Displaying Fun Things in Telnet

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Telnet is one of the oldest network protocols released in 1969, yet it remains enduringly popular due to its simple implementation and ability to enable various interesting applications.

Some developers have created Nyancat that can be viewed in Telnet terminals, as well as Star Wars animations accessible via Telnet.

To see the ASCII version of Star Wars in your terminal, enter the following command (Windows 7+ users need to enable Telnet Client first via Control Panel > Programs and Features > Turn Windows features on or off):

telnet towel.blinkenlights.nl

To view Nyancat, enter:

telnet nyancat.dakko.us

You can also set up a similar Telnet service on your own server to display custom content. We'll use CMatrix (which shows the digital rain from The Matrix) as an example:

• Log into your Debian server and run:

apt-get install openbsd-inetd telnetd cmatrix

Wait for installation to complete.

• Create /opt/cmatrix.sh with:

#!/bin/sh
cmatrix -abu 2

• Edit /etc/inetd.conf and append:

telnet stream tcp nowait nobody /usr/sbin/tcpd /usr/sbin/in.telnetd -L /opt/cmatrix.sh
telnet stream tcp6 nowait nobody /usr/sbin/tcpd /usr/sbin/in.telnetd -L /opt/cmatrix.sh

• Restart the inetd service:

service inetd restart

Now run telnet «your server address» from your computer to see the digital rain effect.

I've also set this up on my server. Use these commands to see:
Nyancat:

telnet lantian.pub 2001

Digital rain:

telnet lantian.pub 2002