PCBoard

PCBoard (PCB) was a <a href="/facts/Bulletin_board_system/22d9c9s2">bulletin board system</a> (BBS) application first introduced for <a href="/facts/DOS/sWwDXNmX">DOS</a> in 1983 by Fred Clark's Clark Development Company. PCBoard was one of the first commercial BBS packages for DOS systems, and was considered one of the "high end" packages during the rapid expansion of BBS systems in the early 1990s. PCB was used as the basis of some of the largest bulletin board systems of the era, like <a href="/facts/Canada_Remote_Systems/Glu2V6hz">Canada Remote Systems</a>.
PCB was notable for its support of large multi-line BBS systems, which it supported by running multiple copies of the program, either using <a href="/facts/Computer_multitasking/Q4acPNMv">multitasking</a> systems like <a href="/facts/DESQview/KjDXlT4v">DESQview</a> or on multiple physical machines using shared storage. The system was licensed by the number of lines it would support; the majority of the systems were the basic two-line license, but it was also offered in 5, 10, 25, 50, 100, 250 and 1000 line systems. A native <a href="/facts/32-bit/TDMVce8s">32-bit</a> IBM <a href="/facts/OS/2/uVBl6ItP">OS/2</a> version became also available with PCB V15.22 and higher. There were also a few tools available for PCBoard, which were specifically developed for the <a href="/facts/OS/2_2.0/uVBl6ItP">OS/2 2.0</a> and <a href="/facts/OS/2_Warp/uVBl6ItP">OS/2 Warp</a> operating system.
Like many BBS companies, the rise of the <a href="/facts/WWW/wvnTrWFq">WWW</a> starting around 1994 led to serious downturns in fortunes, and Clark Development went bankrupt in 1997.

PCBoard open-in-new

PCBoard