Boardwatch Magazine Review

Reprinted from Boardwatch Magazine, July 1992, pp. 36-37, with permission. For further information on Boardwatch, contact: 

Boardwatch Magazine, Guide to Online Information Services and Electronic Bulletin Boards, 5970 South Vivian Street, Littleton, CO 80127; (800)933-6038 (subscriptions), (303)973-6038 (voice), Fax: (303)986-8754, BBS: (303)973-4222, email: FidoNet: 1:104/555, Internet: jack.rickard@boardwatch.com, CompuServe: 71177,2310

THE BMUG GUIDE TO BULLETIN BOARDS AND BEYOND

In books, like BBSs, you have to kiss a lot of frogs to find the princes. But when you find one good one, it causes you to go out actively seeking more frogs. Bernard Aboba's BMUG GUIDE TO BULLETIN BOARDS AND BEYOND is one of the most strikingly unusual books published on the topic of bulletin boards and modem communications, and probably one of the more useful compendiums we've yet seen.

Aboba is a member of the Berkeley Macintosh User's Group (BMUG) and actually started their BMUG BBS at (510)849-2684. Heresy of hesies, he did it on an IBM PC clone. But the book is of course oriented toward the Macintosh BBS community - as is the BBS actually.

The BMUG Guide is unusual from cover to the index. First, it is a large format book that looks like nothing so much as a Sears Roebuck catalog designed by Walt Disney. The large pages allow them to layout a LOT of information in a very accessible style on each page. In these 560 pages reside almost everything a Mac BBS aficionado might ever want to know, and some things you wouldn't think anyone would want to know until you see them in print -- and realize that twenty minutes just went by that you wish you had back.

Aboba's writing style is irreverent in the most delightful sense of the word. And it is thoroughly readable. The layout of the pages in the style of having text on the right 2/3rds of the page with a gutter full of highlights - and it works well in this book.

The BMUG Guide starts with the usual introduction to communications - but from a Mac perspective, providing advice on modems,  terminal software, and making that first connection . It then describes the process of dialing a BBS, what you might find there, and how you can use it. It includes a sampler of Mac BBSs where you can find lots of Mac goodies. Good, but basic stuff.

A BMUG BBS reference chapter details the intricacies of the User Group's own BBS and how to use the various features and gateway e-mail connections they provide. And then the book careens wildly, and delightfully into of all things the Internet. It describes the global network, how to get an Internet account, a whole section on the ARCHIE file finder database, how to ftp on the Internet, the Knowbot address directory and Internet Relay Chat. There's even a section
on Online Library card catalogs.

The book then sports a section on the RelayNet International Message Exchange (RIME) network and it was the first lucid description of this highly centralized PCBoard focused mail network we've read anywhere. The following chapters go into fascinating detail about the early days of FidoNet by Tom Jennings, Ken Kaplan, and Ben Baker (they were there actually). A marvelously detailed introduction to FidoNet explains it more thoroughly than anything we've seen with descriptions of the actual piece parts that make up the toolkit necessary to run a FidoNet system. This is followed by a detailed description of UUCP and other global Internet strategies to get a piece of e-mail around the world. Then a chapter on tying FidoNet to Internet including a complete listing of FidoNet/USENET gateways. This is followed by a series of histories including Tim Pozar on UFGATE, Leo Laporte on MacQuee, Vernon Keenan on EchoMac, and a fascinating description by Michael Connick on how and why he wrote TABBY, the FidoNet interface for Macintosh BBS.

Chapter 31, File Transfer Between Macs, PCs and UNIX and Chapter 32 File Conversion have placed this book on our close reference shelf forever. Anyone who has struggled with moving data between these various platforms will kill for this information. In these chapters, as throughout this guide, Aboba names names, innocent or not and provides complete addresses, prices, telephone numbers, fax numbers, in the best Boardwatch tradition.

Chapter 33 is a Data Compression Primer masterfully done and covers both Mac programs, PC programs, and common areas between the two.

A series of Appendices provide the most thorough resource guide available for communications in either platform. You can look up virtually any comm product here, books, adapters, BBS software, TCP/IP software, device drivers, whatever. Name, address, telephone number, the works. Appendix D contains charts and pinouts for Mac ports and cables - BIG charts - no magnifying glass needed - with lots of cable diagrams. There are even application forms for RIME and FREDMAIL, lists of Mac BBSs on RIMe, EchoMac Network Nodes, a complete list of FidoNet Help Nodes and Coordinators. Appendix J lists ALL the Fidonet Echoes on the backbone. And finally, an understandable and accurate glossary that DOES correctly define the difference between V.42 and V.42bis.

This book is expertly done, technically flawless, and written in a superb and thoroughly original style. If I were to ever attempt to write a book on Mac BBS issues, I would hope it would look like Aboba's. Our highest recommendation. Better yet, if you don't have this book already, you have $23 more than you know what to do with. The BMUG Guide to Bulletin Boards and Beyond, Bernard Aboba, $23, Quantum Books, 4 Cambridge Center, Cambridge, MA 02142; (617)494-5042 voice; (617)577-7282 fax; Internet: quanbook@world.std.com or
aboba@world.std.com