From: bell@teal.csn.org (Bell Scott)
Subject: Re: BBS Standards Committee Formed
Organization: Colorado SuperNet, Inc.
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 08:45:21 GMT

In article <1992Aug19.163738.14506@uvm.edu> cblaise@moose.uvm.edu.UUCP (Chris Blaise) writes:
>From article <Bt7uBL.7Bz@csn.org>, by bell@teal.csn.org (Bell Scott):
>> In article <1992Aug19.000717.162123@zeus.calpoly.edu> cambler@zeus.calpoly.edu (Christopher J. Ambler, Phish) writes:
>>>ONE BBSCON, 14 August, 1992
>>>
>
[...stuff deleted, read msg#9031 if you need the info]
>
>	I think you're taking this in the wrong way entirely.  IT's not
>a commitee to dictate to you how you should RUN your system, it's a commitee
>to decide how to implement stuff into the SOFTWARE.
>
>	Here's an example:  TBBS 2.1, when it was released in 1988, did not
>have Zmodem.  People harped and complained about it since Zmodem had been
>out for awhile.  Why didn't Phil Becker implement it?  Because there was
>no standard.  He said that he had taken two copies of DSZ, both just a couple
>of months apart, and they wouldn't work with each other.  Would it have been
>a viable business interest for him to implement a potentially buggy Zmodem
>into TBBS?
>
>	I see this commitee as one that would hammer out all of the details of
>Zmodem (in this example) before the developers would have to risk implementing
>it.  There are other things that need to be decided upon as well.  Since
>Zmodem came out, I think there are 5-6 newer protocols.  Besides the NAPLPS
>graphics interface you mentioned above, there are at leaat 3 others.  
>Which of these should BBS and telecommunication software developers integrate
>into their software?  This is what I see the commitee standing for.
>
>	If you'd like more information, I would be more than happy to
>ask Phil Becker what his stand on it is, and that of several other people
>who attended the ONE con.
> 
> TTYL
> Chris
>

	Hmmm, let me put it this way.  I know most of the people also.  I also
know Phil Becker. (Knew him when he was writing for a TRS-80 and selling Ataris)
My problem is this: I has not heard of this 'committee' at all until the
post-de-facto post here on inter-net and I LIVE IN DENVER!  I run a BBS!  I
regularly log on to other BBS's!  Obviously it was not widely publicised,
normally this would simply be a case of bad marketing, however, since this
committee will be deciding what kind of Z-Modem and graphics interface I HAVE
TO IMPLEMENT if I hope to get ANY traffic on my system.  I am a bit upset.  It
is not as though I am simply just another BBS twit here, I have written and will
continue to write telecommunications software for Unix, Macintosh and MS-DOS.
I would be very curious to see the list of representatives on this 'committee'.
If you would be so kind as to forward (or better post it here) this list of
my representatives then perhaps I can have a hand in these decisions being
made in our representative democracy.

	I apologise to whom I may offend, however, I will not stop.

	Chris: Noone should take my comments personally as they are not directed
personally.  I do hope you have not taken them as such.  (Though Mr. Rickard
might have just cause for doing so...by the way, WHERE IS HE???)

Scott R. Bell