some pretty cool music. One of the things I really like about this game, was the different theme music they used throughout.

Press G to start the game.

We are now in the Adrmiral Benbow Inn, with Captain Billy Bones sitting at the table. The parser uses a simple verb noun style of input. Such as “Talk to Billy”, GO EAST, GO SOUTH, TAKE (Object), USE (Object) etc. You can get a list of suggestions to help you at any time by entering ‘words’ To not make it too easy, the solution to the puzzle you are trying to solve may not be listed, as well as not everything in the suggestion list will actually do anything useful.

HINT: If you are going to try and play the game through, I would highly recommend that you actually go ahead and create a save disk at this point.

Type ‘create’ <You can see here the parser is not actually that picky>

1) Go to File > Attach Disk Image
2) Select Drive 8
3) Enter Save image in the file name
4) Click Create Image
5) Click Attach
6) Hit Enter
7) When prompted re-insert disk 1 into the drive
a. File > Attach Disk Image > Drive 8
b. Select Treasure0.D64
c. Press Any Key (Once you find the ANY key.)

Now let’s begin, As we can see from the first screen Billy wants some run, do a quick ‘LOOK’
Billy wants his rum, so we better go to the South. You can either type Go South, or simply South
Here is where the first puzzle begins. As the purpose of this blog is not to provide a walk through, but an overview of the game, I now leave you to your devices. Good luck and happy treasure hunting!

The game itself is broken down into Chapters, you will be rewarded with some good in game music, and a description of what lies ahead, and what you will need to do to complete the next chapter.

Chapter list

Chapter 1 – Finding Flints fist and escaping the pirates!
Chapter 2 – Going to Bristol and sailing on the Hispaniola.
Chapter 3 – Treasure Island – Stop the mutiny.
Chapter 4 – Save Hispaniola.
Chapter 5 – Finding the Treasure.

While playing the game again today it was interesting just how much I remembered about the game from that long ago, it also struck me that perhaps we have lost something over the years with education software design. Though I have been out of the loop of playing children’s games. I was trying to think of any titles for the PC, Apple Mac, or other platforms today that provide as much opportunity as some of the text, and graphical text adventures like Treasure Island. Not only did the game make me pick up a book I might otherwise had passed on, being too interested in reading The Hardy Boys. It also gave me valuable typing practice, and taught me to really look at my surroundings put pieces of a puzzle together.

If you have never played the game before or would like to play it again for old times’ sake, you can download the game HERE.

If you complete the game, please come back and tell me how long it took you.

Please do not forget to rate this article, and if you want to be notified when new content is posted to Brent’s World, please REGISTER!

My first article on BASH scripting, where we took a simple number guessing program from the Commodore 64 Users Guide and turned it into a BASH script was so popular https://www.catracing.org/hendrb/bash-script-guess-number/ . We had to do a followup. So to up the ante, I thought I could also reference the blog on BBSing https://www.catracing.org/hendrb/carrier-lost-world-bbs/, and take an IMAGE BBS +.file and attempt to convert it to a BASH script. After all, what is a terminal session anyways, but a big BBS?

For those of you who have not had any exposure to Image BBS or its predecessor C-Net, a Plus file (+.filename, or filename), are basic program modules that are loaded to perform function on the BBS. Each subsystem of the BBS, IE Sub Boards, Upload/Download areas, was a separate program or +. File. Other SysOps could even write their own +. Files, to create more functionality, or write online games.
C-Net, and Image BBS both used a slightly modified BASIC to perform specific tasks, such as outputting text to the screen and modem simultaneously, interpret MCI, etc.

C-Net’s text output command was a$=”Text (K)”:syso

While Image BBS used the & character.

& “Text (K)” (This took up less memory, as it uses fewer characters in the program listing.

Both programs used a Shifted F5 to perform a carriage return, this looked like an inversed K, which is represented here by (K).

Most likely, you’re not here for a BBS history lesson, and want to get down to the programming! So what program did I choose to convert into a BASH script? There was one program on the original Image BBS 1.0 disk that I always had allot of fun with, The Mystical 8 Ball Oracle!

I also thought it would be a great example of some BASH scripting concepts, such as the Do While loop, case statement, and getting to use some ANSI color! One thing about Image BBS, was that it was very colorful! You too can make your BASH scripts stand out by learning ANSI escape sequences.

