Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!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: Checkgroup MODERATOR question. Message-ID: <9001151046.AA11170@uunet.uu.net> Date: 16 Jan 90 02:30:30 GMT Sender: ANU-NEWS Discussion Reply-To: Geoff Huston Lines: 40 > -- Those "random" REJECT messages that I was getting were due to the >fact that I forgot to list "usa" and "na" in my news.sys file. I >don't know why I never noticed that before. I guess I'm blind. >Actually, I guess it comes from running NEWS only locally for a year >before connecting to the outside world. It's always a source of confusion that the Distribution: filters and the newsgroup filters are the SAME set! - this is a Unix B News "feature" that I copied in VMS for lack of anything better to do. I note from mail from David Morrison that C NEWS supports a different configuration file which contains the distribution keywords (in the same basic format) as the sys file. I am testing out a change to NEWS which allows an optional file NEWS.SYSD which contains only the distribution filters for the local and adjacent nodes. I have made it optional to ensure that the current configs will continue to work correctly without alteration. >The question: Checkgroups is great but doesn't automatically set WHO >the moderator is (just that a group IS moderated). Any way to >automatically set that? In the MAILPATHS skeleton file is a copy of a periodic USENET posting describing the role of the "backbone" mailers - read this file - the information in it IS important to correctly set up moderated newsgroups. In general every individual site does NOT have to maintain a current moderator mail address list (and indeed there is no feasible automatic way in which this can be done, as there is no Control: mechanism describing moderator's mail addresses). The general approach is to look at this posting, and determine the "closest" backbone mailer, and set the mailpaths file appropriately. In my case the closest mailer is in Melbourne, and my MAILPATHS file is as follows: backbone %s@munnari.oz i.e. as I have NO LOCAL moderated newsgroups, all moderated newsgroups are therefore accessible via the closest backbone mailer. Geoff Huston