Path: utzoo!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!pdn!tscs!tct!chip
From: chip@tct.uucp (Chip Salzenberg)
Newsgroups: news.software.b
Subject: C News, NFS and mixed CPUs: working
Message-ID: <27DFD553.5FB9@tct.uucp>
Date: 14 Mar 91 19:56:02 GMT
Organization: Teltronics/TCT, Sarasota, FL
Lines: 44

We just got an IBM RS/6000, and it was going relatively unused, so we
decided to move Usenet there.  It turned out to be a little more
complicated than I expected.  I'm sure other people have run into
these problems: what did you do?

RS/6000:
    A partition /news, with NEWSBIN of /news/cbin, NEWSLIB of
    /news/lib, and NEWSCONFIG of /news/lib/bin/config.

SCO UNIX:
    The RS/6000 /news directory is NFS mounted as /u/news.
    NEWSBIN is /u/news/cbin-sco, NEWSLIB is /u/news/lib (shared),
    and NEWSCONFIG is /u/news/lib/bin/config-sco.

C NEWS SEMI-BUG #1:
    Shared NEWSLIB is made difficult by the setnewsids program,
    which is architecture-specific but which lives in NEWSLIB.

PROGRAMMING HACKERY:
    I hacked conf/build and relay/relaynews.c to put "setnewsids"
    in NEWSBIN instead of NEWSLIB, which allowed me to share NEWSLIB.

C NEWS SEMI-BUG #2:
    Remote (client) inews is quite smart, automatically running
    relaynews on the server.  But it has a bug: it assumes that
    the paths on the server are the same as those on the client.

SYMLINK HACKERY:
    On the RS/6000, I created a real directory /u/news to support
    remote requests.  The symlinks are:
        /u/news/lib       -> /news/lib      (expected, probably not needed)
        /u/news/spool     -> /news/spool    (also fine, also unnecessary)
        /u/news/cbin-sco  -> /news/cbin     (KLUDGE ALERT)

REQUEST:
    Perhaps C News installation should put the appropriate commands
    for relaynews (PATH=, etc.) in NEWSLIB/server-inews.  Then all
    clients can run server inews without making path assumptions.

In any case, I have news working now.  Thanks, guys.
-- 
Chip Salzenberg at Teltronics/TCT     <chip@tct.uucp>, <uunet!pdn!tct!chip>
 "Most of my code is written by myself.  That is why so little gets done."
                 -- Herman "HLLs will never fly" Rubin