If you use the echo command you can add COLOR, bold, blinking, and underlined text to your output.

To encode text simply use the –e option of the echo command followed by \e[<ANSI CODE>m

For instance let’s say we want to make our text output bold blue. The ANSI code for bold is 1, and the code for blue text is 44. The line in our BASH script would look like this.
echo –e “\e[1;44mThis is a bold blue line of text\e[0m”

Go ahead and try this at a BASH shell prompt and you should see bold blue text. Here is a good troubleshooting hint. Anything that you can do in a BASH script you can do at the command line. So if something is not working in your script you can break them down line by line at a prompt to find out exactly what is not working.

So let’s break the command above down. We are executing the echo command with the –e (Text encoding option), all ANSI codes entered must be proceeded by the \e and the terminals escape character, in this case the left bracket [. There are two ANSI escape codes in this example separated by the ; 01 specifies bold text, and 44 is the color blue. All ANSI escape sequences must end with the lower case m. The next part of the echo command our actual text, and the \e[0m simply resets the ANSI output to default. So we are not put back at a terminal prompt with a strange color.

Let’s take a look at some common ANSI control codes, that would be useful for your BASH scripts.

So Now that you have an idea of what we will be working with in the program, let’s take a look at our BASH script.

1 #!/bin/bash
2 # /* The Great 8-Ball Oracle */
3 # /* Commodore 64 IMAGE BBS +. File By The Misty Mountain BBS */
4 # /* Included On the IMAGE BBS V1.0 Disk Side 2 */
5 # /* Converted to BASH Script By Brent P Hendricks */
6 # /* Demonstrating Random Numbers, Nested Loops, Case Statement */
7 # /* Check Out Brent’s World, for the acompanied article. */
8 # /* Released to public domain, blog article text (C) 2015 */
9 # /* Brent’s World Blog. www.catracing.org/hendrb */
10
11 PLAY=1
12
13
14 clear
15 echo -e “\n\n \e[1;42mThe Misty Mountain Presents\e[0m”
16 echo -e ” \e[37mWisom Of The Mystic Masters”
17 echo -e ” \e[1;35mThe Mystical 8-Ball Oracle\e[0m”
18 echo -e “\n\n\n\e[37mOriginal Commodore 64 program appeared on side 2 of the IMABE BBS System Disk”
19 echo -e “Converted to BASH Script by Brent Hendricks. To Demonstrate Nested Loop (Do Until),”
20 echo -e “RANDOM Numbers, CASE statement, and ANSI escape codes.”
21 echo -e “\nThis script has been released into the public domain. However the accompanying blog”
22 echo -e “article remains the property of Brent Hendricks, and Brent’s World.”
23 echo -e “\nBe sure to check out Brent’s World @ www.catracing.org/hendrb”
24 echo -e “\n”
25 # echo $PLAY
26 while [ “$PLAY” -eq “1” ]
27 do
28
29 echo -en “\n\nMake Thy Request To The Mystical 8-Ball\nBe Thou Certain, Thy Request May Be Answered Yea or Nay.\n: \e[1;97m”
30 read AN
31 echo -en “\n\e[36mCommencing GURU Meditation.”
32 COUNT=1
33 until [ $COUNT -eq 40 ]
34 do
35 echo -n “.”
36 ((COUNT=$COUNT+1))
37 done
38
39 echo -e “\n\e[0mYou asketh – $AN.”
40 DICE=$((RANDOM % 17 + 1))
41 echo -en “The Answer Is – ”
42 case “$DICE” in
43 1)
44 echo -e “Yes…\n”
45 ;;
46 2)
47 echo -e “No…\n”
48 ;;
49 3)
50 echo -e “Maybe..\n”
51 ;;
52 4)
53 echo -e “Probably Yes..\n”
54 ;;
55 5)
56 echo -e “Probably No..\n”
57 ;;
58 6)
59 echo -e “Undecided..\n”
60 ;;
61 7)
62 echo -e “Of Course..\n”
63 ;;
64 8)
65 echo -e “The Answer Seems Foggy..\n”
66 ;;
67 9)
68 echo -e “Positively\n”
69 ;;
70 10)
71 echo -e “Not A Chance..\n”
72 ;;
73 11)
74 echo -e “The Answer Must Reamin Hidden For Now..\n”
75 ;;
76 12)
77 echo -e “That Is A Silly Question..\n”
78 ;;
79
80 13)
81 echo -e “Yep..\n”
82 ;;
83 14)
84 echo -e “Look For The Answer Within Yourself..\n”
85 ;;
86 15)
87 echo -e “Very Possible..\n”
88 ;;
89
90 16)
91 echo -e “Unlikely..\n”
92 ;;
93 17)
94 echo -e “Nope..\n”
95 ;;
96 esac
97
98 echo -en “Do You have Another Query? y/n : ”
99 read AN
100 if [ $AN = “n” ]
101 then
102 echo -e “\n\n\e[31mThanks For Using. \n\e[33mThe Great 8-Ball Oracle!”
103 echo -e “\e[44Please read the associated blog article @ www.catracing.org/hendrb\e[0m\n”
104 PLAY=0
105 fi
106 done
107 exit 0

