On Tue, 6 Mar 2001, Tim Seifert wrote:
> By: Fred Wright <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> On: Monday, March 05, 2001, 12:56:45 PM
>
> TS>> I've got them to work, where I've logged into a service as a client.
> TS>> But not when I was running my BBS through telser.device as a server.
>
> FW> With what transfer protocol? There are a couple of transparency issues:
>
> I only ever bothered trying ZMODEM, actually. It never really occurred to
> me to try another. I know I have got ZMODEM transfers to work, when I've
> telnetted into other BBSs, albeit slowly.
Then you might be getting bitten by lack of transparency.
> FW> 1) Telser (as client at least) fails to convert transmitted CR to
> FW> CR-LF or CR-NUL. When the server correctly converts received CR-LF to
> FW> CR, this means that a real LF that follows a CR gets swallowed.
>
> FW> 2) Given #1, I wouldn't be surprised if it failed to convert an
> FW> apparent IAC (0xFF) to IAC-IAC to get it through Telnet command
> FW> parsing.
>
> What protocol would you recommend? I know someone else who nearly always
> uses Kermit, but my BBS didn't support that. It's only the freebie Max's
> BBS, I run the thing just for the fun of it, so no extra money's going to
> be spent on it. And all the other BBS software that I've played with, is
> so stupidly over complicated to configure, I might as well learn C and
> write my own.
When it works, I'd use ZModem, but it requires nearly complete
transparency in order to function. It evolved from XModem, which requires
absolutely 100% 8-bit transparency, but with escape kludges for four
specific characters that it thinks might cause trouble (two of them are
XON and XOFF). ZModem also supports propagation of file timestamps, but
this doesn't always seem to be implemented.
Kermit is slower but much less demanding of transparency. It's optionally
able to run with only 7-bit characters (though it doesn't necessarily set
this up right automatically), and it avoids *all* control characters.
However, aside from needing more characters to represent the content, the
original version allowed at most 94 characters per packet, with "lockstep"
handshaking, which makes for horrendously slow transfers over high-latency
connections. Newer enhancements have added optional larger packet sizes
and optional windowed acknowledgments, but these may not always be
available.
One of Kermit's claims to fame is that it's second only to "Hello World"
in the number of platforms it runs on. :-)
Fred Wright
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