fpc-bbs

A unified Free Pascal library for reading and writing BBS-side file-area databases across multiple BBS systems.

Sibling to fpc-msgbase (message-base storage) and fpc-ftn-transport (FTN wire / queue / bundle). Same vendoring model: each library is its own repo, its own tests; consumers vendor it via cp / rsync; bug fix → commit here → consumers make pull-fpc-bbs at their convenience → rebuild → deploy.

Scope

Concern	Owned by
Message storage (Hudson, JAM, Squish, MSG, PCBoard, EzyCom, GoldBase, Wildcat)	fpc-msgbase
FTN transport (PKT, BSO, ArcMail, FilQueue, DBridge)	fpc-ftn-transport
TIC processing / file echo (FSC-0087)	fpc-ftn-transport (tt.tic.*)
BBS file-area databases (FILES.BBS, DIR.LST, per-BBS variants)	fpc-bbs
BBS config readers (per-BBS .CFG / .DAT / .PRM / .CTL formats)	fpc-bbs
BBS user databases (USERS.BBS, USER.DAT)	fpc-bbs (when needed)

Initial backends (priority order)

BBS	Priority	Reference
RemoteAccess (RA)	high	RA's CONFIG.RA + FAREA.RA
Maximus	high	Maximus PRM + AREA.DAT
Synchronet	high	SBBS XSDK conventions
Renegade 1.4	high	Renegade 1.4 binary configs / file area files
PCBoard	secondary	PCBoard 14/15 + Allfix's PCBTYPES.PAS head start
ProBoard	secondary	ProBoard CFG + Allfix's PROBOARD.PAS head start

Allfix v6 (~/Source Code/originalallfix/AllFix.1/TPFILES/ALLFIX/) is the primary reference — its file-area handling already covers several of these, and the migration is the practical motivation for this library.

Status

Pre-implementation. Repo skeleton committed; first concrete unit (bbs.api + bbs.types) lands in the next session.

Naming

Unit prefix: bbs.<category>.<name>.pas —

Namespace	Owner
bbs.api	top-level facade + abstract TBbsBase
bbs.types	shared types (TFileArea, TFileEntry, etc.)
bbs.events	event hooks (mirrors mb.events / TMessageEvents)
bbs.fmt.<vendor>	per-BBS adapter
bbs.fmt.<vendor>.uni	unified-API adapter (when warranted)

All units use {$mode objfpc}{$H+}{$modeswitch advancedrecords}.

Building

Once units land:

fpc -Fusrc -Fusrc/formats examples/example_filearea_list.pas

fpc.cfg covers the multi-target build (i386-go32v2, i386-win32, i386-linux, i386-os2, x86_64-linux).

Layout

src/             bbs.api, bbs.types, bbs.events
src/formats/     bbs.fmt.<vendor>.pas
docs/            architecture, scope, format notes
tests/           regression tests, sample data
examples/        small CLI programs that double as smoke tests

Documentation

• docs/architecture.md — layered design
• docs/scope.md — per-concern boundaries
• docs/format-notes/ — per-BBS quirks

Family

Library	Concern	Status
comet	Comet daemon (session/WFC/routing; wraps fpc-binkp + fpc-comet)	shipped (1.2.2)
fpc-log	Shared TLogProc logger interface for every fpc-* lib	shipped (0.1.0)
fpc-msgbase	Message-base storage (8 formats) + mb.address leaf	shipped (0.7.0)
fpc-ftn-transport	FTN transport tier (PKT / BSO / FilQueue / DBridge / Filebox / ArcMail)	shipped (0.6.0)
fpc-binkp	BinkP/1.1 + Argus / binkd extensions (CRYPT / NR / ND / PLZ / EXTCMD-GZ / ED25519 / DES-CBC / TRF / FREQ)	shipped (0.2.0)
fpc-comet	Native Comet protocol (FSP-COMET-001; X25519 + ChaCha20 + ED25519)	shipped (0.1.0)
fpc-filexfer	XMODEM / YMODEM / ZMODEM / SEAlink / Hydra / Janus / nova	shipped (0.1.1, no origin remote yet)
fpc-emsi	EMSI / WaZOO / FTS-1 / IEMSI session handshakes + dispatcher	shipped (0.1.2, no origin remote yet)
fpc-bbs	BBS file-area databases	in progress (0.0.1 scoped), this repo
fpc-ftpmail	FTP / SFTP server lib (file-tree provider)	proposed — open slot
fpc-dbapi	DB abstraction	in progress (Fastway)
fpc-filebase	(folded into fpc-bbs as the file-area-database side)	—

The tt.tic.* modules (file-echo TIC handling per FSC-0087) live in fpc-ftn-transport -- TIC processing is transport-tier and rides BSO/ArcMail rails. fpc-bbs is the BBS-side storage that the tosser writes into after .TIC validation.