One of the hardest parts I found going from Commodore BASIC to BASH scripting is unlearning the use of line numbers.  instead of thinking line by line, I have to think in terms of blocks of code.  or specific functions.  Let’s take a look at what each block in our Magic 8 Ball program actually does.

Line 1, is not really REQUIRED, if you use the BASH shell by default.  For portability it is considered best practice to specify for your operating system what shell to use.  So Line 1 simply calls the BASH interpreter.  the #! is called the she-bang or shebang..

Lines 2-9 are simple comment statements, equivelant to BASICs REM statement.  Any line in your code that is preceded by the pound or #, is not acted upon by the interpreter.  This is also used in .conf files, to toggle configuration functions on and off.  This is called POUNDING OUT.  So if you hear someone say, just POUND IT OUT.  It means to put a # sign in front of a line in a script of .conf file.

Line 11 sets the variable PLAY to equal 1.  It is good practice to setup static variables at the beginning of the script, before they are used in the script.  This is used in our Do while Loop, but more on that later.

line 14 clears the screen

Lines 15 – 24  is our scripts title screen. Made up of the echo command, using the -n and or the -e option.

-n tells the echo command that you do not want a NEWLINE (CR/LF) sent after the closing quotes.
-e tells the echo command to interpret escape characters, such as \n (NEW LINE), or \e (ANSI Escape codes)

Line 25 (Which is pounded out), was used for troubleshooting.  It is not executed.

Line 26 begins the main portion of our program, which will continue until the PLAY variable is set to 0.  Since BASH does not support any type of a GOTO function.  We have to set the program as one big loop in order to execute the routine again, if the player so chooses.  [ sets up a test routine, which is testing that the PLAY variable is equal -eq to 1/ NOTE: the spaces are there for SYNTAX, not to make it easier to read.

Line 29 establishes our prompt for input, and line 30 reads the keyboard for input (Similar to BASICs INPUT command.), the result is returned in variable AN.

Line 32-37 is a simple do UNTIL loop, similar to a BASIC FOR/NEXT loop.  It outputs 40 “.”s to the screen

The loop will be active until the variable COUNT is equal to “40”, until it does it will echo “.” to screen, and the -n option tells echo, not to add a NEWLINE to the end of it’s output.  Lilne 35 increments count, by 1.

Line 39 simply echo’s again what the user input, and is stored in variable AN

Line 40 generates a random number between 1 and 17.

Our output is generated between lines 42 – 96 using a CASE statement to mimic BASIC 2.0s DATA statement.  The Basic program simply read the data variable x amount of times until it came to the correct response.

IE: 200 DATA “Yes, No, Maybe, … , … , …”, if DICE =3, then the response would have read Maybe.

Line 42 opens the case statement, and each line after that specifies if DICE = x) then perform the tabbed function.  You do not have to tab the next lines, but it does make it easier to read.

IE 1)

echo -e “Yes…\n”

Each case function must end with two semi colons. And finally the entire case function is executed with the esac command as seen in line 96.

Line 98 prompts the user if they would like to ask the Mystic 8 ball another question, and the answer is returned in variable AN

If the user answers no, the exit message is displayed, as seen in lines 102-103, and the PLAY variable is set to 0.  Which if you remember would exit out DO WHILE loop, and return the user to the main prompt.

