The Ins and Outs of Fidonet
By Gregg Phillips

In this age of the computer you keep hearing terms like WAN, (Wide Area Network) LAN, (Local Area Network) ISDN, (Integrated Serial Data Network) Ethernet, FiberOptics, Gateways etc...  The list seems to go on and on, I am not sure how many of you are familiar with HAM radio?  Well, I would compare Fidonet to a voice less HAM radio operation.

Fidonet consist of a series Centers throughout the world that a persons BBS can send messages to and have these messages received through each one of these Centers until it finally reaches its final destination.  The entire trip for one of these messages takes anywhere from 24 to 48 hours, which means that you could have a reply to your message 48 to 72 hours from the time it was sent.  The terminology used for one of these messages is called NetMail.  NetMail is a simple form of E-Mail that you use here on America Online

Another one of FidoNets assets is Echo Messages. (Or Echoes for short)  Echoes are really the mainstay of Fidonet in my humble opinion and they can be compared to a message base here on AOL or if you are a TeleFinder user or sysop then all it is a long thread of messages arranged around one topic with input and response from around the world.

There must be over 2,000 available echoes available from around the world covering topics from Aviation to Zoology and Mormonism to Smut.  For example, on my BBS I carry 27 echoes.  I decided on these by presenting a list of available ones from my Center and they told me which they would be interested in.  A partial list of echoes that my BBS are the following...

ECHOMAC            General Macintosh related topics
MACCOMM          Macintosh Communications
MACHYPE            Pretty much speaks for itself
MACFSALE          This is a great place to get a bargain on a used Mac or software.
MAC_GAMES       Again, pretty much speaks for itself
HS_MODEMS        High Speed modems
AVIATION            As a pilot, I couldn't resist this one.
VIETNAM_VETS    Pretty much the same as above for me. ;)
STARTREK           Seems I have been a Trekie for along time too.
TRAVEL               Speaks for itself

[Unfortunately only one of these threads (STARTREK) is available locally - Ed.]

The you have some required Echos that your center wants you to carry so that you will be kept up to date with the local current events.  Since my Fido BBS address is 1:161/508 and I live in Northern California my Center request that I carry the threads NORCAL and NET161.  Probably the next logical step in this conversation is to explain that address that I just gave for my BBS, its pretty simple once you break it down.

The 1 in front of the colon represent North America, there are 7 total areas.  The next number 161 is the Center that I belong to, this Center handles many other local BBS's such as mine which is 508.  So as you can see, this is kind a like the postal zip code, it just helps the computer better route where this message is intended to go.

You notice that I have been using the term "Center" throughout this so far?  This has been intentional so as to not confuse you with the facts. ;)  There are many different "Terms" for these "Centers" and I will just touch on a few at the moment, after all this is suppose to be an idea of what Fido is and not the operating manual.  The person or BBS that I send my Echo Messages and Net Mail to is called a HUB, everyone that has a 5xx for the last three numbers of there Fido address sends and picks up there information from this one HUB.  They usually have an address like 1:161/500, notice that the last three numbers is an even 100X.

Now for the interesting part, My HUB sends his BBS echoes and Net Mails along with the rest or ours and sends it to the NC, (Network Controller) and this goes up the chain to the Regional Controller then up to the Star.  I might add that this is all done as a hobby and is considered as such.  There isn't anybody making any money here and the best that can be expected is that there long distance phone calls are reimbursed through monthly dues.  For instance my monthly dues for my HUB's long distance calls is currently $3.00 per month.  The last point of this is that this is all considered an amateur network.

Ok, now that you have the very basics on what Fidonet is let's delve into what you need to make this all happen for your BBS.  Since TeleFinder is the area of my concern (and hopefully yours) I will maintain the conversation to this one BBS and how to get it up and running.

Asides from TeleFinder you will need two additional programs to serve as interfaces to Fidonet then to the Macintosh.  The first program that you will need is Tabbynet, the current version of "Tabby" is 2.2 but Michael Connick (the author) has announced a version 3.0 that should be out very shortly.  Tabbynet is the interface to Fidonet for the Macintosh, I believe that there are a couple of others, but for the Macintosh Tabby is pretty much the standard.  Tabbynet consist of a number of applications that run in sequence at a predetermined time to be called an event.  I will get into the different applications and what they do in part 2 of this report.

The other program that is the interface to Tabbynet and TeleFinder is called TeleFinder Link.  In the Dos world TF/Link would be considered the mail "Tosser."  This is the program that actually goes into the preconfigured folders and takes them out all the messages that have been place there by your callers (and yourself) and delivers them to another folder (TabbyGen) for Tabbynet to process for delivery to the HUB.  After this has been accomplished, it then goes through all your Echoes (Threads) and looks for any new messages that have been posted since the previous time that the program was run and collects them as well and delivers them to the TabbyGen folder as well.

Once Fidonet has completed making its call to the HUB and has delivered your messages the HUB then searches to see if there is any mail that it has for your BBS along with your batch of echo messages.  Once these have been downloaded to your system Tabby processes them for duplicates (if it finds any it then deletes them) and for areas etc...  Once this has been completed TF/Link comes in with its TFLink Import application and delivers the new messages to the different Threads and the netmails to the different members mailbox.  I will also get into the four different applications that comprise TeleFinder Link in part 2 of this message.

