Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

Found this useful single click script to build/install syncterm (don't forget to download and sfs load the Fatdog devx first - available via Control Panel/System/SFS Manager/fd64-devx_812).

I like to run it outside of X such as on virtual console 2 (Ctrl-Alt-F2).

Nice for BBS connections such as blackflag.acid.org, but also OK for ssh connections. Does store site passwords (if you opt to enter those) in open/text form within ~/.syncterm, so make sure that folder isn't open to others.

#!/bin/bash

echo "This will get syncterm, build it, and install it for you!"

# Determine if debian or not
checkOS=$(grep -i id_like /etc/os-release|awk -F\= '{print $2}'|sed 's/"//g')

if [[ "$checkOS" == "debian" ]]; then
  # Debian/Ubuntu: To Install apps/libraries used to compile
  echo "Debian/Ubuntu found: Preparing to install relevant libraries..."
  sudo apt-get install -y wget libncurses5-dev libncursesw5-dev gcc libsdl1.2-dev build-essential
fi

if [[ "$checkOS" == "fedora" ]]; then
  # Redhat/Fedora: To Install apps/libraries used to compile
  echo "Redhat/Fedora found: Preparing to install relevant libraries..."
  echo "sudo yum install wget ncurses-devel devtoolset-8 SDL2"
  exit 1
fi

# To Pull source
echo "About to download the syncterm application source..."
wget http://syncterm.bbsdev.net/syncterm-src.tgz

# To extract tgz file
echo "Extracting the source now..."
tar xvzf syncterm-src.tgz

# Change directory to
echo "Change into the 'make' folder"
D=$(ls -1hrtd sync*/|tail -1|sed 's/\/$//g')
cd ${D}/src/syncterm

# To get full path src
echo "Set st_path variable for the SRC_ROOT path..."
st_path=$(pwd|sed 's/\/syncterm$//g')

# Time to compile!
echo "Make SRC_ROOT with path: $st_path"
sudo make SRC_ROOT=$st_path

# Install SyncTerm
echo "Install SyncTERM..."
sudo make install

# Find out where Syncterm was installed
echo "Find out where SyncTERM installed"
which syncterm

When away from base and using phone data I find that tethering my laptop/phone and even general browsing http can really eat into your data allowance and its nice to have a much lower bandwidth BBS fallback for chatting/games etc. Board sysops are also a very welcoming/friendly group.

If you want to view boards that support RIP, a vector based screen drawing protocol that uses ! and | codes/text to build up a graphical image where that text looks something like

!|Z5Q6D61466Y2R921B1E|Z5P6C806SAE74CS7E1E|ZCS7EF28CEL4QCE4B1E

you need a terminal that supports the RIP protocol so that it displays the image (the above example of RIP text isn't the one for this next image). RIP Term and SyncTerm are two such terminal programs. Most standard BBS's use ASCII/ANSII which just draw 'images' using text (including block characters etc.). RIP vector drawing is less blocky, for example this following image is of the blackflag.acid.org BBS's messages menu

In which case for RIP its best (mandatory) to run syncterm in a graphical environment such as under X. One way is to do that is on a separate X, so Ctrl-Alt-F2 to a console session, log in and run

Xephyr :5 -nolisten tcp &

That starts another X and jumps you to that typically on Ctrl-Alt-F5, that initially is just a black screen, so Ctrl-Alt-F2 again and run

DISPLAY=:5 xterm &

to start a xterm on that X. Ctrl-Alt-F5 back to it and you should have a command prompt. Given the lower resolution of BBS's let's set that to 640x480 resolution by running
xrandr -s 640x480
Then when you run syncterm it will better fit the screen/display.

Once you configure a BBS to call within syncterm make sure you F2 to call up the configure menu and set the very last entry in that menu to RIP. Selecting RIP3 usually works OK. Call (ssh or telnet) to your desired board(s) and join in on chats, post/read messages, chat with the sysop, play games or just simply browse around.

When you ctrl-alt-F4 back to the usual desktop that should revert to your usual 1366x768 (or whatever) resolution. You can flip between the two as desired. 1366x768 on Ctrl-Alt-F4 (main system), 640x480 on Ctrl-Alt-F5, two separate X sessions.

Nice in the respect that you can BBS for hours in evening and use relatively little data bandwidth, maybe less than 10MB. In contrast HTTP can eat through GB's of your data allowance often seemingly without actually having done/achieved much.

If you want another program on that second X then its just a case of running something like
DISPLAY=:5 galculator &

Or if so inclined you can even load a tray
DISPLAY=:5 jwm &
jwm tray at such low resolution does however look uncomfortably big.