Hi everyone,

I was offline for a week due to a blown DSL modem/router but that's now all fixed.

In the meantime, I was feeling up to doing some serious work on my doors. Here's what I've done so far:

- Did some serious document updating. Put in instructions on how to run the doors locally, updated various bits of information, put in donation information.

- Found a rather serious logic error that has been in the doors since the beginning but it was a condition that I didn't think to test for until just recently. This affects all of my currently supported doors and I've recompiled all of them.

- Converting from ARJ to RAR for archive type. I am a registered RAR user and use my AV stamp.

- Put in Cheepware License info to all of my door source code.

- Set up an automated system to create an archive with the latest source code.

Other things I am working on:

- For those people who donate to help with Cheepware, I will create a key for you that will show a "Thank you to <name> for donating to Cheepware!" in the closing splash screen of a door. This will be rolled out for all of my Cheepware doors. Each door will have a unique key for this. This is optional, of course.

- I am closing my Github repo and will be handling the source code directly via a RAR archive. I have my reasons for doing this.

I also brought back a door I wrote about 15 years ago and haven't touched it since. I took it out of circulation also for some reason ... it is my "Quote of the Day" door. It is ready to be released and has been updated to my current codebase.

I am working on finishing porting Augury, my tarot card door, from QuickBASIC to Pascal. My "oneliner" door, FreeLiner, that I haven't touched in probably 20 years, will be brought up to speed with my current codebase.

So I am hoping in a month's time to have all seven doors available for you. Then I am going to try to work on porting these doors to another doorkit so I can offer DOS, Win32, Linux, and OS/2-native doors. The main trick is porting my own door writing unit to work.

These last two items might take a bit longer than I am estimating. I don't know if I have said this but I am not in good health. I am now permanently disabled and unemployable with multiple chronic health issues that fluctuate a lot, meaning I don't know how I'll feel from day to day. I am hoping that I will continue to feel better though.

I am also working on moving my BBS to a slightly newer (still 10 years old, heh) machine that is much faster and conducive to doing more with it.

So there's a quick update for you all. If you have any questions or suggestions, please let me know.

Later,
Sean


--- Maximus/2 3.01
* Origin: Outpost BBS: the home of Cheepware! (1:18/200)

Hi everyone,

I have been doing a lot of work behind the scenes so I figure I owe you an explanation.

I am working on moving my BBS to run MBSE under FreeBSD. Today, I
successfully was able to compile the example Mastermind door included with Manndoor (the doorkit I am moving to) under FreeBSD.

FreeBSD does not currently support DOSemu (though there is DOSbox) so I am going to primarily develop for FreeBSD. I will do "best effort" work for
other operating systems but I will no longer do this alone. If someone
really wants my doors for their OS, I will need someone who is willing to actively help me test my doors on that OS. I am happy to set up a VM for
DOS. OS/2 (ArcaOS), Win32, and Linux but all I will be able to do is compile the programs. I will need help testing.

If you're interested in being an active beta tester, please let me know.

I'm also going to start creating PDF version of the documentation for sysops
to use.

Thanks for being patient. My health has gone downhill quite a bit and I am starting to climb back up that hill and my energy has come back.

Right now, any Linux/FreeBSD* sysops interested in testing a Mastermind
door?

-- Sean

* = I only support FreeBSD since it's what I run.
___ MultiMail/FreeBSD v0.52

--- Maximus/2 3.01
* Origin: Outpost BBS: the home of Cheepware! (1:18/200)

Re: Updates
By: Sean Dennis to All on Sun Dec 05 2021 01:57 am

FreeBSD does not currently support DOSemu (though there is DOSbox) so I am going to primarily develop for FreeBSD. I will do "best effort" work for other operating systems but I will no longer do this alone. If someone really wants my doors for their OS, I will need someone who is willing to actively help me test my doors on that OS. I am happy to set up a VM for DOS. OS/2 (ArcaOS), Win32, and Linux but all I will be able to do is compile the programs. I will need help testing.

If you're interested in being an active beta tester, please let me know.

Right now, any Linux/FreeBSD* sysops interested in testing a Mastermind door?

I can help with testing on Linux.
--- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
* Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (1:123/115)

Dan Clough wrote to Sean Dennis <=-

Right now, any Linux/FreeBSD* sysops interested in testing a Mastermind door?

I'll set up a Devuan Linux VM and get things going there.

-- Sean

... WinErr 011: Window open - Do not look outside
___ MultiMail/FreeBSD v0.52

--- Maximus/2 3.01
* Origin: Outpost BBS: the home of Cheepware! (1:18/200)

Sean Dennis wrote to Dan Clough <=-

Dan Clough wrote to Sean Dennis <=-

Right now, any Linux/FreeBSD* sysops interested in testing a Mastermind door?

I'll set up a Devuan Linux VM and get things going there.

All righty.... Let me know what you need me to do.



... Everybody should believe in something: I believe I'll have another drink. === MultiMail/Linux v0.52
--- SBBSecho 3.14-Linux
* Origin: Palantir * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL * (1:123/115)

Dan Clough wrote to Sean Dennis <=-

All righty.... Let me know what you need me to do.

In your case, I already have instructions for Synchronet/Linux. Should be straightforward.

-- Sean

... WinErr 010: Reserved for future mistakes by our developers
___ MultiMail/FreeBSD v0.52

--- Maximus/2 3.01
* Origin: Outpost BBS: the home of Cheepware! (1:18/200)

Hi everyone,

Yep, I'm still around. After having two major heart attacks in April and
May then having three stents put in my heart, I'm doing a lot better.

I am working on my doors right now. I am working on implementing a function
so the doors can be used locally with a BBS and will know they are being run locally, causing the door to go into local mode automatically.

I'm also revamping the documentation to where there is a single document
with the common instructions and a separate file with specific instructions
and quirks about individual doors. Much easier to make changes to two
sma]l documents instead of six large documents.

No ETA on when this will be done but they should be done soonish, I hope.

There are plans to have a monthly Cheepware FAQ being published in here but that's low priority.

I've also found a few odds and ends that I plan on hatching out eventually; things that I'd meant to polish up and release but never got around to it.

-- Sean

... WinErr 01F: Reserved for future mistakes of our developers.
___ MultiMail/Linux v0.52

--- Maximus/2 3.01
* Origin: Outpost BBS - Cheepware WHQ (1:18/200)