Skip to content

packetloss404/vibebbs

BranchesTags

Repository files navigation

VibeBBS

██╗   ██╗██╗██████╗ ███████╗██████╗ ██████╗ ███████╗
██║   ██║██║██╔══██╗██╔════╝██╔══██╗██╔══██╗██╔════╝
██║   ██║██║██████╔╝█████╗  ██████╔╝██████╔╝███████╗
╚██╗ ██╔╝██║██╔══██╗██╔══╝  ██╔══██╗██╔══██╗╚════██║
 ╚████╔╝ ██║██████╔╝███████╗██████╔╝██████╔╝███████║
  ╚═══╝  ╚═╝╚═════╝ ╚══════╝╚═════╝ ╚═════╝ ╚══════╝

A retro Bulletin Board System for the Vibe Coding era.

VibeBBS brings back the magic of 1980s/90s BBSes — ANSI art, door games, message bases, private mail, polls, a graffiti wall — with a modern hybrid architecture. Connect via Telnet for the authentic experience or through your browser with a full terminal emulator. Both transports feed one shared session engine, so 16 nodes across both protocols see each other in real time. Built for the vibe coding community.

Features

  • Hybrid Access — Raw Telnet server (TCP 2323, real IAC negotiation) + browser web terminal (xterm.js over WebSocket) with CRT scanline effect, both driving one BBSSession engine
  • Multi-Node Concurrency — Up to 16 simultaneous users with cross-protocol broadcasts: login/logout/disconnect notices, SysOp pages, and new-mail alerts reach online users regardless of how they connected
  • ANSI Art UI — Full-color retro interface with box drawing, gradients, and block art throughout (~40-state ANSI session machine, hand-written byte-level input parsing including backspace and Telnet IAC)
  • Message Bases — 5 threaded conferences with reply chains, per-user unread tracking (message_read join table), access-level gating, and a /S save / /A abort multi-line editor
  • Private Mail — Person-to-person mail with inbox/read/reply/delete, recipient validation, unread badges on login, and live "new mail" push if the recipient is currently online
  • Polls & Voting Booth — Interactive polls with one-vote-per-user enforcement (DB-level unique constraint) and results rendered as percentage ASCII bar charts
  • Live Multi-Room Chat — 3 chat rooms with real cross-node message relay scoped per room, join/leave announcements, and /W who's-here
  • Graffiti Wall — Tag the wall; usernames are ANSI-stripped before display
  • 4 Door Games — Two classic-inspired ports and two originals, all vibe-coding themed, all complete with scoring and win/lose conditions
  • SysOp Tools — MOTD-on-login, SysOp paging (blinking alert to every level-200+ node), who's-online, system stats, and a token-authenticated web admin dashboard
  • File Areas — 4 browsable catalog areas for scripts, prompts, CLAUDE.md files, and ANSI art (listing/catalog; transfer not yet wired)
  • Persistent Storage — SQLite (better-sqlite3, WAL mode, 11 tables) with scrypt-hashed passwords and call logging

Quick Start

git clone git@github.com:packetloss404/vibebbs.git
cd vibebbs
npm install
npm start

Then connect:

Method Address
Web Terminal http://localhost:8088
Admin Panel http://localhost:8088/admin
Telnet telnet localhost 2323

Default login: SysOp / sysop

Screenshots (What You'll See)

VibeBBS renders entirely in ANSI art. Here's what the flow looks like:

┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  A Bulletin Board System for the Vibe Coding Era     │
│  Where retro meets the future of AI-assisted code    │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

    Enter your credentials below
    or type NEW to register

    Username: _

The main menu provides access to all BBS functions:

┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  [M] Message Bases        [E] Private Mail           │
│  [F] File Areas           [V] Polls / Voting Booth   │
│  [D] Door Games           [R] Graffiti Wall          │
│  [B] Bulletins            [W] Who's Online           │
│  [C] Chat Rooms           [U] User Settings          │
│  [P] Page SysOp           [S] System Stats           │
│                           [G] Goodbye / Logoff       │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Architecture

