DOS ain't dead

Karen 21.11.2023, 04:50	DOS email clients? (Users) Post reply
	Hi folks, just wondering if there is anything that might be used, say with Links for DOS, that provides email support? With google pulling basic html, I am hoping for a command line option that lets me access an email account, even a new one, from my DOS desktop entirely. Thanks, Kare

mceric

Germany,
21.11.2023, 10:26

@ Karen

DOS email clients?

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Hi! As often with DOS, the problem will be TLS / SSL support. For example Arachne supports mail, but no TLS / SSL. It can only invoke wget and curl to get some hint of support, for https websites.

One idea might be forwarding your mail to a provider with roundcube or squirrelmail webmail, which might work with DOS browsers.

Has anybody tested compatibility with lynx, links, dillo or similar for DOS yet? I guess w3m and elinks are not yet available for DOS?

Old DOS versions have existed for Pegasus Mail, Mutt and Pine at some point, but their TLS / SSL support will be as outdated as their last DOS versions.

The information on whether DOS versions existed at all is taken from
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_email_clients

I am not aware of DOS ports of related clients Alpine, Cone, and Mailx, but those are classic text-based mail clients as well.

You could also try a tool based approach with fetchmail, popclient or similar, to download your mail into local files, which you can then open with other tools of your choice. Sending mail would be a spearate task then.

The Gnus mail client for Emacs might work with Emacs for DOS, but will depend on Emacs for TLS / SSL, which I doubt any DOS version of Emacs supports properly?

---
FreeDOS / DOSEMU2 / ...

SuperIlu

Berlin, Germany,
21.11.2023, 21:45

@ mceric

DOS email clients?

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> Hi! As often with DOS, the problem will be TLS / SSL support. For example
> Arachne supports mail, but no TLS / SSL. It can only invoke wget and curl
> to get some hint of support, for https websites.

Well, TLS is doable (as I've proven with DOStodon), but I think the main problem will be Unicode/UTF-8 support and nowadays everything is HTML-Mails :-(

libcurl has IMAP and SMTP support, so it should even be possible to add that to DOjS and then implement a client in Javascript. But alas, I already have to much projects :-D

---
Javascript on MS-DOS? Try DOjS https://github.com/SuperIlu/DOjS
Fediverse: @dec_hl@mastodon.social

Karen

22.11.2023, 01:36

@ SuperIlu

DOS email clients?

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I suppose where I am confused flows from the latest sshdos compile
managing security just fine. also, the links compile built for dos with a
bit of javascr*** support has no issues with https sites at all. I can
log into amazon canada with it.
So if those can be done, why cannot a port from alpine back to pine for
dos solve this issue?
My goal is gmail, post removal of basic html access.
But if other structures manage security just fine and hppts sites
just fine, why not email?
Kare

> > Hi! As often with DOS, the problem will be TLS / SSL support. For
> example
> > Arachne supports mail, but no TLS / SSL. It can only invoke wget and
> curl
> > to get some hint of support, for https websites.
>
> Well, TLS is doable (as I've proven with DOStodon), but I think the main
> problem will be Unicode/UTF-8 support and nowadays everything is HTML-Mails
> :-(
>
> libcurl has IMAP and SMTP support, so it should even be possible to add
> that to DOjS and then implement a client in Javascript. But alas, I already
> have to much projects :-D

mceric

Germany,
22.11.2023, 12:47

@ Karen

DOS email clients?

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Thanks for letting me know that the current links and sshdos support current security protocols just fine. In that case, feasible options should be:

- Use sshdos to visit a shell server where you can run pine, alpine, cone, mutt or mailx for Linux. It might (?) even be possible to install that on your own router, as those usually run Linux?

- Use links with a provider which uses squirrelmail or roundcube as webmail, if (!) those require less javascr*** than gmail webmail does.

In addition, our current version of curl seems to support email protocols such as imap, but using that to access mail is probably tedious.

Again the question would be whether anybody has experience with using links for squirrelmail or roundcube, or with the shell method?

---
FreeDOS / DOSEMU2 / ...

iw2evk Magenta (Italy), 03.12.2023, 13:48 @ mceric	DOS email clients? Post reply
	FLmail support gmaill and others mail service. https://storage.googleapis.com/google-code-archive...ox-microwindows-nxlib-fltk-for-dos/FLMAIL91.zip Roberto

glennmcc

North Jackson, Ohio (USA),
03.12.2023, 18:05

@ iw2evk

DOS email clients?

