News server question

Sheldon Brown said:

I schlep

You should only schlep schmattes, not your notebook!

Why don't you use: groups.google.nlgroupsOpen ↗
8&group=rec.bicycles.tech

Greets, Derk

Sheldon Brown said:

Is there a reasonably priced News server I could subscribe
to that would offer a good choices of Newsgroups, and
would allow me to use the same passwords/logins regardless
of how I was connected?

Take a look at news.individual.netnews.individual.netOpen ↗

Its what I use and its free, carries rec.bicycles.tech

Sheldon Brown said:

Is there a reasonably priced News server I could subscribe
to that would offer a good choices of Newsgroups, and would
allow me to use the same passwords/logins regardless of how
I was connected?

Better, there is a free one-

news.individual.netnews.individual.netOpen ↗

Pretty complete if you are willing to forego binaries. Fast-
picks up new posts quickly. Highly recommended.

"Sheldon Brown" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...
| Sorry to be O.T. but this is the main group I use, and I
| feel entitled to ask a question for a change.
|
| I schlep my Ti Powerbook back and forth all the time. At
| home I have Comcast cable; at the shop I have a DSL
| connection. When I'm out of town I use Earthlink dialup or
| sometimes various hotel based isps.
|
| The problem is that each of these has its own News server,
| and I have to shut down Netscape and re-start it using a
| different profile every time I move from one connection to
| another. This gets me into different history files and
| newsgroup subscriptions, and is generally a P.I.T.A.
|
| Is there a reasonably priced News server I could subscribe
| to that would offer a good choices of Newsgroups, and
| would allow me to use the same passwords/logins regardless
| of how I was connected?
|
| I very much like the Netscape News software, and want to
| continue to use
it.
|
| Sheldon "No News Is Bad News" Brown

Try either of the two *free* newsgroup servers below:

eagle.america.net

news.america.net

I've been using these servers for years (initially because
it made it easier to change ISP's without having to
resubscribe using to a new newsgroup server, and now because
my current ISP does not have a newsgroup server) and I've
never had any problems with either one.

Jean

"Derk" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Sheldon Brown said:

I schlep

You should only schlep schmattes, not your notebook!

Why don't you use: groups.google.nlgroupsOpen ↗
8&group=rec.bicycles.tech

Because he said "I very much like the Netscape News
software, and want to continue to use it."

I'd recommend www.teranews.com.

Greg

Sheldon Brown said:

Sorry to be O.T. but this is the main group I use, and I
feel entitled to ask a question for a change.

I schlep my Ti Powerbook back and forth all the time. At
home I have Comcast cable; at the shop I have a DSL
connection. When I'm out of town I use Earthlink dialup or
sometimes various hotel based isps.

The problem is that each of these has its own News server,
and I have to shut down Netscape and re-start it using a
different profile every time I move from one connection to
another. This gets me into different history files and
newsgroup subscriptions, and is generally a P.I.T.A.

Quoted message said:

I very much like the Netscape News software, and want to
continue to use it.

I've had the same problem.

I'm not intimately familiar with the latest Netscape
newsreader, but you might be able to get all those profiles
to use a common .newsrc file. Many newsreaders will. Try
asking this particular question on a Netscape or Mozilla
newsgroup. It's the easy/cheap solution, if it will work.

Quoted message said:

Is there a reasonably priced News server I could subscribe
to that would offer a good choices of Newsgroups, and
would allow me to use the same passwords/logins regardless
of how I was connected?

Here's a page with a bunch of these services listed:

newsrover.comservice.htmOpen ↗

Unfortunately, most seem to have doubled their prices for
their cheapest plans, from $5 to $10 per month. There are
still a few cheap ones though. You could try Teranews, which
has a "free" plan with a nominal setup fee. I never had much
luck with free news servers. They come and go like the four
winds. Once they get discovered they start to suck really
badly, as the [censored]/warez/mp3 crowd hops on.

Good luck in your search, but try the software
solution first.

Matt O.

Sheldon Brown said:

Is there a reasonably priced News server I could subscribe
to that would offer a good choices of Newsgroups, and
would allow me to use the same passwords/logins regardless
of how I was connected?

I very much like the Netscape News software, and want to
continue to use
it.

Sheldon "No News Is Bad News" Brown

If text is all you are after, I would suggest
news.individual.net, as several others already have. What
they didn't mention is that you will need to sign up, and
wait for them to issue you an account, which can take
several days. There are many free or open servers out there,
but individual is one of the very best, they carry a wide
variety of groups, have good retention, and progagation is
almost instant. I remember one of the major providers
offering unlimited text access after a one-time signup fee,
but can't recall which one it was.

Sheldon Brown said:

I schlep my Ti Powerbook back and forth all the time. At
home I have Comcast cable; at the shop I have a DSL
connection. When I'm out of town I use Earthlink dialup or
sometimes various hotel based isps.

Quoted message said:

The problem is that each of these has its own News server,
and I have to shut down Netscape and re-start it using a
different profile every time I move from one connection to
another. This gets me into different history files and
newsgroup subscriptions, and is generally a P.I.T.A.