┌─────────────┐     ┌──────────────────────────────────────┐
│ Telnet :2323 │────▶│                                      │
└─────────────┘     │   BBSSession (State Machine)         │
                    │                                      │
┌─────────────┐     │   ~40 states: login, menus, messages,│──▶ SQLite DB
│ Browser :8088│────▶│   mail, polls, chat, doors, admin... │
│  (WebSocket) │     │                                      │
└─────────────┘     └──────────────────────────────────────┘
                              │
┌─────────────┐               │
│ Admin Panel  │───────────────┘
│  (REST API)  │     Express routes + token auth
└─────────────┘

Both Telnet and WebSocket connections construct the same BBSSession over a tiny transport shim (write/end). Telnet sends real IAC negotiation bytes (WILL ECHO, WILL/DO SUPPRESS-GO-AHEAD) and parses raw input byte-by-byte; WebSocket adds ping/pong keepalive for idle timeout. The NodeManager tracks every active node across both transports as a node → {session, username, activity} map and provides broadcast(), which powers cross-protocol login/logout/paging/new-mail announcements.

Message Bases

# Conference Description Access
1 General Discussion Chat about anything and everything All users
2 Vibe Coding Share your vibe coding sessions & tips All users
3 Show & Tell Show off what you built with AI All users
4 Prompt Engineering Discuss prompts, CLAUDE.md files, and workflows All users
5 SysOp Corner System administration discussion SysOp only

Messages support threading (replies), per-user read tracking via the message_read join table, access-level gating per conference, and writing with /S to save and /A to abort.

Private Mail

Person-to-person messaging backed by a dedicated private_mail table:

  • Send, inbox, read, reply, and delete
  • Recipient existence validation with canonical casing
  • Unread counts surfaced as a badge on login
  • Real-time "you've got mail" push when the recipient is online on any node

Polls / Voting Booth

An interactive voting subsystem (polls, poll_options, poll_votes tables):

  • One vote per user, enforced by a UNIQUE(poll_id, user_id) constraint
  • Live results rendered as percentage ASCII bar charts
  • Ships with a seeded sample poll on first run

Chat Rooms & Graffiti

  • Live Chat — 3 rooms with real-time cross-node message relay scoped to the room you're in, plus join/leave announcements and /W to see who's present.
  • Graffiti Wall — Leave a tag on the wall, seeded with starter messages. Usernames are ANSI-stripped before rendering so nobody can break the layout.

File Areas

# Area Description
1 Scripts & Tools Useful scripts and utilities
2 CLAUDE.md Collection Curated CLAUDE.md files
3 Prompt Libraries Prompt collections and templates
4 ANSI Art ANSI art files and packs

Note: file areas are browsable catalogs (listing + metadata). Actual upload/download transfer is not yet wired.

Door Games

🚀 Vibe Wars

Inspired by TradeWars 2002

Intergalactic AI resource trading across 8 sectors with a per-sector price model and volatility. Buy and sell GPU Cores, Training Data, Model Weights, API Tokens, Prompt Packs, and VRAM Chips. Navigate probabilistic pirate encounters, manage fuel, cargo, and hull, and maximize your fortune in 30 turns with end-of-game scoring.

⚔️ Prompt Quest

Inspired by Legend of the Red Dragon

Dungeon crawler where you descend through floors fighting 8 scaling dev-bug monsters — from Null Pointers to the dreaded Prod Outage Dragon. Earn XP and gold, level up, buy weapons (Rubber Duck → Claude Opus Staff) and potions, and see how deep you can go.

💰 Token Tycoon

Original

Build an AI startup from $5,000 to IPO in 24 months. Hire engineers, buy compute, train models, run marketing campaigns, and acquire customers via real revenue/cost formulas. Random events like viral tweets, angel investors, and AWS bill surprises keep every playthrough different. Graded S through F on final valuation.

📚 Stack Overflow

Original

Developer-themed hangman with 80 words across four categories: Programming Languages, Frameworks & Tools, Dev Concepts, and AI & Vibe Coding. Guess the word before your stack overflows (6 wrong = crash). Multi-round scoring with running win rate.

