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The America Online Protocol Revealed
Gods Misfit writes "The America Online protocol(Connecting, Logging In, Joining Chats, etc..) has remained a mystery for most of its life. The only way one could log into their AOL account was via the AOL software. A few months ago, some people set out to break down the AOL protocol and open the door for alternative America Online software. This document is the result: The AOL Protocol.
A sign on example for Visual Basic programmers has been written and is available here." I suspect a fair number of people never try Linux or one of the BSDs because they're moderately happy with AOL as an ISP, and switching OSes would mean switching ISPs at the same time. A shame that AOL doesn't make this kind of information more easily available.
I suspect a fair number of people never try Linux or one of the BSDs because they're moderately happy with AOL as an ISP, and switching OSes would mean switching ISPs at the same time. A shame that AOL doesn't make this kind of information more easily available.
Probably very few people using AOL would consider playing with *nix. If you're playing with other operating systems, you've probably already outgrown AOL. You're not burning ISOs from Redhat that you downloaded via AOL/dialup. If you're on AOL, you're happy and content and most probably don't want to be switching ISPs or playing with a new OS. Besides, just because you're on a new OS, doesn't mean you have to get rid of your M$ partition and AOL as your dialup. People can explore the goodness of *nix on that old computer in the closet they feel bad about donating to the Salvation Army.
The AOL protocal was a nice reverse engineering hack. Nice work fellows. AOL didn't make it more freely available because it was a proprietary technology. They'd prefer to keep it to themselves or license it out.. otherwise they would have used a published standard.
=steve
--- rapper/producer/bachelorette party stripper
Actually, it doesn't surprise me that they don't make it available. If they release that information, they lose an edge they have on joe average as an entry level computer user. How many times have you talked to someone who wanted to show you something that was on the 'internet' and in reality, it was something that was on a section of AOL? AOL has done a really good job of making a 'controlled' section of the internet we're they control the information. By having only one style of software they have more control also. Would YOU just want anything to connect to YOUR server and have authorization privleges? Of course AOL is very much based on server side scripting, and a butchered version of html. All aol sections are addressed with an aol://xxxx:xxxx:asdgfsadgas type link... a mix of alphanumeric strings, etc. Essentially it's THERE style of html distributed through a browser.
But in the end the bottom line is profit. You don't want to allow people to get onto the internet where you can't 100% control what the first thing they see is. AOL gives the illusion to first time joe averages that it IS the internet. My mom spent months on AOL without even using the actual internet and she thought she was on the internet. It's marketing genius. You control their access, you control the way content is shown, you give them places to spend their money and control the ways they communicate. Everyone does it the same way, so everyone is having a similar version of their own experience...
The AOL designers aren't dumb IMHO, sure it's not the service that I want as my ISP, but when it comes to marketing, they know what their doing...
For awhile they were going to make it so you could use them as a 'traditional' isp using Dial-up, but I don't think that anything really ever came of it.... I guess AOL users just like hearing 'WELCOME, YOU'VE GOT SPAM, (I MEAN MAIL)...'
[Something witty and intelligent should have appeared here.]
{Traicovn}
They fear that the change they make will kill their expensive toy and force them to go talk to a more computer literate friend who will once again berate them for using the most expensive ISP with the worst service.
I suspect that this doocument will be the source from which nasty new AOL hacks will be based. And now that it is out it is in very immature hands.What this will do. (maybe) is covered by point 8
Not that it matters to me because I don't use AOL
I used to have a cool sig, back when I cared
In my opinion, logging on and enjoying AOL's so-called services was never 1/10 of the problem as their stupid crappy propritary mail system.
Back around 1996 or so, I was part of an AOL beta program that released a MAPI interface for AOL mail servers. IE, you could add the AOL mail server to your Outlook config and download your AOL mail right into Outlook.
Of course, the AOL exec freaked out when they considered how many eyeballs their advertisers would lose if everyone uninstalled the AOL client and kept their mail via Outlook. So the program was canned, and I was unfortunately too short-sighted to save a copy of that MAPI tool before the area was closed down.
Ever since, I've been trying to get my sister/parents/grandparents off AOL. Not to mention that AOL never supported Windows NT because they couldn't figure out how to install their stupid AOL Adapter TCP shunt thing. So for years my relatives were forced to run a crappy 16-bit (Win 3.11) version of the AOL client for the sole purpose of checking e-mail.
AOL's mail service is terrible but a lot of people don't want to change their e-mail addresses. If you really want to do a great services to help newbies move beyond their AOL shackles...please, I implore you:
A) Reverse engineer the AOL mail protocol so that external programs can at least READ AOL mail (sending, unsending, and AOL custom features are optional)
B) Reverse engineer the AOL mail database (local copy of stored mail) so that it can be imported into another program.
Even after I got a couple family members to switch over to Hotmail, they still have to use the AOL client to read their old mail. It's that or save it all as flat text and lose all the important header information.
Also, a bonus to reverse engineering the AOL mail database would be the ability to sync mail with your Palm. The AOL client for Palm is 400KB and can only dial-up, not sync.
Please post reply if you know of any project working on the AOL mail/database formats. Thank you!
- JoeShmoe
-- I wonder which will go down in history as the bigger failure: the War on Drugs or the War on Filesharing
Why do I see a lukewarm future among kiddies of "number squatting", getting personal phone lines that're similar to national ISP dialins except for the area code?
I also wonder about the legality of such a practice. The users are placing the call, right? I guess it depends on how different AOL's login procedure is from something standard. "No, Your Honor, that was my personal login so I could access my computer from my friend's house." Compare to the tone-detector that lets you use a redbox to turn appliances on and off.
Back in 1995, Claris introduced Emailer, a Mac e-mail client application that could retrieve AOL mail, along with many other kinds of mail accounts. Development was continued on it for about 3 years or so, but it became an orphan when Claris became Filemaker, Inc and divested itself of non-database products. It was neglected and finally end-of-lifed by Apple in November 1998 at version 2.0v3. Most of the team that created it went on to develop Outlook Express for the Mac, which does not do AOL mail because AOL decided to stop licensing out the protocol. I can only assume that AOL realized they could make more money by forcing everyone to use their shitty built-in mail client and bombarding them with paid advertisements the entire time, than by licensing out the protocol to other software companies creating clean, elegantly-designed mail clients.
Six years later, Emailer still works great on Mac OS 9.x, and the original developers do not believe it should break under OS X. I still use it (as do a lot of people) and I still think it's the best mail client I've ever used, because it doesn't do HTML mail. Nothing but pure, speedy text.
~Philly