Newsreader

[Dave @ Stejonda]

[cross-posted & FU set to dist]

demon.ip.supportIn message <[email protected]>, John Glover
<[email protected]> writes

>Unless your a Demon customer you cannot try turnpike free so buying that could be a mistake.

unfortunately still true

> Turnpike can be fiddly and awkward to set up

never really found that to be true

>but once going is pretty solid. Its support newsgroup however seems full of pedants and spends a
>lot of time at war with itself.

I think your latter point was once true but no longer is

--
dave @ stejonda

 

[Dave @ Stejonda]

In message <[email protected]>, Tim Downie
<[email protected]> writes
>Can you get Turnpike as time-limited "trialware" or do you have to cough up before you can even
>look at it? I don't mind paying for software but I'm loath to buy anything "sight unseen".

You can freely install and run Turnpike to have a look at it and read the documentation. However,
without buying a Universal Licence you can only connect through a Demon account. Demon offer a 30
day trial dial-up account <http://www.demon.net/signup/trial/index.shtml>. Many of us wish that
Demon would create a trialware version of TP.

--
dave @ stejonda

 

[Arthur Clune]

Simon Brooke <[email protected]> wrote:

: I'm not familiar with Windows so can't really advise you on Windows news clients. FWIW the
: following news clients are frequently used on this group:

: 000001 968 Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2800.1158
<snip>
: 000020 40 tin/1.4.2-20000205 ("Possession") (UNIX)(Linux/2.4.20-18.9 (i686))

Are these number of articles/newreader? If so, it's a bit skewed since a few very proflic posters
can bump something up, and of course people who use usenet less are much more likely to use either a
web interface or OE.

For starters I suspect that the tin line above is me and me only since that's my exact id string.

Arthur

 

[Geraint Jones]

"Arthur Clune" <[email protected]> wrote: ( Simon Brooke <[email protected]> wrote: ) : I'm not
familiar with Windows so can't really advise you on Windows ( : news clients. FWIW the following
news clients are frequently used on ) : this group: ( ) : 000001 968 Microsoft Outlook Express
6.00.2800.1158 ( <snip> ) : 000020 40 tin/1.4.2-20000205 ("Possession") (UNIX)(Linux/2.4.20-18.9
(i686)) ( ) Are these number of articles/newreader? If so, it's a bit skewed since a ( few very
proflic posters can bump something up, and of course people who ) use usenet less are much more
likely to use either a web interface or ( OE.

Presumably it's only those articles that have User-Agent lines in them.

 

[Toby Barrett]

"<-- Wide Load -->" <apsw07048<NOSPAM>@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote in
news:[email protected]:

> Replies at bottom huh, Think I'd find that useful.!

Oh yes. The best part of that is the automatic trimming. You highlight the part of the message you
want to reply to in the preview window, select "Follow-up to Newsgroup" and it quotes only that part
and puts the cursor on a line below it.

Toby

--
Remove spamtrap to reply by mail

 

[Tenex]

teknohippy wrote:
> Agent can't do multiple emails, full blown outlook is my preffered email client.

Same here but I have OE6 as a newsreader with Outlook and now use Xnews exclusively for
all binaries.

 

[Tenex]

<-- Wide Load --> @blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:
> I'm new to this newsgroup (you can probably tell) and was wondering if any of you can help me.
> Simple question, what is the best newsreader software I should use? Currently using Outlook
> Express 6, but I think I seen on the Internet somewhere that Freeagent is better, is this true or
> should I stick with OE6?
>
> Thanks

It's a horses for courses, YMMV question.

I've recently started using Xnews for binaries - very easy interface and free. Another that looks
good is Gravity - haven't really got into it yet - again freeware. I can't stand the free part of
Agent/Free Agent but it's popular if limited.

 

[Tenex]

Adrian Boliston wrote:
> "<-- Wide Load --> @blueyonder.co.uk>" <apsw07048<nospam> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>
>> I'm new to this newsgroup (you can probably tell) and was wondering if any of you can help me.
>> Simple question, what is the best newsreader software I should use? Currently using Outlook
>> Express 6, but I think I seen on the Internet somewhere that Freeagent is better, is this true or
>> should I stick with OE6?
>
> I tried free agent and hated it!