Admin Panel

The SysOp admin panel is a web-based single-file vanilla-JS SPA at /admin with a retro green-on-black terminal aesthetic, served by Express with token auth (/admin/api/* routes gated by a requireAuth middleware; login requires access level ≥ 200).

  • Dashboard — Live stats (users, messages, calls, uptime), online nodes, recent call log
  • User Management — List, delete, reset passwords, edit access levels (password hashes stripped from API responses)
  • Message Management — Browse by conference, delete individual messages
  • Bulletin Management — Create, toggle active/inactive, delete announcements
  • Node Monitoring — Real-time view of who's online and what they're doing

Configuration

All settings live in config.json:

{
  "bbsName": "VibeBBS",
  "sysopName": "SysOp",
  "telnetPort": 2323,
  "webPort": 8088,
  "maxNodes": 16,
  "allowNewUsers": true,
  "idleTimeout": 300,
  "messageBases": [ ... ],
  "fileAreas": [ ... ]
}
Setting Default Description
telnetPort 2323 Telnet server port
webPort 8088 Web terminal & admin panel port
maxNodes 16 Maximum simultaneous connections
allowNewUsers true Allow new user registration
idleTimeout 300 Seconds before idle disconnect
newUserLevel 10 Access level for new accounts
sysopLevel 255 Maximum access level

Database

VibeBBS uses SQLite (better-sqlite3 in WAL mode, stored at data/vibebbs.db, gitignored). The 11-table schema is auto-created and seeded on first run via namespaced CRUD modules over prepared statements:

  • users — Accounts with scrypt-hashed passwords (per-user salt), access levels, and stats
  • messages — Threaded messages organized by conference
  • message_read — Per-user read tracking for unread counts
  • bulletins — SysOp announcements with active/inactive toggle
  • files — File metadata with download counts
  • call_log — Login/logout history per node
  • graffiti — Graffiti wall entries
  • private_mail — Person-to-person mail with read/unread state
  • polls, poll_options, poll_votes — Polls, their choices, and one-vote-per-user records
  • motd — Message of the day shown on login

The default SysOp account, welcome content, a sample poll, MOTD, and starter graffiti are seeded automatically on first launch.

Tech Stack

Component Technology
Runtime Node.js
Database SQLite via better-sqlite3 (WAL)
Web Server Express
WebSocket ws
Web Terminal xterm.js v5.5.0
Auth scrypt (Node.js crypto)
Protocol Telnet (raw TCP via net)

Three runtime dependencies, zero build step.

Project Structure

vibebbs/
├── server.js                  # Entry point — starts all servers
├── config.json                # BBS configuration
├── package.json
├── src/
│   ├── core/
│   │   ├── ansi.js            # ANSI escape codes & art screens
│   │   ├── bbs.js             # Session state machine (~40 states)
│   │   └── database.js        # SQLite schema & CRUD (11 tables)
│   ├── server/
│   │   ├── telnet.js          # Telnet server (raw TCP + IAC)
│   │   ├── websocket.js       # WebSocket server
│   │   └── node-manager.js    # Multi-node connection tracking
│   ├── doors/
│   │   ├── door1.js           # Vibe Wars (trading game)
│   │   ├── door2.js           # Prompt Quest (dungeon crawler)
│   │   ├── door3.js           # Token Tycoon (startup sim)
│   │   └── door4.js           # Stack Overflow (hangman)
│   ├── admin/
│   │   └── panel.js           # SysOp web admin panel (Express + embedded SPA)
│   └── web/
│       └── index.html         # Browser terminal (xterm.js)
└── data/                      # SQLite database (gitignored)

License

MIT

Built with vibes by packetloss404. Keep vibing.

About

Retro BBS for vibe coders — Telnet + Web terminal with ANSI art, message bases, door games, and SysOp admin panel. Node.js powered.

Resources

Readme
Activity

Stars

0 stars

Watchers

1 watching

Forks

0 forks
Report repository

Releases

No releases published

Packages

 
 
 

Contributors

Languages