If the user answers Y, then PLAY stays set to 1, and the loop begins at the beginning.

If you choose to type the above script in, using the text editor of your choice, remember you must make the script executable.

Save the script as 8ball.sh
At a shell prompt enter chmod 775 8ball.sh

To execute the script, simple enter ./8ball.sh
This should be your output.

Thank you for visiting Brent’s World.  We hope you enjoyed another BASH scripting article, we hope that you take the time to experiment with out script.  Please feel free to share any comments, and enhancements.

SysOps running Image BBS’s are welcome to copy this blogs text, as long as it is copied in it’s entirety and credit is given to Brent Hendricks, and the URL to Brent’s World is displayed in the text.  The original Commodore BASIC program was included on disk 2 of Image BBS v1.0.  Image BBS is Copyright New Image Software, and has been released to the public domain.  This BASH script is also public domain, however the blog text is Copyright 2015 Brent P Hendricks.

NO CARRIER! – The Lost World Of The BBS

“Radio Killed The Video Star.” Or in this case the Internet killed the BBS SysOp, in one of my first blog posts (On the original Windows IIS blog), I mentioned that I used to be a BBS System Operator, known as a SysOp.

What is this BBS I speak of?  Before your phone or cable company offered to give you a permanent connection to the internet via DSL, or CABLE.  There were generous people like myself that would sacrifice one of their computers to allow you to use a device called a modem, that connected your computer to a plain old telephone line that allowed you to call another computer running specialized  software to exchange e-mail, post public messages, play simple text based games, or trade the latest in public domain or pirate software.

This specialist software called a  BBS program which in my case was the premiere BBS package for the Commodore 64 called IMAGE BBS v1.2. The software came on a double sided disk which held 170k per side. That is 340Kilobytes, not megabytes or gigabytes! This may not seem like a lot these days!, but for its day, it was a HUGE program.   I first went online with a 20MB Lt. Kernel Hard Drive, and later upgraded to 105MBs.  Again in 1993 on a Commodore 64 computer this was HUGE!  Not to mention expensive.  Used, the 20MB hard drive system cost $350.  Brand new would set you back about 750.00!

The modem connected the computer to the telephone line and transferred data at a maximum speed of 2400 baud, which meant 2400 bits per second. Or 2400 divided by 8 is a whopping 300 bytes per second. Think about this.  An extremely SLOW internet connection would be over 3,000 bytes per second.

One of the really cool things about a BBS that I feel has been lost with the internet, is that each system had it’s only theme, focus, and in some respects it’s own personality, depending on the SysOp, who the “regular” callers were, and the main focus of the BBS. Each system took on it’s own unique personality.  Additionally for those that called and posted regularly it because a mini online community.

I really enjoyed running my BBS, and made several long lasting friends throughout the experience.  It also taught me how to support my users, and taught me a great deal about programing in  Commodore BASIC, it was allot of fun writing small programs and making modifications to the system.

There are several IMAGE BBS systems still being run today, accessible on the internet through TELNET. One of the most popular IMAGE BBSs in San Diego back in 1994.  Commodore Image is online at cib.dyndns.org 6400.  You can access it either through a normal TELNET client using ANSI COLOR and IBM graphics or through a PETSCII terminal emulator called CG TERM.

I thought it would be fun to interview some of the people that ran  Image BBS systems for the blog, I received replies from Larry Hedman (X-Tec of Commodore Image),  Eric Lamb of Buccaneer’s Den (not currently in operation.), Ryan Sherwood (PINACOLADA), who also is the founder and moderator of the IMAGE BBS group on Facebook, and Al LaRosa (Of Bucko), who is chalk full of history and trivia surrounding Image BBS, and New image Software.

• What was your first experience with telecommunications, What was your first modem and it’s speed?

Larry: I first started telecommunicating on a Commodore 64 with a VolksModem at 300 baud. I used it for calling Bulletin Boards I found listed in Commodore magazines that I subscribed to which were Compute, Compute’s Gazette and RUN Magazine. I also had an account on Q-Link that I called frequently.

