Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!samsung!umich!terminator!usenet
From: sjr@mcimail.com (Sander J. Rabinowitz)
Newsgroups: comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d
Subject: NNTP News Reader. Are there any?
Message-ID: <1991Jun23.032610.5867@terminator.cc.umich.edu>
Date: 23 Jun 91 03:26:10 GMT
Sender: usenet@terminator.cc.umich.edu (usenet news)
Reply-To: sjr@mcimail.com
Organization: ---
Lines: 32

Mike O'Connor (mjo@ais.org) on 06/19/91 recently wrote the following in
response to a query by cnolan@mee.tcd.ie:

> Check out sjrNEWS, basically an NNTP news gatherer.  Available for
> anonymous FTP from freebie.engin.umich.edu.

I am the author of the above software, and what Mike says is quite correct.
However, for those of you residing outside of Michigan, I need to add
the following:  sjrNEWS was developed to work specifically with the
Merit/Michnet network.  Given a Merit dialup telephone number, this software
uses Hayes AT commands to hook up to the Merit node.  Once connected,
it issues Merit-specific commands to hook up to a particular NNTP server,
and once it does that, it retrieves articles, sending them to a local
disk file of the user's choosing.

The reason I mention all this is that I don't know if the author of the
original query resides in the Merit/Michnet service area, or if sjrNEWS
will work on a dial-up network other than the one just stated.  However,
both the executable and the Turbo Pascal source code for sjrNEWS is
provided and is released to the public domain, so there's a chance that
it can be adapted to suit the needs of a particular user (either to change
or add features for a Merit user, or to adapt the program for a different
network).

Incidentally, I myself have moved out of the Merit/Michnet service area,
so even I haven't used the program much lately.  8-)  However, I understand
at least one person has written an sjrNEWS enhancement, which is also
available from freebie.engin.umich.edu.

---
Sander J. Rabinowitz | sjr@mcimail.com -or- | Support your local
Brentwood, Tennessee | sjr@raidernet.com    | public Unix system :-)