One more comment to add: another thing to consider is message recovery when the connection is lost during editing. Being a shy i2p user, I have to live with the occasional drop, and there have been a couple of occasions when I lost connection in the middle of editing a very long post, and found myself having to type the whole thing a second time--this time into vi and then copy/pasting into the client once I was happy with it.

Are you aware that if the client is running on your own machine, you can configure any external editor you want?

2022-08-26 16:56 from IGnatius T Foobar <ajc@citadel.org>
Are you aware that if the client is running on your own machine, you
can configure any external editor you want?

No. I guess I should have spent more than 2 minutes setting it up and reading about how to invoke it!

Ok then ... assuming that this becomes the way you use the client for the most part now ... after you live with it for a little while, tell us how you feel about it does to your workflow when you hit <E>nter-message and the screen clears to display the editor. Do you find it disruptive? Distracting? Or is it just fine, and there's no distraction?

2022-08-27 15:01 from IGnatius T Foobar <ajc@citadel.org>
Ok then ... assuming that this becomes the way you use the client for

the most part now ... after you live with it for a little while, tell

us how you feel about it does to your workflow when you hit
<E>nter-message and the screen clears to display the editor. Do you
find it disruptive? Distracting? Or is it just fine, and there's no

distraction?

I used it for a little while but stopped because replies and quotes seem to still go to the same builtin editor, and it was jarring to me for different commands to spawn different editors. But for the short while that I did use it, I don't remember the screen being cleared. So if it did, I guess it didn't bother me.

Anyway, new topic. Maybe I can get some tips about how to better use Citadel. I have a problem, which is that I am stupid and a slow thinker. So when I'm using email, it's not unusual for me to read several emails, then go away and digest them for a bit, and then return and respond after I have thoughts.

I find this flow difficult for me with Citadel because I go through my room list, read all of the messages, and then when I come back later, I don't remember all of the rooms that I read earlier in the day because (g)oto doesn't visit them anymore unless there are new messages.

Like I said, I know that I am dumb and forgetful. Any tips?

Sure thing. I do this all the time. If you <S>kip out of a room instead of <G>oto, it won't mark the messages as read and you'll be brought back to them next time.

2022-10-11 13:27 from IGnatius T Foobar <ajc@citadel.org>
Sure thing. I do this all the time. If you <S>kip out of a room
instead of <G>oto, it won't mark the messages as read and you'll be
brought back to them next time.

Aaah, I should have realized that. I think I thought it meant "stop where you are and go to the next room," leaving unread messages unread but messages I have already read are marked read. Thanks!

Aaah, I should have realized that. I think I thought it meant "stop
where you are and go to the next room," leaving unread messages unread

That's <A>bandon :)

Got it! ssh bbs@uncensored.citadel.org and log in as normal.

2023-09-14 20:37 from nonservator <nonservator@uncensored.citadel.org>

Got it! ssh bbs@uncensored.citadel.org and log in as normal.

That's one way to do it if you're connecting over clearnet. For those of us who connect over I2P, the keystroke delay is near intolerable. I run the text client locally, and when it starts I see some messages about AES or something or other, so I infer that client<->server is encrypted there, too.

I want to get back into using the proper text client. I figure by now
encryption has to be supported?

Encryption has been supported for so long now that the person who implemented it is dead.

If you connect a Citadel Client to a Citadel Server it will encrypt by default.

There are lots of good reasons to use the client locally instead of just connecting over SSH. More integration with your system environment, local editor, status line mode, better handling of inline URLs, all sorts of fun like that. And as zel suggested, if you're connecting over the darknet, you pretty much need to run the client locally because otherwise you get keystroke delay reminiscent of the early 1990's when most places had 19.2K circuits.

apt install citadel-client

That'll give you a slightly old but quite usable client.

I'm a client-usin' fool.

A lot of "retro bbs" sites seem to have those installed. I had assumed that wouldn't be a use case for us, since we have a native web interface. Am I assuming incorrectly?