 Eric Lamb: I had purchased my first computer, a brand new Commodore 64 when I was in 7th grade. A year or two later, an ad in Commodore Power/Play magazine (I believe) offered a package deal.  A VicModem running at 300 baud, and a free month of Q-Link for something a special price.  I had been reading about modems, Q-Link, and even the personal BBS for a bit, but had never tried it.  I ordered this kit.  As this was an acoustic modem, I found that all of the cheap phones in our house wouldn’t work… I had to borrow an old phone from a friend, and I was hooked!  I used that 300 baud modem for at least a year, most likely longer!

Ryan Sherwood: I had a neighbor, Matt, who had a Commodore 64 and a modem (and two rooms full of Commodore and Amiga stuff). I don’t remember what type of modem it was, but it was probably a 2400 BPS modem. We used CCGMS and dialed local BBSes (in Washington state, the US) like Time Takers’ BBS, Oakbrook Express, The White House, and others.  The first modem I was able to buy for myself was an Aprotek Minimodem-C 24. I loved having all the LEDs on it, they were so informative. The first BBS I dialed with it was the Aprotek support BBS in Rogue River, Oregon. There I downloaded some SIDplayer *.mus files, but didn’t know you needed SIDplayer to play them. So I emailed the sysop, and thankfully he answered my question. I downloaded a version of SIDplayer and got that working. I remember doing a lot of early morning downloads in the summer because the long distance rates were cheaper. I got a neat version of Star Trek, and downloaded lots of little demos.

Al DeRosa:  First experience with a modem was a 300 baud Mighty Mo, I got it for Christmas as an afterthought when I bought my first C64.. I called Compuserve and was paying $6 an hour for using it..

• What made you become a SysOp?

Larry: I got the idea to start my own BBS from calling other boards.  The idea of running a BBS seemed interesting and at the time I was stationed at a Naval Air Station in Adak, Alaska.  There were no Bulletin Boards being run there so I decided to start one to see if there would be interest locally.  The interest was there, and I soon began receiving numerous calls from people with computers on the island.  That blossomed into forming a computer users group, eventually growing to about 60 or so members. I served as president of the Adak Computer User’s Group (ACUG) for about 2 1/2 years.

Eric Lamb: Once I discovered the world of the BBS, I made many local friends who ran one. I even was asked to SubOp on a couple of boards, my first SubOp role was helping a friend out who was running an Atari ST BBS.  I loved it.  I somehow convinced my parents into letting me have my own phone line (they hated me hogging the phone anyway) and I knew I had to run my own.

Ryan Sherwood: I liked the idea of the community it created. People would get together, write messages to each other, play games, try to date each other, read interesting text files about the Commodore and anything else you cared to put on the BBS. I wanted a piece of this action!

Al DeRosa: Paying $6 an hour for CompuServe, I called a local BBS and I was hooked. I NEEDED to run a BBS.

• Did you always run Image BBS? If you ran other software which package for the Commodore 64 did you run?
  

  Larry:  It’s hard to remember what all software I ran my BBS on but it seems I started using All American BBS software and a few others. Eventually, I bought Cnet 11.0 and later upgraded to 12.0. That’s probably when I bought my first hard drive, a Xetec Lt. Kernal 20 meg.

  Eric Lamb: I started out very small.  My first couple of attempts at running a BBS was off of a single 1541 drive.  The first package I ran was AA BBS, which you could download a shareware copy off of Q-Link.  It wouldn’t time out, but it had messages asking you to pay for it for an upgrade.  It was also rumored that there were back doors in the code… I didn’t care, I ran that package for a while… Then I started looking for others… I ran Color BBS, Ivory, EEBBS, and then discovered C-Net.  I LOVED C-NET… My first version was 10.0.  I ended up buying more drives to set up a better BBS.  I had two 1541’s a SFD-1001, and two CBM 8050 dual drives.  I stayed with C-Net from 10.0, to 11.1a, and maybe 12… not sure… right around then I discovered Image BBS, which was an offshoot of C-Net (most people know this story if they know the history of Image.)  I ran Image until my BBS went down in the early 90’s, probably 1993.

Ryan Sherwood: No. While I was saving up to buy Image BBS, I downloaded some other smaller BBS programs, just to see what they were like. I tried Fantasy Role-Playing BBS, C*Base, one I think was called “Micro-RAM BBS” (entirely contained in RAM, when you wanted to save messages, you broke out of the program and saved it), and some others.

