+DarkLord Posted May 25, 2019 Share Posted May 25, 2019 If you're on Facebook, there's a couple groups that have some nice examples of ATASCII. Just enter the group name in Facebook's search prompt and ask to join. 1. ATARI 8-bit BBS scene! 2. 216 Atari reunion The "ATARI 8-bit BBS scene!" has some impressive ATASCII screens from BBSs that were online in the New Orleans area. The "216 Atari reunion" group includes ATASCII screens from BBSs that were online in the Northeastern Ohio (216) area code. -JP Don't do Facebook - can someone please post examples? Thanks. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnPolka Posted May 26, 2019 Share Posted May 26, 2019 Don't do Facebook - can someone please post examples? Thanks. I have one interesting example of ATASCII on my BBS' website. In 1988, a user created a slide show about the BBS' mascot, The Basement Cat. You can see it at the following link: http://basementbbs.loginto.me:7000/basement-cat.html You can see some of the "216 Atari Reunion" images on the Basement BBS today. Just keep in mind that the welcome screens and menus are randomized between each call. So, you would have to call multiple times to see all of the screens. -JP 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+DarkLord Posted May 26, 2019 Share Posted May 26, 2019 Thanks, I'll try that after I get home from work. Appreciated! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kirkman Posted June 6, 2019 Share Posted June 6, 2019 I wish to add a few atacsii vignettes into my game as it progresses. I wonder if it requires a modem line to run? I think I have the largest archive of ATASCII animations online right now: https://breakintochat.com/collections/atascii/ I wrote an HTML5 / javascript viewer. It's not 100% complete, but it works well enough to display most of the animations in the collection. You can run the viewer in full-screen mode, change the emulated modem speed, or turn on "diagnostic mode" to see how the cursor moves around the screen. I am interested in looking at and watching and debugging ansi graphics for the opening screens for old school BBS's. I found a lot a few years back but cant find it now ANSI art and ANSI animations are easy to find online. The best archive is https://16colo.rs/, which is searchable. It includes ANSI and its spinoffs (xbin, .tnd, etc). Also, people still create awesome ANSI art and animations today. Here are some of my pieces from the last couple years: https://16colo.rs/pack/blocktronics-67rpm/KM-Keith-Green-For-Him-Who-Has-Ears-To-Hear.ans https://16colo.rs/pack/blocktronics-6710/km-3-grief.xb https://16colo.rs/pack/blocktronics_detention_block_aa-23/ANSI_Star_Wars_KM-FALC_.ANS 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kirkman Posted June 6, 2019 Share Posted June 6, 2019 We supported ASCII, ATASCII, VT52, Instant graphics, Color Graphics System, and ANSI so I'd say yes. It certainly was supported back in the day. So funny you should bring up Instant Graphics and Sound because I started researching it earlier this year. I got interested because, though I called several Atari 8-bit and ST BBSes in the early/mid-1990s, I never heard of it back then. It was only this year that I came across a reference to it while I was doing some new research on RIP graphics. It looks like the IGS technique is very similar to RIP... in fact, if the history I found on an old website is accurate, there is a good chance that RIP was directly inspired by IGS. Because they are similar, I'm thinking about taking on the project of creating an IGS renderer for HTML5 / javascript similar to my earlier ATASCII and RIP projects. (For those unfamiliar, my HTML5 RIPscrip viewer is here: http://joshrenaud.com/experiments/ripscrip.js/. It doesn't offer 100% RIP implementation, but it works fairly well for most non-flood-fill RIP screens. This project was meant as a first step toward developing a RIP->SVG converter. I still hope to do that, but deciding what to do about RIP's flood-fill command has stymied the project for a while) 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+DarkLord Posted June 6, 2019 Share Posted June 6, 2019 Spent an hour or two going through my BBS backups but I can't find where I had IGS running for a (very short) time. When I realized it was limited to 14.4k speed, a super awkward editor and no one else at the time seemed to be interested in doing it, I dropped it. I do remember that much. I must have thought it was such a dead end that I didn't even keep the work I did with it. <kicking myself now> Does anyone even still have the original ST IGS archive/file? Seems like I found it on a CD collection somewhere is how I came across it. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tillek Posted June 6, 2019 Share Posted June 6, 2019 Yeah, I actually had planned to get into some IG (maybe with a game) and RIP (there was a RIP thing for RatSoft that I had installed just before the big crash in 93, which I lost all of it).... But then the BBS died.... (But if we can archive the stuff in case I ever decide to put it up or someone is stupid enough to try again....) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kirkman Posted June 6, 2019 Share Posted June 6, 2019 Does anyone even still have the original ST IGS archive/file? Seems like I found it on a CD collection somewhere is how I came across it. I have a couple versions I have found in some archives. Ill try to email you later. