Hacker News Reader

Comment by jlgaddis | Hacker News Reader

And let's not forget the great times that could be had by joining any large channel on IRC and sending a single command:

  /CTCP #channel PING +++ATH0

Interestingly enough, I tried it again a few months ago and was shocked to discover that it apparently still works.

View on HN

For those like me who didn't know what the above IRC line meant, http://everything2.com/user/xmatt/writeups/%252B%252B%252BAT... is a nice writeup.

Old cruft doesn't die. Old cruft even gets ported to new platforms.

I installed https://github.com/SecUpwN/Android-IMSI-Catcher-Detector the other day and found a menu entry called "AT command interface", which I shall carefully leave alone.

Yes, the chip (or sub-chip) in your phone that talks to the mobile network is still called a modem, and is still controlled with the AT command set. When you answer a call it sends "ata" (AT Answer) to the modem. It does not pick up AT commands from the data passing through, unlike the old modems.

Careful, it's a great way to still get k-line'd on many networks.

The DCC SEND bug is still pretty common too.

The modem I had fixed this by requiring a 1 second gap after +++ where no bytes were sent before dropping into command mode.

According to legend, the 1-second gap was patent-protected, so that's why not every manufacturer implemented it. Arguably became more of a problem after the Internet since on BBS you were mostly navigating "trusted" menus and I think BBS chat servers would even drop the string.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com