Newsgroup newbie wants a good newsgroup app.

  • Thread starter Thread starter Neowulf
  • Start date Start date
N

Neowulf

Allright, I've tried Outlook Explorer, Agent Newsreader, and xNews. They all
look pretty much the same and, sooner or later, the older newsgroup posting
vanish when I try to get new headers.

I want to read the old threads, darn it! !$%@#&(&#!!!11!! Excuse my French.

Please point me towards something that doesn't look like 80's technology. Or
tell me I'm stupid and not using the programs correctly. Either way--my ego
can take it.


Aaron
(e-mail address removed)
(e-mail address removed) (soon)
www.neowulf.net (soon)
 
Neowulf said:
Allright, I've tried Outlook Explorer, Agent Newsreader, and xNews. They all
look pretty much the same and, sooner or later, the older newsgroup posting
vanish when I try to get new headers.

I want to read the old threads, darn it! !$%@#&(&#!!!11!! Excuse my French.

Please point me towards something that doesn't look like 80's technology. Or
tell me I'm stupid and not using the programs correctly. Either way--my ego
can take it.
Click to expand...

Although I've never used it you might try the Google. Just go to Google and
click on the GROUPS link near the top of the page.
 
Ceg said:
Although I've never used it you might try the Google. Just go to
Google and click on the GROUPS link near the top of the page.
Click to expand...

Well I use OE and Agent both and you can save the posts you like; heck if
you have enough disk you can save them all. :D
 
Neowulf said:
Well, I appreciate the suggestion. It'll probably do the trick; I
thought I wanted to browse old threads, but now I see how much of
a headache that can be! It kinda makes me appreciate these
newsgroup reader apps.

I suspect that I'm my own worst enemy in this case. I think I've
been inadvertently clicking "Catch Up" when I DO NOT want to catch
up--I just want to see the newer posts, as well as the ones I
already had.
Click to expand...

news.software.readers or alt.usenet.offline-reader.forte-agent
might be groups to check out also for further Q & A.

Please bottom post.
Still, I'd like a nice, skinnable newsreader that can save,
categorize, and compress the old threads, rather than pitch them
when you select "catch up." Maybe I'll make it myself...as I have
the health for it... Hmm, yeah... :-]
Click to expand...
[snip]
 
Well, if you like rubbing salt in open wounds then you'll like this. It's
about as fun as scraping fingernails down a chalkboard. If you're using OE
you can right-click on the newsgroup name and select properties. On that
window you can hilite and copy the path to where the newsgroup is stored on
your hard drive. Paste it into something like NotePad so you can see the
full path. With that info you can set up a batch file to call up your
favorite zip program to go zip that dbx and tuck it away into an archive
collecting folder. If you're good with batch files you can set it to
process according to the day of the week or some such other criteria.

Neowulf said:
Well, I appreciate the suggestion. It'll probably do the trick; I thought I
wanted to browse old threads, but now I see how much of a headache that can
be! It kinda makes me appreciate these newsgroup reader apps.

I suspect that I'm my own worst enemy in this case. I think I've been
inadvertently clicking "Catch Up" when I DO NOT want to catch up--I just
want to see the newer posts, as well as the ones I already had.

Still, I'd like a nice, skinnable newsreader that can save, categorize, and
compress the old threads, rather than pitch them when you select "catch up."
Maybe I'll make it myself...as I have the health for it... Hmm, yeah... :-]


Aaron

Ceg said:
They
all technology. way--my
ego

Although I've never used it you might try the Google. Just go to Google and
click on the GROUPS link near the top of the page.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Allright, I've tried Outlook Explorer, Agent Newsreader, and xNews.
They all look pretty much the same and, sooner or later, the older
newsgroup posting vanish when I try to get new headers.
Click to expand...

In Xnews, the headers do not vanish unless you a)read them or b)push F8
(catchup.)

You can choose to mark all headers and posts "unread" by selecting them and
using the pulldown.

One thing you may not understand is that posts do not stay on servers
forever. Servers have different decay rates, but at some point all posts
eventually expire.
 