I've found a kindred soul at last ;-)

 

[Tenex]

<-- Wide Load --> @blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:
> "Toby Barrett" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>> Doesn't have loads of bells and whistles, but is fast and (I've found) reliable. It also
>> automatically positions your replies for bottom-posting, unlike OE.
>
> Replies at bottom huh, Think I'd find that useful.!

Whatever you choose you'll probably run OE6 in parallel at least for a time so get OE-quotefix and
put it in your Windows Startup group - it's free and invaluable.

 

[Simon Brooke]

"Arthur Clune" <[email protected]> writes:

> Simon Brooke <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> : I'm not familiar with Windows so can't really advise you on Windows news clients. FWIW the
> : following news clients are frequently used on this group:
>
> : 000001 968 Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2800.1158
> <snip>
> : 000020 40 tin/1.4.2-20000205 ("Possession") (UNIX)(Linux/2.4.20-18.9 (i686))
>
> Are these number of articles/newreader? If so, it's a bit skewed since a few very proflic posters
> can bump something up, and of course people who use usenet less are much more likely to use either
> a web interface or OE.

Yup, it is. I first wrote the script to count the number of posts per person, and the 'count the
client id strings' functionality got added on later. So as you say it counts the number of posts per
distinct id string, not the number of users per distinct id string (which would of course be
impossible, because of lurkers).

> For starters I suspect that the tin line above is me and me only since that's my exact id string.

Prolly. The Gnus/XEmacs string is almost certainly all me. FWIW the analysis was of 4319 messages
received between 2003-08-26 06:06 and 2003-09-10 11:36

--
[email protected] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

'Victories are not solutions.' ;; John Hume, Northern Irish politician, on Radio Scotland
1/2/95 ;; Nobel Peace Prize laureate 1998; few have deserved it so much

 

[Simon Brooke]

[email protected] (Geraint Jones) writes:

> "Arthur Clune" <[email protected]> wrote: ( Simon Brooke <[email protected]> wrote: ) : I'm not
> familiar with Windows so can't really advise you on Windows ( : news clients. FWIW the following
> news clients are frequently used on ) : this group: ( ) : 000001 968 Microsoft Outlook Express
> 6.00.2800.1158 ( <snip> ) : 000020 40 tin/1.4.2-20000205 ("Possession") (UNIX)(Linux/2.4.20-18.9
> (i686)) ( ) Are these number of articles/newreader? If so, it's a bit skewed since a ( few very
> proflic posters can bump something up, and of course people who ) use usenet less are much more
> likely to use either a web interface or ( OE.
>
> Presumably it's only those articles that have User-Agent lines in them.

Nope:

for header in X-Newsreader User-Agent X-Mailer do grep "^$header:" * |\ sed
"s/^[0-9]*:$header://" >> $tmp/newsreaders$$ done sort $tmp/newsreaders$$ |\ uniq
-c |\ sort -nr |\ awk 'BEGIN { score = 1000000; place = 0; eplace = 0} \ { if ( $1
== score) \ { \ place ++; \ printf( "%6.6d= %s\n", eplace, $0); \ } \ else \ { \
score = $1; \ place ++; \ eplace = place; \ printf( "%6.6d %s\n", place, $0); \ } \
}' |\ head -$a

Yes, I know it's a hack, but it's for interest and amusement only. If anyone wants the whole
script, mail me.

--
[email protected] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

'Victories are not solutions.' ;; John Hume, Northern Irish politician, on Radio Scotland
1/2/95 ;; Nobel Peace Prize laureate 1998; few have deserved it so much

 

[Geraint Jones]

Simon Brooke <[email protected]> wrote: ( [email protected]
(Geraint Jones) writes: ) > Presumably it's only those articles that have User-Agent lines in
them. ( ) Nope: ( ) for header in X-Newsreader User-Agent X-Mailer ( ... ) ( Yes, I know it's a
hack, but ...

OK, so what proportion of posts don't have exactly one of those lines?

 

[Richard Bates]

On Wed, 10 Sep 2003 10:55:32 +0100, "<-- Wide Load -->" <apsw07048<nospam>@blueyonder.co.uk> in
<[email protected]> wrote:

>I'm new to this newsgroup (you can probably tell) and was wondering if any of you can help me.
>Simple question, what is the best newsreader software I

Decision will also depend upon whether you want an offline or online reader.