Quoted message said:

Is there a reasonably priced News server I could subscribe
to that would offer a good choices of Newsgroups, and
would allow me to use the same passwords/logins regardless
of how I was connected?

Quoted message said:

I very much like the Netscape News software, and want to
continue to use it.

Don't bother with another server; even a different server (I
use giganews) would have the same issues unless you used the
provider's web-based reader.

In Mozilla 1.6 and Netscape 7.x you can set the newsrc file
location in the "Server Settings" under the properties for
the news server. This file contains your subscribed groups
and article history and has a defacto standard format.
Almost all the original text-based readers (like tin, pine,
mut, etc) and more modern readers like Agent can share the
same .newsrc file.

In Netscape/Mozilla, this is set by default to a file in
your profile directory. Hence, when you change profiles, you
change newsrc file. Simply point both your profiles to the
same file.

Mikey

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----

In article <[email hidden]>,

Quoted message said:

Sheldon Brown said:

I schlep my Ti Powerbook back and forth all the time. At
home I have Comcast cable; at the shop I have a DSL
connection. When I'm out of town I use Earthlink dialup
or sometimes various hotel based isps.

Quoted message said:

The problem is that each of these has its own News
server, and I have to shut down Netscape and re-start it
using a different profile every time I move from one
connection to another. This gets me into different
history files and newsgroup subscriptions, and is
generally a P.I.T.A.

Quoted message said:

Is there a reasonably priced News server I could
subscribe to that would offer a good choices of
Newsgroups, and would allow me to use the same
passwords/logins regardless of how I was connected?

Quoted message said:

I very much like the Netscape News software, and want to
continue to use it.

Don't bother with another server; even a different server
(I use giganews) would have the same issues unless you used
the provider's web-based reader.

In Mozilla 1.6 and Netscape 7.x you can set the newsrc file
location in the "Server Settings" under the properties for
the news server. This file contains your subscribed groups
and article history and has a defacto standard format.
Almost all the original text-based readers (like tin, pine,
mut, etc) and more modern readers like Agent can share the
same .newsrc file.

In Netscape/Mozilla, this is set by default to a file in
your profile directory. Hence, when you change profiles,
you change newsrc file. Simply point both your profiles to
the same file.

_ I think you have this exactly backwards. While an article
ID is unique across USENET, the message id numbers that NNTP
uses are unique to each server. Newsrc files contain message
id numbers, not article numbers.

_ Booker C. Bense

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Quoted message said:

_ I think you have this exactly backwards. While an
article ID is unique across USENET, the message id numbers
that NNTP uses are unique to each server. Newsrc files
contain message id numbers, not article numbers.

New topic from OP's question: ever since some guy
"impersonated" me a few days ago (either here or on .misc --
only one post AFAIK), my server started dropping posts like
crazy. (I think Chris B. may have busted him, but not sure.)

Just a coincidence?

(I just changed the little spam-defeater in my addy just in
case; hope it works as well as previous one.)

Bill "paranoid poster?" S.

Quoted message said:

Sheldon Brown said:

I schlep my Ti Powerbook back and forth all the time. At
home I have Comcast cable; at the shop I have a DSL
connection. When I'm out of town I use Earthlink dialup or
sometimes various hotel based isps.

Quoted message said:

The problem is that each of these has its own News server,
and I have to shut down Netscape and re-start it using a
different profile every time I move from one connection to
another. This gets me into different history files and
newsgroup subscriptions, and is generally a P.I.T.A.

Quoted message said:

Is there a reasonably priced News server I could subscribe
to that would offer a good choices of Newsgroups, and
would allow me to use the same passwords/logins regardless
of how I was connected?

Quoted message said:

I very much like the Netscape News software, and want to
continue to use it.

Don't bother with another server; even a different server
(I use giganews) would have the same issues unless you
used the provider's web-based reader.

In Mozilla 1.6 and Netscape 7.x you can set the newsrc
file location in the "Server Settings" under the
properties for the news server. This file contains your
subscribed groups and article history and has a defacto
standard format. Almost all the original text-based
readers (like tin, pine, mut, etc) and more modern readers
like Agent can share the same .newsrc file.

In Netscape/Mozilla, this is set by default to a file in
your profile directory. Hence, when you change profiles,
you change newsrc file. Simply point both your profiles to
the same file.

I think he wants an even simpler soulution of not having to
change profiles. There are enough free or extremely cheap
news servers out there that I think Mr Brown will attain
his goal of just using one in the future. And more than
likely his new server will be better than one of the ISP
provided ones.

Greg

On Tue, 20 Apr 2004 11:26:09 -0400, Sheldon Brown

may have said:

Is there a reasonably priced News server I could subscribe
to that would offer a good choices of Newsgroups, and would
allow me to use the same passwords/logins regardless of how
I was connected?

Huh? Configure your newsreader to login with an ID and
password regardless of where you're connected, and it should
not care about that. Some hotel broadband nets block port 25
to keep spammers from using them as access points, but I
haven't run into one yet that keeps me from using my usual
nntp host...and your existing Earthlink account should give
you access to news.earthlink.net from *anywhere*. (But their
retention stinks.)