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tillek Posted June 7, 2019 Share Posted June 7, 2019 I have a couple versions I have found in some archives. Ill try to email you later. Or post them, in case others are interested too? 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnPolka Posted June 7, 2019 Share Posted June 7, 2019 (edited) Does anyone even still have the original ST IGS archive/file? Seems like I found it on a CD collection somewhere is how I came across it. I have version 1.5 on my BBS (The Basement BBS) available for download (igs.arc in file SIG #3). As I mentioned in another thread, I tried using the editor and it was very counterintuitive or buggy (or both). If there's a newer version of the editor, I'd love to try it. The archive comes with information on the IG Standard but no docs for the editor. -JP Edited June 7, 2019 by JohnPolka Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kirkman Posted June 7, 2019 Share Posted June 7, 2019 Here are the versions of IGS I have been able to find (2.14, 2.16, 2.17) and the versions of IGS_EDIT I have found. Also, Larry Mears ported his IGS to the PC and called it "Blue Instant Graphics" ("Blue" is a reference to IBM/Big Blue, I think). So far I have only found v1.03 of that edition, but I know other versions (and accessories) existed. igs-versions.zip 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tillek Posted June 7, 2019 Share Posted June 7, 2019 If I ever get things fixed/back up again I might have to talk to you about what RIP stuff you were able to find. Alas.... Or... maybe get RIP running with Carina? ... Ehhhh..... maybe not. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+DarkLord Posted June 8, 2019 Share Posted June 8, 2019 Thought about RIP for DarkForce when it first came out. Decided against it because I never saw a working RIP terminal/app for the ST and didn't want to use graphics that an ST user couldn't see. ANSI was really dominant/popular at that time too.... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bikerbob Posted June 9, 2019 Share Posted June 9, 2019 (edited) mispost sorry Edited June 9, 2019 by Bikerbob Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tillek Posted June 10, 2019 Share Posted June 10, 2019 Thought about RIP for DarkForce when it first came out. Decided against it because I never saw a working RIP terminal/app for the ST and didn't want to use graphics that an ST user couldn't see. ANSI was really dominant/popular at that time too.... Where I was, I basically was the ST community, so actually, VT-52 was what I had no use for. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+DarkLord Posted June 10, 2019 Share Posted June 10, 2019 Interesting. I actually like VT52. Sure, it's not as technically impressive as other standards but some surprising things can be done with it (there are plenty of demo's online you can watch). For static screens on my BBS, I thought they were fine. Here is an example: 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tillek Posted June 10, 2019 Share Posted June 10, 2019 It wasn't that, it was just that none of my callers used it since pretty much no one in my area had Ataris anymore. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+DarkLord Posted June 13, 2019 Share Posted June 13, 2019 Ah, gotcha now - misunderstood, sorry. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bengalih Posted December 5, 2020 Share Posted December 5, 2020 On 5/22/2019 at 8:32 PM, _The Doctor__ said: The Resistance may have the choice for IGS but it doesn't have anything created for it. The old BBS's I speak of are Starship and Parallel Dimension... I will look for some old floppies with CGS documents.... I'm just curious (sorry to ressurect old post), but I'm curious what Parallel Dimension BBS you were referring to? Is it the one that was based out of NY (914)?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tillek Posted December 6, 2020 Share Posted December 6, 2020 Hey Doc, any luck finding any of those CGS documents? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zzip Posted December 7, 2020 Share Posted December 7, 2020 On 6/9/2019 at 11:32 PM, DarkLord said: Interesting. I actually like VT52. Sure, it's not as technically impressive as other standards but some surprising things can be done with it (there are plenty of demo's online you can watch). For static screens on my BBS, I thought they were fine. Here is an example: That looks pretty decent. Much better than the VT-52 BBSes I was used to encountering. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+DarkLord Posted December 9, 2020 Share Posted December 9, 2020 On 12/7/2020 at 11:12 AM, zzip said: That looks pretty decent. Much better than the VT-52 BBSes I was used to encountering. Worked on those really hard, I did. Didn't use one of the few ST VT52 editors either, I did it by hand. Honestly, I felt more comfortable just coding it in straight in an ST text editor. Of course, checking the results are harder. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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