Al DeRosa: I first put my BBS up on November 22th 1986, I ran CNet 10.0 (Pirated of course) then when I decided to put the BBS full time I bought a copy of CNet 11.1a from Perspective and ran it until 12.0 came out, when 12.1 and the debacle of that came about I followed Dan Gladden and Fred Dart to New Image.

• • What made you switch to IMAGE BBS?

    Larry: I switched to Image BBS when Don Gladen split from Perspective software.  I had a choice between DS2 and Image. I chose Image because of the friendship I had developed at the time with Fred Dart (The Chief).  Since Fred was going with Image, I followed along.

    Eric Lamb: A friend of mine told me about Image, I believe it was actually my Co-Sysop or (SubOp) at the time.  I loved it right away.

    Ryan Sherwood: What made you switch to IMAGE BBS? I really liked the look and feel of it. I think the newly installed SIGs (special interest groups) on a local BBS called Time Takers did it for me. I naively asked the sysop, Sysop Jack, if I could have a copy of it. He tactfully pointed out if was a commercial product and put me in touch with New Image Software in Utah. Sysop Jack and I had a few phone conversations after that, about being a sysop. I still remember excitedly running home from the post office, reading through the manual (it even had that nice plastic cover, so it must be really professional!). Setting it up on 1 1541 didn’t work very well—there was some problem getting to the waiting for call screen. That resulted in a few phone calls to my mentor, Sysop Jack, and later to Fred Dart. They both was very patient and kind, and we did a lot of troubleshooting over the phone. Later I bought a second 1541 from a high school friend. That made things a little less painful. The whole experience increased my resolve to save up for a Creative Micro Designs hard drive, and several years later, JiffyDOS.
    

    Al DeRosa The debacle of 12.1!

• • What was the primary focus of your BBS?
    

    Larry: The primary focus of Commodore Image BBS was to provide a means of communications via message boards for the local community in Alaska. As my BBS grew, it later became a primary support board for Image Sysops. I provided access to Image updates, files written by other Image Sysops and technical support for those who needed it.

    Eric Lamb: My BBS was named “The Buccaneer’s Den”.  It had a few main points.  It was somewhat Ultima themed (I actually called myself Lord Brittish then, with the purposeful spelling error to separate me from the Ultima creator).  I also had pirated software in small amounts, but we certainly discussed pirate software a lot and where to get it.

    Ryan Sherwood: Role-playing and Dungeons and Dragons. I’d still like to write a mode of the BBS where you get to different places by typing commands like in a text adventure. This was inspired by another local Apple BBS called “Dura-Europos.” I’ve customized the new user login sequence somewhat to reflect more of an Arthurian theme, but never dug around much in Image’s BASIC code to do anything more to reflect this theme, except name a few sub-boards things like “The Dragon’s Eye Bar & Grill.”

    Al DeRosa: Support and legit software. I was NISSA NorthEast Headquarters for about 5 years. Also was the NISSA Net Administrator till I took the BBS down..

• • Can you share an especially memorable story regarding your BBS?

    Larry: I don’t recall any particular memorable story but I think the highlight of my experience with Image was when Fred Dart decided to remove NISSA from the New Image company and turn it over to the primary support boards. It was “The Chief” who suggested to Al DeRosa “BUCCO” to consider me as one of the administration boards for the newly reorganized NISSA group. I considered that an honor and I took the position with enthusiasm.

    Eric Lamb: This is a tough one… I had so many. I made many friends through my BBS, many of which I still talk to.  I also can trace my current career, in a way, back to my BBS.  I also remember the local BBS parties here in Salt Lake City, Utah, and I even hosted or helped organize several of those.  I loved them.  One last story I remember was when I went with a group of friends in high school to a haunted house at Halloween time.  As we were going through, a “monster” jumped out, then he stopped, took his mask off and said “Hey!  It’s Lord Brittish!”  My friends, who were not modem geeks, were stunned…  Good times!

    Ryan Sherwood: Not really. I lived in a small town and didn’t have many callers.

    Al DeRosa: Becoming the record holder for calls without a crash or reboot, I ran the BBS for well over 1500 or 1800 calls before it finally crashed while I was beta testing my version of Utopia. The other memorable event was getting a call from Don Gladden who I had only spoke to once before congratulating me that I was getting my Image Software and that my serial number was E0001

• Did you allow pirated software on your BBS? 