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---
--
http://glennmcc.org/

bocke

29.12.2023, 22:02
(edited by bocke, 29.12.2023, 22:21)

@ iw2evk

DOS email clients?

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> FLmail support gmaill and others mail service.
>
> https://storage.googleapis.com/google-code-archive...ox-microwindows-nxlib-fltk-for-dos/FLMAIL91.zip
>
> Roberto

FLTK for DOS programs are the result of Georg Potthast's merger of two projects: Nano-X/MicroWindows and XD640. The first one had a port to DJGPP and a port of FLTK to it, for quite some time. The other was a small FLTK based Linux desktop environment for VGA 640x480 resolution made by Jean-Marc Lienher.

Georg ported FLTK 1.3 to Nano-X including XD640 programs and some other FLTK based projects. He likely also made quite a few improvements to programs. For example, the original flmail that came with XD640 likely didn't support SSL. Also, he likely ported them to FLTK 1.3, as they used a custom version of FLTK 1.1 with UTF8 support.

As the original code of flmail is under a license similar to BSD or MIT, George is not required to post his modifications.

I would argue this actually proves that if you don't plan to commercialize a project, you might better put it under GPL or similar license, so you can follow the changes by others in the future. And if author of a port is not able to maintain it, anyone else can take over from the latest code point.

Nowadays, when George decreased his presence on the web (I hope he is ok as it kinda coincides with the COVID), there's none to pick it up and recompile with the newer OpenSSL version (or an alternative SSL library).

Edit:

I remembered he also made a small Linux distribution based on Tiny Core and Nano-X: NanoLinux. It featured some of the same software as FLTK for DOS project with some additional FLTK apps.

Links for those interested:
https://lienher.org/jean-marc/xd640/en.html
https://github.com/o-ksi-d/xd640
http://microwindows.org/
https://github.com/ghaerr/microwindows
https://fltk-dev.easysw.narkive.com/n3Mk7FJB/fltk-1-3-0-ported-to-dos
https://code.google.com/archive/p/nanox-microwindows-nxlib-fltk-for-dos/
https://sourceforge.net/projects/fltk-dos/
https://sourceforge.net/projects/nanolinux/

bocke 05.01.2024, 17:11 @ bocke	DOS email clients? Post reply
	Some "news" on Georg. Last post of his I found on the web was on his DOSUSB forums from the may of 2022: https://347402.forumromanum.com/member/forum/entry...59.1.how_to_purchase_a_license_for_product.html So, it's likely he's fine, just busy with work or family matters. If you are interested in an updated version of FLMail, you can try emailing him: http://www.georgpotthast.de/usb/contactn.htm

bocke

30.09.2025, 13:38

@ bocke

DOS email clients?

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A little correction. Georg didn't do the initial port of FLTK to DOS. It was done by the author of XD640 himself in early 00s:
https://web.archive.org/web/20040812050018/http://www.oksid.ch/fltk-dos/index.html

Georg's version from 2010s was an update of that version and conversion to Fltk 1.3.

The original project was licensed under BSD license, so Georg was free to modify the programs without sharing the source. If the dev chose GPL instead, we would now have the source to update Flmail and OpenSSL on our own.

Rugxulo

Usono,
30.09.2025, 14:24

@ bocke

DOS email clients?

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> If the dev chose GPL instead, we would now have the source to update
> Flmail and OpenSSL on our own.

I just assume he used DJGPP's port of OpenSSL:

* https://www.delorie.com/pub/djgpp/current/v2tk/

> ssl101ub.zip B 8,936,850 2016-12-26 OpenSSL 1.0.1u for DJGPP V2
> ssl101us.zip B 6,466,497 2016-12-26 OpenSSL 1.0.1u sources
> ssl102ub.zip B 12,297,519 2019-12-31 OpenSSL 1.0.2u for DJGPP V2
> ssl102us.zip B 7,316,436 2019-12-31 OpenSSL 1.0.2u sources

* http://www1.delorie.com/archives/browse.cgi?p=djgpp/2020/01/15/12:39:15

> This port has been created because 1.0.2 is
> the Long Term Support (LTS) version (support will be provided until 31st
> December 2019) and the 1.0.1 version is currently only receiving security
> bug fixes and all support will be discontinued for this version on 31st
> December 2016.

