Date   : Wed, 12 Jul 2006 14:06:01 +0100
From   : Rob <robert@...>
Subject: Re: The Beeb BBs Project

At 13:22 12/07/2006, Jules Richardson wrote:


>We're drowning in DEC hardware, which covers a lot of the original 
>public services - Primes we have a fair chance of being able to do; 
>other stuff (like DG) will be a bit harder.  Modems shouldn't be a 
>problem - if any software can't be configured for whatever modems we 
>have then we can always resort to emulating the modem side via 
>modern hardware. The showstopper seems to be that nobody anywhere 
>has a complete backup of any of the services.

I know Micronet had an in-house system that ran on a pdp-11 (because 
I usually did the backups on it!) but it wasn't much more than a way 
to edit and browse frames;  It was being replaced by something else 
that I never actually got to use properly, before I left there, but 
which tried to use Amigas of all things as terminals.  I assume they 
took that with them when they moved out after they were sold to Prestel.

I was about to suggest that someone bob down to 8 Herbal Hill 
sometime to see if any of the old kit was still lurking about, but a 
quick google for the address shows a number of non-EMAP related 
activities there now (It used to be shared with Motorcycle News, whom 
I had thought stayed on.) so if there was, it's probably all been 
cleared out by now.

Do BT still own Telephone House, in Temple? (Home of Prestel.) They 
used to have all sorts of goodies in their basement...


Oh, as a note on the size of a backup of Prestel ...

 From *65659#

October 1987
Frames available for access .. 310,000
Terminals attached to Prestel .. 77,000 (61% business)

December 1988
Frames available for access .. 258,120
Terminals attached to Prestel .. 95,460 (57% business)

Frames are typically stored in 1K blocks. (768 bytes displayable, 
rest for routing.)


Rob