I used to dislike netscape 'cos it was naff at offline reading over a slow dialup connection.

If you have broadband then the off/online issue is less relevant.

--
Two drums and a cymbal fall over a cliff. Boom boom, Tish. Email address is false. It begins
thus: richard@

 

[Geraint Jones]

Simon Brooke <[email protected]> wrote: ( [email protected]
(Geraint Jones) writes: ) > OK, so what proportion of posts don't have exactly one of those lines? (
... ) -[simon]-> egrep '^(X-Newsreader|User-Agent|X-Mailer):' * | wc -l ( 4265 ) -[simon]-> ls | wc
-l ( 4420 )
( 155posts or 3.5%

Whilst I'm inclined to believe your answer, you only get 5/10 for the method, in case there are
messages with several of those lines.

At least they're not all mine.

 

[Simon Brooke]

[email protected] (Geraint Jones) writes:

> Simon Brooke <[email protected]> wrote: ( [email protected]
> (Geraint Jones) writes: ) > Presumably it's only those articles that have User-Agent lines in
> them. ( ) Nope: ( ) for header in X-Newsreader User-Agent X-Mailer ( ... ) ( Yes, I know it's a
> hack, but ...
>
> OK, so what proportion of posts don't have exactly one of those lines?

-[simon]-> cd /var/spool/news/uk/rec/cycling

-[simon]-> egrep '^(X-Newsreader|User-Agent|X-Mailer):' * | wc -l 4265

-[simon]-> ls | wc -l 4420

155 posts or 3.5%

--
[email protected] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

'Victories are not solutions.' ;; John Hume, Northern Irish politician, on Radio Scotland
1/2/95 ;; Nobel Peace Prize laureate 1998; few have deserved it so much

 

[Trevor Barton]

<-- Wide Load --> <> wrote:
> I'm new to this newsgroup (you can probably tell) and was wondering if any of you can help me.
> Simple question, what is the best newsreader software I should use? Currently using Outlook
> Express 6, but I think I seen on the Internet somewhere that Freeagent is better, is this true or
> should I stick with OE6?

I use "slrn", which is great, fast, text-mode and works a treat. I wouldn't use anything else. Comes
with my operating system distrubution, as well, and it's free.

Dunno if it works on your operating system, though?

Trev

 

[---WideLoad---a]

> I've used Microplanet Gravity for a good few years now and love it. Microplanet don't actually
> develop for it anymore so the last version
> (2.5) is considered Freeware. However, there is a lot of user support out there and new revisions
> are relased quite frequently. Check out:
>
> http://lightning.prohosting.com/~tbates/gravity/
>
> For more details and downloads.
>
> Dene
>
Thanks all, downloaded a few, gravity seems best (for me anyway), very configurable! Much better
than OE6 and a better tool for the job.
--

<--- WIDE LOAD ---

 

[Callas]

[email protected] wrote:
> For starters I suspect that the tin line above is me and me only since that's my exact id string.

Cor, tin. Not used that since my Uni days.

--
Callas

 

[Tim Hall]

On Wed, 10 Sep 2003 11:05:02 GMT, Simon Brooke <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>I'm not familiar with Windows so can't really advise you on Windows news clients. FWIW the
>following news clients are frequently used on this group:
>
>000002 316 [email protected]

Not really a news client, as I'm sure you'll agree.

Have you tried doing a google search using a cycling forums poster as a starting point too? eg, Nora
Lenderby (Mrs) posted the other day. Oh good I thought, lets see what other words of Wisdom Scott
Munn's friend (for it is she) has come up with. Because of the way the cycling forum thing works
(for some values of work) all users also get picked up as something like
"<[email protected]>". Poxy web interfaces.

Tim
--
In space no one can eat ice cream

 

[A]

>Simple question, what is the best newsreader

I always feel insecure with Outlook Express. Thunderbird - the mail/newsreader partner of Mozilla
Firebird - is coming along. See http://www.mozilla.org/projects/thunderbird/index.html My favorite
is still Ameol ("a most excellent off-line reader") which belongs to Cix conferencing, but will work
as a newsreader without a Cix account. Follow links from www.cix.co.uk to
ftp://ftp.cix.co.uk/pub/ameol2/32-bit/a253_32.exe