I will close with the information as to where you can get the applications and there prices.  In part 2 of this report I will go into depth on how to become a member of Fidonet and to get your name published in the NODELIST as well as what the NODELIST is.  In the meantime though, please feel free to respond directly to me (AFC Gregg) with any comment or question that you have regarding these reports.  So until next time, happy computing!

Tabbynet   $80.00

M.C.Connick & Company
PO Box 307
Bradley Beach, NJ  07720. 
908 988-0659

TeleFinder Link   $25.00

This program was written by Bas Shulte of the Netherlands and in an attempt to help him out Rusty has taken over some of the distribution for Bas to try and make it easier on us to acquire the software without having to deal with international postal regulations and such.  Rusty can be reached at the following...

Rusty Tucker
Spider Island Software
4790 Irvine Blvd., Suite 105-347
Irvine, CA 92720
714 669-9260  (Voice/Fax)
714 730-5785  (Spider Island BBS)

The following is a transcript of an e-mail correspondence between AFC Gregg and FranG on starting a FIDONET node on TeleFinder, gratiously distributed with their permission.

It was nice hearing back from you so soon.  I was just trying to finish of section 2 of 2 on the Fidonet series when I though I might take a break and check out AO.  Since I did not have plans to cover specifics that you have asked for in the last part I thought I might send them to you here.

     FG> There seems to be such a dearth of info on FidoNet
     FG> (not surprising since it is an amateur network, as
     FG> you point out) that your article was like finding an
     FG> oasis in the desert. Don't mean to get melodramatic,
     FG> but I couldn't get anything on Fido and how to join
     FG> it and even what it really was or offered.

Thanks, I thrive on praise. ;)  Give me a compliment and I am always good for another paragraph or two. :)

     FG> Once we get our BBS set up (we're ordering the
     FG> TeleFinder software tomorrow and just ordered Tabby)

Good decision!

     FG> how do we make contact with our hub/region
     FG> controller/star so we are officially part of this
     FG> system?

There are a couple of ways of accomplishing this...
1) Find someone that is already a member of Fidonet and logon to there board and leave the sysop their a message as to your intentions and ask them who there HUB is for there area?

2) When you order Tabbynet for Michael Connick you might ask him or his wife if they might send you the latest NODELIST.  At last count, this file was over 800K and there board is only 2400 baud so I don't believe that you will want to download it from them but I think that it might be worth say $5.00 for them to put it on a disk and send it to you with your Tabby program if you ask them nicely?  If not let me know and I will send you one. ;)

Once you have the NODELIST (BTW, the NODELIST is update every week with another file that the HUB sends you called the NODEDIFF file.  What the NODEDIFF file is the difference's that have changed since the previous weeks i.e., new phone numbers, nodes etc..)

Once you have the NODELIST, open it with your favorite word processor and do a search on your area code and see the different nodes in your area.  If you come across one that says HUB then you are in business, if not you will have to expand your search or logon to one of the listed nodes to find out who the HUB is for your area.

Once that has been accomplished and you have found the HUB send this person your intentions of starting a Fidonet node and that you would like to become a member and be given an address and marked up in the NODELIST?  All of this has to be done by way of Tabby to prove to the HUB that you have the capabilities necessary for the communications need.  The HUB will respond in kind through email to your BBS with your address number and the best times in which to contact them for your echo messages and mail.

Once that has been completed you are in.  This process takes from 7 to 14 days on the whole depending upon your communication prowess and the HUB's.

     FG> How do we determine which echos we want to bring in?

The way that I decided was to get the echo list from my HUB and posted that in a public area of the BBS and asked my callers in which echoes they would be interested in, simple as that.  Any echo that got more than two votes I started that echo.

     FG> Are there some limits?

Only self imposed ones that I know of and of course disk space.  For example, if you were to carry ECHOMAC and set the shave to 500 messages this will take up anywhere from 600k to 1 meg of hard disk itself because it is such a busy echo.

     FG> Are there any fees?

You can expect to help cover your HUB's long distance calling fees to collect echos for your area.  In net 161 that I belong to, my HUB charges $3.00 per month.

     FG> We are not a huge urban user gp, altough the largest
     FG> in CT (300 members) so accessing the rest of the
     FG> world through FidoNet is very exciting to us.

I live in a tiny little town called Benicia California, I might add that this was the first capital of California and quite a bit of nostalgia attached to it as I imagine a lot of small towns do?  This is what first enticed me to Fidonet, the ability for you to send a message that literally travels around the world and is responded to by sometimes hundreds of people from all over.  This has been one of the more truly rewarding systems that I have become involved with!

     FG> Enjoyed your personal remarks as well. A very dear
     FG> friend of mine, now moved from CT to NYC and part of
     FG> NYMUG, shares some of your passions--namely aviation
     FG> and was a Vietnam veteran. He's also into scuba and
     FG> astronomy (he'll be in Costa Rico to see the
     FG> eclipse). Bet you bring in those too!

Boy, you got that right!

     FG> Looking forward to installment 2.

In regards to installment two, I was wondering if you wouldn't mind if I posted this message?  I seemed to have gotten carried away with some of the answers and these might be of help to other that are in your position.  So if you give me the go ahead, I will make this installment two and start working on installment 3?

Please get back to me with your answer as soon as possible since we have to have the mailer out by Saturday evening?  Thank you for your continued interest and don't forget out Monday evening TeleFinder chats.

-Gregg