Really Simple BBS

A message board for packet radio, suitable for use with ax25d.

Really Simple BBS (rsbbs) implements a bulletin board system that enables radio amateurs to read and store messages at your station. It generally adopts conventions common to other popular BBS systems, (B, J, K, L, R, S, H, etc.)

It is designed to run on a linux system when called by ax25d. That is, when a user calls your station, ax25d answers the call and routes the connection to rsbbs via standard input (stdin). rsbbs responds to the user through ax25d via standard output (stdout).

Features

• Send and receive messages: Send a message to another user by callsign, or read messages sent to you.
• Private messages: Send a private message readable only by the user.
• Simple setup: Install it, add it to your ax25d.conf, done!
• Plugin architecture: Add your own commands with simple plugin modules
• Access logging: Keep an eye on your BBS's activity

Requirements

• AX.25: It is assumed that you have a radio connected to your host, that you have configured your axports, and that ax25d can answer calls.
• Python 3: As this is a python 3 application, you will need python 3 and pip.
• Note on compiling Python3: If you build Python3 from source on debian/raspbian, you will need libssl-dev, libffi-dev, and libsqlite3-dev
• Hardware: A system capable of running Direwolf and ax25d should be more than sufficient.

Installation

Clone this repository and install it with pip:

git clone https://git.b-wells.us/jmbwell/rsbbs.git
cd rsbbs
python3 -m virtualenv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install .
rsbbs -h

The config file will be created at first launch.

Configuration

By default, the config.yaml file lives in your system's user config directory, such as ~/.config/rsbbs/config.yaml, as determined by the platformdirs module.

To use a config.yaml file from a different location, use the -f option:

rsbbs -f ~/config.yaml -s <calling station's callsign>

Either way, if the file is missing, rsbbs will create it.

The config.yaml file is pretty simple and self-explanatory for now:

bbs_name: John's Really Simple BBS
callsign: HOSTCALL
banner_message: Leave a message!
command_prompt: ENTER COMMAND >

Tip: To show the location of the current config file (among other configuration options), run:

rsbbs --show-config

Usage

With ax25d

Assuming you have ax25d working on your system, add something like the following to your ax25d.conf file:

[KI5QKX-10 via vhf0]
default   * * * * * *  *    root    /usr/local/bin/rsbbs rsbbs -s %U

Notes:

• Specify the full path to the rsbbs application.
• The installation path may vary on your system.
• If you install it in a virtualenv, specify the path to rsbbs in that virtualenv's /bin directory.
• Be sure to specify the -s %U parameter; this passes the ax.25 caller's callsign to the rsbbs application.

See man ax25d.conf for more details.

Directly

You can launch it from the command line on your packet station's host, and you can interact with it just as you would over the air.

This might be useful for administration purposes or just to talk to yourself. It does not have a standalone mode for taking calls, however -- that's what ax25d is for.

rsbbs -s URCALL

Options

Run rsbbs -h to see the following help:

usage: rsbbs [-h] [-d] -s CALLING_STATION [-f CONFIG_FILE] [-v]

options:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -d, --debug           Enable debugging output to stdout
  -s CALLING_STATION, --calling-station CALLING_STATION
                        The callsign of the calling station
  -f CONFIG_FILE, --config-file CONFIG_FILE
                        specify path to config.yaml file
  --show-config         show the current configuration and exit
  -v, --version         show program's version number and exit

Operation

Check out the sample transcript for a look at how it works.

Development

In general, on a macOS or linux system:

1. Clone the repository
2. cd to the working directory
3. Create a venv
4. Install it in "editable" mode with pip install -e .

For example:

git clone https://git.b-wells.us/jmbwell/rsbbs.git
cd rsbbs
python3 -m virtualenv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -e .
rsbbs -h

Contributing

Pull requests welcome. If you're not sure where to start:

1. Fork it (https://git.b-wells.us/jmbwell/rsbbs)
2. Create your feature branch (git checkout -b feature/fooBar)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -am 'add some fooBar')
4. Push to the branch (git push origin feature/fooBar)
5. Create a new pull request

License

GPLv3.