EDIT: The announcement post of the port does say it supports DJGPP out of the box. However, there were still minor changes.

bocke

04.10.2025, 22:47

@ Rugxulo

DOS email clients?

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> I just assume he used DJGPP's port of OpenSSL:
>
> * https://www.delorie.com/pub/djgpp/current/v2tk/
> * http://www1.delorie.com/archives/browse.cgi?p=djgpp/2020/01/15/12:39:15
>
> EDIT: The announcement post of the port does say it supports DJGPP out of
> the box. However, there were still minor changes.

I think so too. I wanted to say: we could update Flmail and its OpenSSL support. Not a native English speaker so I slip up sometimes. :)

kerravon

Ligao, Free World North,
13.10.2025, 17:46

@ bocke

DOS email clients?

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> A little correction. Georg didn't do the initial port of FLTK to DOS. It
> was done by the author of XD640 himself in early 00s:
> https://web.archive.org/web/20040812050018/http://www.oksid.ch/fltk-dos/index.html
>
> Georg's version from 2010s was an update of that version and conversion to
> Fltk 1.3.
>
> The original project was licensed under BSD license, so Georg was free to
> modify the programs without sharing the source. If the dev chose GPL
> instead, we would now have the source to update Flmail and OpenSSL on our
> own.

Or - more likely - you would not even have access to the binary.

The GPL is an attempt to force someone - in this case Georg - to
do something he apparently doesn't want to. You can email him
and ask him why, and try to convince him to change his mind,
but there is a very good chance he will stick to his original
position - like almost everyone in the world does.

Attempts to force people to do things - in this case - write free
code and release the source code - since that's what "all good
people" would do (and it's always better if it is "someone else"
who does that good deed) - tend not to work. Marx thought that
was possible too. It doesn't end well. And the middle is completely
atrocious. Only the beginning is inspiring. This doesn't just
apply to code. Have you ever tried following Jesus's "pacifism"?
I tried it once. Didn't end well either. Both are junk philosophy.

I personally steer clear of modifying GCC because of the GPL,
and I am instead spending an enormous effort to try to replace it.
I make the minimal possible changes to GCC to get around some
immediate issues, but that's it. You can't ignore this other
aspect of what happens when you think you're in a monopoly
position to force others to do your bidding.

bocke

17.10.2025, 00:15

@ kerravon

DOS email clients?

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> Or - more likely - you would not even have access to the binary.
>

Why would you need the access to binaries?

You need source code to update the code. To access anything using SSL or TLS you have to use pretty recent versions of an SSL library as the encryption methods are retired every several years.

Sometimes, updating a recent-ish code is just a recompile. And sometimes a one line source fix.

It's not about forcing anyone to do anything but about having the source to update or modify software. Which is not the case when someone only publishes the binaries, like Georg did. The first is required by GPL, the second is allowed by BSD and MIT licenses.

My point was that if the original code was under GPL, anyone could update it and release a new version that supports modern SSL/TLS server allowing this new LINKS build to access modern HTTPS web. This could be done with only a recompile with newer version of OpenSSL from DJGPP.

As Georg's changes are mostly available only as binary, you can't change the source - you have to use an ancient port by the original author, manually porting the code to the updated components.

turboblack

13.10.2025, 16:20

@ Karen

DOS email clients?

Post reply

> Hi folks,
> just wondering if there is anything that might be used, say with Links for
>
> DOS, that provides email support?
> With google pulling basic html, I am hoping for a command line option that
>
> lets me access an email account, even a new one, from my DOS desktop
> entirely.
> Thanks,
> Kare

https://www.bttr-software.de/forum/board_entry.php?id=22015 The Links browser supports encryption and can open our email service.

Join us!

---
elpis.ws - zine // downgrade.me.eu.org // old.net.eu.org // fnd.pp.ua // w10.host - manage your website and email in DOS

bencollver

13.10.2025, 16:55

@ Karen

DOS email clients?

Post reply

> Hi folks,
> just wondering if there is anything that might be used, say with Links for
>
> DOS, that provides email support?
> With google pulling basic html, I am hoping for a command line option that
>
> lets me access an email account, even a new one, from my DOS desktop
> entirely.
> Thanks,
> Kare

I haven't done email from DOS, but if i did, i would go through a BBS. QWK offline mail is well supported on DOS.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QWK_(file_format)

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