Bisharat's QuickTopic Message Boards

In September 2001 I received a question about support for the Hausa language on computers and the internet. As part of my response I set up a message board using the QuickTopic service called "Hausa charsets & keyboards." Over the course of the next several years I set up similar forums in response to other questions, which are listed below in alphabetical order (my posts are under the name of "BisharatNet").

In 2013 I closed all but the Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba boards to new contributions due to recurrent problems with spam with some, and non-activity on others. The Igbo board was subsequently closed in 2018, at which time I copied the whole board message history. In December 2021, QuickTopic itself was closed. Links below are to archived versions of the first page of each forum. Unfortunately, the earlier content was not preserved in archiving:

• Ghanaian languages & ICT (closed, 2013)
• Hausa charsets & keyboards
• Ibibio, Efik, Anaang & ICT (fonts, keyboards & applications) (closed, 2013)
• Igbo language & ICT (fonts, keyboards & applications) [ PDF of board message history ] (closed, 2018)
• Langues Béninoises et les NTIC (closed, 2013)
• Langues Burkinabè et les NTIC (closed, 2013)
• Langues Sénégalaises et les NTIC (closed, 2013)
• Swahili Advanced Computer Applications (SACA) (closed, 2013)
• Langues Togolaises et les NTIC (closed, 2013)
• Yoruba language & ICT (fonts, keyboards & applications)

Although these were technically electronic bulletin-board style forums, they also had a subscription feature.

These QT boards had varying success - some having been used heavily, and others very little. Unfortunately, a lot of interesting traffic has been lost, especially for the Hausa and Yoruba boards, which were among the most active.

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