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6.09 - FOSSIL DRIVERS
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[6.09.01] - WHAT IS A FOSSIL DRIVER?
A FOSSIL driver allows DOS based modem communication software
(i.e.: BBS Programs, Mailers and Door Games) to communicate through
a standard interface that talks to the actual serial port hardware.
The FOSSIL interface is an extention of the IBM BIOS Interupt 14h
functions, to read and write data to a serial port, and to configure
the serial port settings. In addition to providing communications,
a FOSSIL driver can also can be used as an interface for getting
input from the keyboard, and displaying characters to the video
screen (though programs usually use the BIOS or DOS functions to
handle this type of I/O). Some FOSSIL drivers support TCP/IP telnet
communications rather then just serial communications.
[6.09.02] - THE HISTORY OF FOSSIL DRIVERS
The word "FOSSIL" is actually an acronym for "Fido-Opus-Seadog
Standard Interface Layer". The idea of using a FOSSIL driver began
in 1985, When Tom Jennings (Fido BBS Author, and founder of FidoNet),
released a generic version of Fido BBS called Fido_Gen, which used
a seperate layer for the serial communications. In those days there
were many "IBM PC" clones that ran MS-DOS and had an 808x or 80286
processor, but they all used different types of UART hardware to
control the serial ports, so trying to develop communication port
software to support all the differnt flavors of serial hardware was
a nearly impossible task.
The idea caught on, as Thom Henderson (the author of SEAdog mailer)
and Bob Hartman built a driver around Tom's generic serial layer in
order to solve some issues in SEAdog. Vince Perriello then got
involved when he modified the driver for the DEC Rainbow computer
so he could run SEAdog on his DEC.
The FOSSIL interface was standardized in 1986. That year Wynn Wagner
(the author of Opus BBS) was attempting to use a commercial serial
driver with Opus BBS, without much sucess. Bob Hartman suggested
that Wynn should use the SEAdog/Fido serial driver, and then Vince
Perriello called Wynn to discuss porting Opus to the Dec Rainbow.
The three guys got together, Vince wrote the first FOSSIL definition.
Bob Hartman then released OPUSCOMM, which was the first official
FOSSIL driver.
Soon afterwards, the Fido/Seadog drivers non-IBM compatible computers
were re-written as FOSSIL drivers for the DEC Rainbow, Tandy 2000,
Sanyo MBC-55x, and the Heath/Zenith-100.
In 1987 Vince Perriello authored FSC-0008, the offical FidoNet
Technical Standards Committee FOSSIL Specification, draft 4.
That same year two new FOSSILS were developed for PC's using the new
specifications: David Nugent's BNU, and Ray Gwinn's X00.
These two FOSSILs became the DOS "standard" over the next decade.
Both BNU and X00 were released as freeware for non-commercial use, and
both had a donation option for commercial users.
In 1988 Rick Moore of Solar Winds Computing published draft-5 of the
FOSSIL Specification based on input from both David Nugent and Ray
Gwinn. This became FSC-0015, which was the final specifications
defined for the FidoNet Technical Standards Committee. Ray Gwinn later
added several "unofficial" commands to his X00 FOSSIL driver.
A few other DOS FOSSIL drivers were developed in the following years,
but by then BNU and X00 had become so widly used that the later ones
had a hard time gaining popularity with BBS operators.
In 1990 Nikos Karasawidis released NTG FOSSIL, which was freeware for
non-commercial use.
in 1993 Anders Danielson released ADF (AnDan FOSSIL) as shareware.
Anders made a number of optimizations for running DOS applications under
Windows over the years. ADF gradually gained popularity over BNU and
X00 in the later 1990's near the end of the BBS era. In 1999 Anders
re-released ADF as freeware.
open source freeware.
Three OS/2 FOSSIL drivers appeared in 1993. Ray Gwinn developed SIO,
an OS/2 Serial driver with FOSSIL support. It was a total rewrite
of X00, and it became the perfered driver for OS/2 communications.
Joakin Hernberg developed the VDF FOSSIL, and Greg Rumple developed
Magnum FOSSIL, but nether one gained much use by the BBS community.
SIO later added the ability to create Virtual Modems (VMODEM) on a
TCP/IP telnet connection.
In 1994 Mario Viara released FCI FOSSIL, which was originally shareware.
Ten years later Mario re-released FCI as open source freeware.
In 1994 Brian Woodrullf released WinFossil, the first 32-bit FOSSIL
for for Windows. Unfortunatly WinFossil suffered some compatibility
and stability issues. Most Windows Sysops continued to use DOS based
FOSSILs such as X00 and BNU. WinFossil was Shareware, and the Win95
version only supported serial COM ports as the DOS FOSSIL's did.
In 1994 the first Virtual Modem / Virtual COM port for Windows 3.1
and 95 was developed by David Yon called COMt, which allowed DOS COM
port appications (inclduing DOS FOSSIL drivers) to perform over a
TCP/IP telnet connection. David discontinued COMt when he later
co-founded Tactical Software in 1996.
In 1995 Gerhard Wiesinger released NTFOSS, which was the first
FOSSIL for Windows NT. NTFOSS was an extreamly stable but unlike
WinFossil it would only work for a limited time without registration.
