Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!mailrus!wuarchive!kuhub.cc.ukans.edu!anu-news!list
From: munnari!csc.anu.oz.au!gih900@UUNET.UU.NET (Geoff Huston)
Newsgroups: news.software.anu-news
Subject: RE: OPEN newsgroup is broken in NEWS V5.9
Message-ID: <8911250007.AA02302@uunet.uu.net>
Date: 25 Nov 89 15:57:50 GMT
Sender: ANU-NEWS Discussion <ANU-NEWS@NDSUVM1.BITNET>
Reply-To: Geoff Huston <munnari!csc.anu.oz.au!gih900@UUNET.UU.NET>
Lines: 44

>This is a bug report about the behavior of the OPEN command in NEWS V5.9A.  I
>built this from sources obtained from Bob Sloane.  I got the base sources from
>Bob then applied the DIFF/SLP files supplied by Geoff, then built NEWS.
     
>The Problem:
>
> OPEN <some_newsgroup> does not open the desired news group
     
>When an OPEN command is parsed a check is made for the value of the command
>line object NEWSGROUP, to see if the desired news group is the pseudo group
>"MAIL".  If it is all goes well.  If the value of the NEWSGROUP command line
>object (actually Parameter 1) is not MAIL and there is no class then the logic
>drops into do_selgrp, which then drops into do_select.  do_select checks if a
>parameter has been passed, and if not checks for the command line object
>NEWSGROUP (again).  This check returns CLI$_ABSENT.  It appears that one cannot
>"reparse" a command line object once it has been parsed the first time.
>Because of this the OPEN command acts as though no newsgroup value has been
>passed.
     
     
This is NOT fixed in the 5.9B patches posted out yesterday - BUT will be fixed
in the 5.9C release. I have located and fixed the problem:
     
NEWSSELECT.C :
     
do_openit()
{
  char s[80];
  short s_l;
  $DESCRIPTOR(s_d,s);
     
  if (cli$get_value(c$dsc("NEWSGROUP"),&s_d,&s_l) & 1) {
    s[s_l] = '\0';
    s_to_lower(s);
    if (!strcmp(s,"mail")) return(do_open_mail());
    if (do_select(s,0,2)) selgrp_action();
    return(0);
    }
  if (cli$present(c$dsc("CLASSNAME")) & 1) return(do_set_class());
  return(do_selgrp());
}
     
     
Geoff Huston