(From Mike Ehlert's BBS Software Development News - 4 Jan 98)
Proboard BBS author Philippe Leybaert announced
today that he is willing to make a big effort to
make ProBoard a success again!
This comes just two days after his previous
announcment in which he said that ProBoard
perspectives look very bad, and he was very
close to the point of letting someone else
take over his development. Many Proboard
SysOps urged him not to give up, and offer
their support in any capacity.
Today Philippe went on to say that "although
ProBoard/32 will not be ready in January,
it will certainly not take another year." Many
Proboard SysOps are breathing a Sigh of Relief,
as of yesterday it seemed that the end was so
very near.
ProBoard Sysops have eagerly been waiting the
public beta release of ProBoard/32 3.0, a
Win95/NT generation of the once popular BBS
package since the summer of 1996 when it was
originally scheduled for release.
Unfortunately, there were numerous delays,
and release dates were postponed first for
weeks, then for several months as the author
vanished into seclusion.
Philippe reappeared in mid October and
announced that the reason for lack of
development was due to him taking time off
to get married and settle into his new house.
He assured us that ProBoard would finally
be released in "the next few months".
Late in November one of the ProBoard Sites
announced that the deadline for the first
release of ProBoard/32 was December 97,
and the ProBoard world eagerly awaited as
the final days drew near.
In mid December Philippe announced that
most of his registration sites had not
paid him recently, and said if the
situation did not improve there would
be no new version!
Chuck King (the US/Canada registration
site) quickly responded. Philippe had
failed to notify him of his new address
when he went into seclusion. US funds
were sent, and we were told the release
was back on track.
As the end of December deadline approached,
ProBoard SysOps eagerly awaited for the
32-bit version. Unfortunately December came
and left with no sign of Proboard/32.
On January first, members of the ProBoard
Mailing list began to speculate on why it
did not appear, and when it would.
On January second, Philippe responded
explaining that there was no December
release date after all, and it was all
a misunderstanding.
He mentioned that he is currently
working on some other project to
provide himself immediate income,
and that he should be able to spend
time developing Proboard once again
in "a few weeks" after his current
project is done.