In 1995 a Andrew Sapozhnikov released RLFOSSIL, which was the only
DOS based FOSSIL driver supporting TCP/IP communications instead of
serial port communications. RLFOSSIL required a DOS Packet driver and
a high degree of skill to configure it, and by then most Sysops had
moved on to OS/2 or Windows which did not use or require DOS packet
drivers.
In 1996 Brian Woodruff ported WinFossil over to Windows NT.
He released 3 public beta versions that year, which allowed a single
node to accept inbound telnet connections, in addition to the serial
port communications found in the original WinFossil for Windows 9x.
In 1997 Dedrick Allen released a beta version of NetModem, a TCP/IP
telnet FOSSIL driver for Windows 3.1 and 95. The multinode version of
NetModem had serious stability problems which could result in Windows
crashing and rebooting, and unfortunatly Dedrick abandoned development.
In 1997 Tactical Software released COM/IP, a commercial virtual COM
port redirector for Windows 95, based on COMt.
In 1998 Martin Winkler developed a product called CFOS, which began
as a CAPI FOSSIL driver for ISDN modems. CFOS later evolved to become
an ISDN and DSL download optimizer and firewall, in addition to a
FOSSIL interface.
In 1999, Tactical Software developed a FOSSIL driver for COM/IP.
Their BBS beta tester, PC Micro, became the primary distributor and
support site for COM/IP, offering BBS sysops a 256 virtual COM port
license for $50. Years later Tactical raised the pricing considerably
by charging per COM port, pricing higher counts at over $1000.
In 2000, Rob Swindell ported his DOS based Synchronet BBS software
to Windows in *nix, and wrote an internal FOSSIL driver for Windows
which allowed it to run DOS doors via telnet. Synchronet had been a
Commercial BBS program from 1992-1996, after which it was released
as freeware.
In 2001 Maarten Bekers developed SyncFos, a free telnet interface
which allows Maartens EleBBS software to function with the Synchronet
BBS FOSSIL driver (also freeware) by Rob Swindell.
In 2001, PC Micro developed NetFoss, a freeware FOSSIL driver for
Windows with internal telnet support. NetFoss includes Net2BBS, a free
telnet server, and NetFoss is compatible with many other telnet servers.
In 2004, PC Micro released NetSerial, a virtual COM port redirector for
Windows, with telnet and tcp/ip support. NetSerial allows 256 virtual
COM ports, sysop priced at $25. NetSerial can be used with NetFoss or
ADF Fossil drivers, or with Win32 COM or DOS UART access.
In 2004 Rick Parrish updated SynchFos to support other drop files,
so it could run from his freeware GameSrv Telnet server. He renamed
his version to mSyncFos, which became part of the GameSrv package.
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[6.09.03] - WHAT FOSSIL DRIVERS ARE AVAILABLE FOR FREE?
DOS FOSSIL DRIVERS:
ADF 1.50 - Freeware - http://www.digsys.se/adf.html
BNU 1.70 - Freeware - http://pcmicro.com/bnu
X00 1.53 - Freeware - No offical site
FCI 1.07 - Freeware - http://www.viara.cn/en/fci.htm
WARNING: There are fake versions of BNU 2.02 and X00 2.02
being distributed. Both authors have confirmed these are
fakes, released by a hacker.
There is a beta version of BNU 1.89h, but it does not work as well
as 1.70. X00 1.53 was a public beta version that added support for
BAUD rates over 38400 bps, and was considered by many sysops to be
the best DOS FOSSIL driver for many years. ADF performs better then
BNU or X00 under Windows however, since it release idle timeslices
to Windows.
DOS FOSSIL DRIVERS can only use COM1-COM4 under Windows NT flavors
including 2000 and XP, due to limitations in the Windows NTVDM.
Native Windows FOSSIL Drivers can support all COM port values.
WINDOWS FOSSIL DRIVERS:
NETFOSS 0.8.1 - Freeware - http://netfoss.com
SYNCFOS 2.2 - Freeware - http://elebbs.com/index.elm?catagory=18
mSYNCFOS (mod) - Freeware - http://www.randm.ca/products/msyncfos
Many other FOSSIL drivers can be found at these sites:
BBS Archives - formerly run by PC Micro
http://archives.thebbs.org/ra82a.htm
The COMM Port OS/2 - run by Bob Juge
http://www.juge.com/bbs/Dos.1.Html
DOS FOSSIL Drivers - the bookcase library
http://www.bookcase.com/library/software/msdos.undef.fossil.html
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[6.09.04] - HOW DO I ADD A FOSSIL DRIVER TO MY BBS?
Typically DOS based FOSSIL drivers could be installed either as
a TSR (Terminate and Stay Resident) driver, or as a device driver
which was loaded in the config.sys during the DOS boot process.
DOS based FOSSIL drivers usually were configured by passing many
parameters on the command line, which would instruct it which
COM ports, FIFO sizes, buffer sized, and other settings to use.
Windows and OS/2 based FOSSIL drivers typically were configured
in a GUI.
Since every FOSSIL driver used unique configuration settings,
you should review the documention for the FOSSIL driver you are
using. Some BBS Software required a FOSSIL driver and would not
run without one, while other BBS software could be told to use
or not use a FOSSIL in its configuration program.
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