For those of you who have been wondering why I have been rather quiet on my Facebook page during the past two weeks, aside from being sick, and injuring my leg, I have been rather busy resurrecting some of the Internet services which I ran years ago as a part of the Endtime Prophecy Net online ministry.
In particular, I am referring to my Armageddon BBS -- formerly known as the "Treasure Trove BBS" -- and my Hotline server, which was likewise known as the Armageddon Server. I used both to offer my own writings to the world, as well as my KJV Bible verse lists, free Bible software, and other related things which are of interest to me.
Some of you are probably too young to even know what BBSing is, or what a Hotline server is. However, for the initiated -- that is, you Old Schoolers who know now to telnet to a BBS, and how to use a Hotline client, I am sure you will understand. In fact, if you want to reminisce about the "Old Days", following are some images -- screen captures, actually -- of how my BBS and Hotline server currently look.
The first four images below are of my Armageddon BBS. While I can log on to my BBS via the BBS software itself -- that is Hermes II, which is a very old BBS software -- in order to make these images, I actually telneted in to the BBS using the Mac OS X Terminal app. I use the "Homebrew" theme with a few tweaks done to it.
This first image is the Armageddon BBS log in or welcome screen:
Here is an image of the Armageddon BBS Main Menu:
Here is an image of the Armageddon BBS Transfer Menu:
Here is the Armageddon BBS Log Off Screen:
Being as both the Hermes II BBS software and the Hotline server software is old -- it only runs on 68k and PPC Macintosh machines -- in order to run the programs on my iMac -- which is Intel-based -- I had to install what is called an emulator. In fact, I installed two them. They are called Basilisk II and SheepShaver. They both emulate -- or copy, you might say -- the Mac Classic and Legacy environment of the old days.
In short, with these two emulators installed on my machine, I can utilize the old Mac operating system running in virtual environments on my iMac. That is why I can run my BBS and Hotline server again. It is a system operating within a system.
Anyway, if that is too technical for some of you to understand, don"t worry about it. The point is, the Armageddon BBS and the Armageddon Hotline server are both now running, and you are welcome to visit them, if you know how to do it.
This last image shows the entire Classic Mac environment running inside of the Basilisk emulator, on my iMac. Actually, I am using SheepShaver now, but you get the picture. On the left side of the image below are all of the windows I have open which form a part of my Hotline server. And on the right side of the image you can see my Hermes Ii BBS:
If you know how to telnet -- such as by using the Mac OS X Terminal app -- you can telnet to my BBS by using the IP address of 202.128.4.177. In fact, using the domain name should work too; that is endtimeprophecy.net, as you see here below. You just type one of the following in the Terminal window, and hit your return key:
telnet 202.128.4.177
telnet endtimeprophecy.net
You may have to make some changes to the theme that you use with the Terminal app. I use the Homebrew theme with a few tweaks done to it.
When you telnet, the Terminal will by default use the standard telnet port of 23, so you shouldn"t have to add that to the IP address or domain name above.
Regarding my Armageddon Hotline server, you need to download a Hotline client of your choice, which is compatible with your machine. You will find a number of them on the Web, and most are all free, because this software is quite old, and no longer used by the vast majority of people. Just us old geezers refuse to let go of this "ancient" technology. You need to remember that BBSing and Hotline is what we were doing 20 to 25 years ago, before the World Wide Web became a hit.
Anyway, once you have a Hotline client, all you need to do is give yourself a name and a user icon in the client"s prefs window, and then bring up the "Connect" window. In the "server" field, you just have to put 202.128.4.177. The software will automatically default to using port 5500.
Do not put anything in the "login" or "password" fields, as otherwise, the server won"t let you log in, because it won"t recognize you. By leaving those two fields blank, you will be logging on to the server as a guest.
So, as I said, besides being sick, and hurting my leg, that is what I have been up to recently.
Armageddon BBS and Armegddon Hotline Server Ride Again!
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