If you want a third-party news server for other reasons,
it's hard to beat Easynews for retention times and server
response speeds.

--
My email address is antispammed; pull WEEDS if replying via e-mail.
Typoes are not a bug, they're a feature.
Words processed in a facility that contains nuts.

Sheldon Brown said:

Sorry to be O.T. but this is the main group I use, and I
feel entitled to ask a question for a change.

I schlep my Ti Powerbook back and forth all the time. At
home I have Comcast cable; at the shop I have a DSL
connection. When I'm out of town I use Earthlink dialup or
sometimes various hotel based isps.

The problem is that each of these has its own News server,
and I have to shut down Netscape and re-start it using a
different profile every time I move from one connection to
another. This gets me into different history files and
newsgroup subscriptions, and is generally a P.I.T.A.

I've taken to using a private newsserver to alleviate
problems. This solution is (probably) not the one you want
to take. But I'll describe it anyway.

Basically I run the leafnode server on my home computer. I
run a cronjob to pull down new posts and post my articles.
Since everything is run on the local computer, it's all very
very fast. You would setup authentication on it so noone
else could use it and just connect to it anytime you wanted
to read newsgroups.

This pre-supposes you have
1. A networked (probably unix) computer at home you leave
on.
2. sufficient round 'tuits to get it setup.

Quoted message said:

I very much like the Netscape News software, and want to
continue to use it.

Bah! tin forever!

😉

--
Dane Jackson - z u v e m b i @ u n i x b i g o t s . o r g

-Aldous Huxley

Werehatrack said:

Huh? Configure your newsreader to login with an ID and
password regardless of where you're connected, and it
should not care about that. Some hotel broadband nets
block port 25 to keep spammers from using them as access
points, but I haven't run into one yet that keeps me from
using my usual nntp host...and your existing Earthlink
account should give you access to news.earthlink.net from
*anywhere*. (But their retention stinks.)

I don't know about Earthlink, but most ISPs won't let you
connect to their NNTP or SMTP servers from outside their
own network.

Matt O.

Werehatrack said:

On Tue, 20 Apr 2004 11:26:09 -0400, Sheldon Brown

may have said:

Is there a reasonably priced News server I could subscribe
to that would offer a good choices of Newsgroups, and
would allow me to use the same passwords/logins regardless
of how I was connected?

Huh? Configure your newsreader to login with an ID and
password regardless of where you're connected, and it
should not care about that.

Some ISPs allow access to their news servers only for
clients on their subnets, with no authentication. Once
you're outside of their network, no access.

Greg

On Tue, 20 Apr 2004 16:39:07 +0100, "MSeries" <[email hidden]> wrote:

<Sheldon Brown wrote: < <> Is there a reasonably priced News
server I could subscribe to that <> would offer a good
choices of Newsgroups, and would allow me to use <> the same
passwords/logins regardless of how I was connected? < <
<Take a look at news.individual.netnews.individual.netOpen ↗ < <Its what I
use and its free, carries rec.bicycles.tech < < <

Correct answer 8-)

Werehatrack said:

Huh? Configure your newsreader to login with an ID and
password regardless of where you're connected, and it
should not care about that. Some hotel broadband nets
block port 25 to keep spammers from using them as access
points, but I haven't run into one yet that keeps me from
using my usual nntp host...and your existing Earthlink
account should give you access to news.earthlink.net from
*anywhere*. (But their retention stinks.)

Alas, Comcast uses a partially disabled Giganews account
that only allows access from within Comcast (and probably
only within a certain region).

Quoted message said:

If you want a third-party news server for other reasons,
it's hard to beat Easynews for retention times and server
response speeds.

I'll second (or third, or fifth) the recommendation for
news.individual.net. Alternatively, Capt. Bike might double-
pay Giganews (once through Comcast, once directly) so he
could access Giganews from anywhere.

If you have a (almost) always-on connection at home, you
might also consider running an ssh daemon on that, and port-
forwarding news access through the home box via ssh (or
openssh). A bit slower than direct access, since Comcast
drastically limits uplink speeds, but it does work, and
doesn't require additional changes.

Pat
--
Apologies to those easily confused. Address is spam-
resistant. Correct email address like pdlamb 'round-about
comcast point net.

Patrick Lamb said:

Alas, Comcast uses a partially disabled Giganews account
that only allows access from within Comcast (and probably
only within a certain region).

I imagine that is fairly common. My U server does the same
thing. In fact, it only allows access from a *.lehigh.edu
computer, which is a pain. For a while I ran a forwarding
account through my office machine, but have since decided to
just use comcast from the home machine, remotely displaying
the newsreader (with X windows this is trivial) if I have to
see it from somewhere else.

--

David L. Johnson

__o | The trouble with the rat race is that even if
you win you're _`\(,_ | still a rat. --Lilly Tomlin
(_)/ (_) |

Dane Jackson said:

Bah! tin forever!

😉

Good lord, Sheldon. You've managed to rile up the *nix
zealots. God help us all now! ;-)