 Larry: Absolutely not.

Eric Lamb: Yes! I was a rebel back then…

Ryan Sherwood: Yeah, it was pretty common back in the day, and especially after I got Dragon’s Eye on telnet in the 2000s, people would upload copyrighted/pirated stuff. I did a lot of pirating myself, I guess, by calling long distance BBSes. There were no Commodore retailers anywhere nearby. Later on I discovered Tenex and started buying things through the mail

Al DeRosa  At first yes, but then I got scared and took it all off..

• • How many computers did you have in your house?
    
    Larry: It depends on what time frame. In the ’90’s I owned one C=128DCR, three C=64’s, One C=64C, one SX64 and a VIC20.

    Eric Lamb: One… toward the end of my run, I had a spare, but only one monitor.

    Ryan Sherwood: Two, An IBM XT (with no modem), and the Commodore 64.

    Al DeRosa  At that time I only had 2 a 128 and a 64, the BBS ran on the 64 and I used the “Muxed” 128 as my personal computer. Since then my house has become IBM! I own and have in my possession every PC ever made from a XT up to the latest and greatest.

• •   Did you run any other BBS software after Image BBS?

    Larry: No

    Eric Lamb: Nope, Image was the last product I ever ran.

    Al DeRosa  When I took the Image down, I went Amiga and can’t remember the name of the software but it was modifiable like CNet Amiga. Then I went over to the PC World, and ran Wildcat 95..

  • What year did you take you’re BBS down, and what was the primary purpose for taking it off line?

    Larry: I took Commodore Image BBS down in 1996 not by choice but because my equipment was damaged by lightning.

    Eric Lamb: I believe I took my BBS down early in 1993, maybe even the tail end of 1992… I can’t quite remember… Traffic had slowed a bit, although the Internet had not quite hit the general public yet, but the Commodore was all but dead… The company was gone (or close) and the C-64, while still having a large following was really looking long in the tooth..  My priorities were changing as well.  I was in college, I had a job, and real life started to take over.  I also started having some hardware issues with the computer and drives, so I shut it down.

    Ryan Sherwood: I’d graduated high school in 1994 and moved out. There were really not many frequent callers for about 4 or 5 months, and decided it wasn’t worth tying up a phone line for such little actual use.

    I’m currently trying to bring back The Dragon’s Eye to telnet (for the second time) and join a reincarnated Image network, although the process is still in the bug-squashing stages. I do run a Facebook group devoted to Image BBS which anyone is welcome to join: https://www.facebook.com/groups/141819789446/

    Al DeRosa: I took my Image down in 93, ran Amiga BBS till 94, then went on Wildcat till 96, then took that down when Fred Dart recruited me to help write Image 2.0, which I ran till 97 when all of my hard drives on my Lt Kernal went bad, I just didn’t have the heart to buy another 85 meg HD to put in it only for it to crap out like the last 2 did. From that point on I was done with BBS’.

Image BBS v1.2 boot screen

BBS Login Screen

BBS Graffiti Wall – Add Your Words Of Wisdom?

The SysOp has spoken (BBS News)

Custom Graphics Screen, letting me know the SysOp was not available for chat.

Title screen for the message bases – The Heart of a BBS

Message Base Post

Doing REALLY Well at Golf Solitare

Golf Solitare, one of the many colorful games available for IMAGE BBS

Myself and my fellow SysOps had allot of fun and immensely enjoyed the opportunity to interact with the people who called our systems, it also taught me valuable skills that I still use today in my work as a system administrator!  Being a SysOp was hard work, sometimes very frustrating, and other time allot of fun!   I would like to thank Larry Headman,  Eric Lamb, Ryan Sherwood, and Al DeRosa for also sharing their experiences.   If you would like to download a copy of Image BBS v1.2a, and look at it on VICE.  Both disks are available here.

ftp://ftp.zimmers.net/pub/cbm/c64/comm/bbs/image12a.zip

Please give Larry’s BBS a try at telnet://cib.dyndns.org:6400

To experience Commodore Color Graphics (C/G), you can download CG Term here.https://paradroid.automac.se/cgterm/