Ceg said:
Although I've never used it you might try the Google. Just go to Google and
click on the GROUPS link near the top of the page.
Click to expand...

I'd second that suggestion. You can do that to see all the various news
groups, and even search for specific message subjects you might want to
read. I've found posts going all the way back to 1999!

*** Reply to (e-mail address removed) (Formerly Rancherjim) ***
 
First of all, I've learned two things since initially posting: (1) a bit
more about how to use xNews, and (2) there is a newsreader called
Selida, and it looks kinda cool. It may not be skinnable, but oh well;
I'll d/l it and give it a try.
In Xnews, the headers do not vanish unless you a)read them or b)push
F8 (catchup.)
Click to expand...

Which is probably what I did, at some point. I think the only bug in the
software is that a human is using it at 2AM. :]
You can choose to mark all headers and posts "unread" by selecting
them and using the pulldown.
Click to expand...

Also, in the last hour and a half I figured out that thing Onno Tasler
mentioned about setting purge to 0.
One thing you may not understand is that posts do not stay on servers
forever. Servers have different decay rates, but at some point all
posts eventually expire.
Click to expand...

That's life.



Aaron
(e-mail address removed)
 
I'll third that. got to www.google.com and click on groups and decide the
one you want to read. I'm not about to go through that cration of a batch
file, saving to zip, etc. Although those are good instructions for that
method of doing what google can do quicker. Also, who want milllions of
threads? You may think of google as a library in terms of ng threads. One
poster on one group stated he/she downloaded something like 60,000 messages!
WOW! 300 is max for me and sometimes I even reduc that. But google is the
way to o to read old threads.

Helen
 
The voice of "donut" drifted in on the cyber-winds,
from the sea of virtual chaos...

They also don't vanish if your using Headers storage.
But inevitably...
One thing you may not understand is that posts do not stay on
servers forever. Servers have different decay rates, but at some
point all posts eventually expire.
Click to expand...

And thus the need for a better news server. For newsgroups in general
use an RFN server (wwwreadfreenews.net) with the groups.ini setting
"PostTo=ISP", where ISP is you main posting server alias. At 160 days
retention RFN can't be beat. Some groups also have dedicated servers
that have the group archived back several years or more. These are
quite useful at times as well.
 
Really? I haven't seen that. I wonder if it's google or is it due to
cross-posting? Just wondering.

Helen
 
Helen said:
Really? I haven't seen that. I wonder if it's google or is it due to
cross-posting? Just wondering.
Click to expand...

It seems to have to do with the age of the original posts. The times I've
seen it, the most recent post was from 1998.

You have to do some very specific searches to find any such thing, which I
did.

I was looking for game play info for an older video game.
 
Allright, I've tried Outlook Explorer, Agent Newsreader, and xNews. They all
look pretty much the same and, sooner or later, the older newsgroup posting
vanish when I try to get new headers.
Click to expand...
I want to read the old threads, darn it! !$%@#&(&#!!!11!! Excuse my French.
Click to expand...
Please point me towards something that doesn't look like 80's technology. Or
tell me I'm stupid and not using the programs correctly. Either way--my ego
can take it.
Click to expand...

All you need is a newsreader that allows you to save posts
indefinitely. I have posts in all newsgroups I read going back many
years. As for the interface Dialog is pretty UTD. It is currently
finishing it's beta testing but will remain freeware after it's final
release.

http://www.40tude.com/dialog/history.htm

Regards, John.

--
****************************************************
,-._|\ (A.C.F FAQ) http://clients.net2000.com.au/~johnf/faq.html
/ Oz \ John Fitzsimons - Melbourne, Australia.
\_,--.x/ http://www.aspects.org.au/index.htm
v http://clients.net2000.com.au/~johnf/
 
Sweet said:
[snip]
Just wanted to say, I love the username 'donut'

Cool. ;)

--
Andy


email: sweetandylicious at eml dot cc
Click to expand...
Click to expand...

It is one word isn't it? LOL. Just kidding as I think of it being
hyphenated. BTW, with OE Quotefix you see the little smiley faces or
blue ones crying if you us a semi-colon and a left parenthesis. ;(

;)
Helen
 
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