Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!sundc!hadron!inco!mack From: mack@inco.UUCP (Dave Mack) Newsgroups: news.admin Subject: Re: Patch for inews (was Re: Final action on soc.sex) Message-ID: <2226@inco.UUCP> Date: 14 Apr 88 15:11:48 GMT References: <3720@medusa.cs.purdue.edu> <1988Apr6.171345.3827@sq.uucp> <2216@inco.UUCP> <862@gethen.UUCP> Reply-To: mack@inco.UUCP (Dave Mack) Organization: McDonnell Douglas-INCO, McLean, VA Lines: 140 In article <862@gethen.UUCP> farren@gethen.UUCP (Michael J. Farren) writes: >In article <2216@inco.UUCP> mack@inco.UUCP (Dave Mack) writes: >>This article contains a patch to News 2.11, patchlevel 14, which solves >>both of these problems by allowing sites to transmit articles posted to >>locally nonexistent groups. > >I'm sorry - I don't quite understand what this gains you. This patch is aimed primarily at backbone sites, although I believe that smaller feed sites could benefit from using it. It allows two things: 1) you can pass groups to your downstream sites which, for whatever reason, you don't want to be available locally, and 2) you can reduce the amount of disk space needed to store news. The first item is simply a courtesy to the sites you feed, and if you don't want to pass a group on, you don't have to. The second item is a result of the fact that, like you, many sites expire the junk directory more frequently than the active group directories. Suppose, for example, that you want to feed all of the comp groups to a downstream site, but no one at your site is interested in reading comp.binaries.atari.st. If you add the line comp.binaries.atari.st null to your /usr/lib/news/aliases file and rmgroup the newsgroup, it will be fed to the sites downstream, but the articles will be placed in your junk directory. Of course, things will get a little weird when a checkgroups message comes in, but... > If the >upstream site has decided not to carry a full feed, wouldn't they >be rather leery of installing such a patch? There are many reasons >other than censorship for limiting a feed, you know - I don't carry >soc.all or talk.all because I simply do not have enough disk space >for them. If someone downstream from me tried to make an end-run >around my limitation by using your patch, I can assure you that two >things would happen right away: first, their articles would vanish >into thin air as soon as they hit my machine (I expire junk daily, >and will continue to do so); and second, their status as a feed would >vanish as soon as I caught on to what they were trying to do. There is absolutely no way that installing this patch would allow one of your downstream sites to do an end run. First, if one of your downstream sites installs this patch, it doesn't change anything that happens on your machine. The patch doesn't alter the newsgroups line in the message or anything like that. Second, if you install the patch, it doesn't mean you have to carry anything you don't want to. Unless you insert lines in your aliases file aliasing unlocalized newsgroups to null, the software behaves exactly as it did before. *Only* the newsgroups that the news administrator aliases to null are affected, and then only if they aren't localized. Here's the approximate PDL for the sequence of events in inews when it receives an article: (this is with the patch installed) . . . parse the Newsgroups: line foreach newsgroup do top: if newsgroup is not in the active file then if the newsgroup is not in the buggroup file then if the newsgroup is in the aliases file then if the alias is "null" then add the name NULL:newsgroup to the list of newsgroups in nbuf; continue; else add the name newsgroup to the list of newsgroups in nbuf; endif substitute the alias for the newsgroup name; goto top; else continue; endif else buggroup processing; continue; endif else add the name newsgroup to the list of groups in nbuf; endif endloop if the article isn't posted to a localized or nullified group then put it in junk; else rewrite the Newsgroups line, omitting newsgroups which are neither localized nor aliased to null; endif . . . foreach newsgroup listed in nbuf do if newsgroup is prefixed with "NULL:" then if this is the only name in nbuf then put article in junk; endif else if this is the first name in nbuf then copy the article to the appropriate directory; else make a link in the appropriate directory; endif endif foreach downstream site which accepts this newsgroup do if this article hasn't already been added to the batchfile then append the pathname to the article to the batchfile for this site; endif endloop endloop >If they were courteous enough to call and ask first, they might not >want to put in the patch at all - because it wouldn't do them a bit >of good. >I also have to put in a comment here - the content of alt.sex so far >indicates to me that the backbone sites were quite correct in their >decision. Whatever happened to the newsgroup that was supposed to >have serious talk about sexuality issues? I have to agree that the contents of alt.sex haven't been very substantive, but give it a little time. And of course, if soc.sex had been created, the forum would be open to many more people, and might actually improve in quality. My reason for posting this patch was less an interest in seeing soc.sex created than my annoyance over the rationale given for not creating it. The attitude of the backbone sites (as expressed primarily by Greg Woods) was that, while they were not opposed to having such a group, they couldn't carry it locally, and therefore it wouldn't propagate to the sites they feed. This patch fixes that flaw in the news software. -- Herr Professor Doktor Kent...errr, David Mack, Ph.D., L.L.D, D.M.A A man whose opinions diverge radically from those of the corporation (nameless now forevermore) which pays him to perform rites and rituals beyond the comprehension of mortal man.