Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!olivea!olivey!jerry
From: jerry@olivey.olivetti.com (Jerry Aguirre)
Newsgroups: news.software.b
Subject: Re: What is NNTP?
Message-ID: <50326@olivea.atc.olivetti.com>
Date: 7 Feb 91 05:00:11 GMT
References: <187@numenor.gtephx.UUCP> <1991Feb6.223942.13388@zoo.toronto.edu>
Sender: news@olivea.atc.olivetti.com
Organization: Olivetti ATC; Cupertino, CA
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In article <1991Feb6.223942.13388@zoo.toronto.edu> henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes:
>high speeds, rather than autodialing modems and phone calls.  If all
>your connections to the outside world go via UUCP, NNTP is probably of
>no interest to you.

Recent discussion about NNTP transmission of news has pushed its other
function out of the mainstream of discussion.  I was using NNTP a long
time before I ever had an internet connection.  NNTP can also be used
for remote reading of news. 

If one has a LAN with users spread out on several hosts then it may make
sense to run NNTP on one server and use NNTP modified versions of
the news readers on the other systems.  In this way the overhead of
processing and storing is only on a single system.  If the LAN suppors
access to remote file systems (NFS and others) then that is also an
alternative though even with NFS NNTP is useful for handling posting.

When I first started running news I installed it on 5 systems and they
fed each other via UUCP over RS-232 cables.  Of course back then the
storage for 2 weeks of news wasn't what it is today but the effort to
maintain all those systems was a real pain.

				Jerry Aguirre