bill@unixland.uucp (Bill Heiser) (05/19/91)
I'm trying to debug what should be a pretty simply Cnews sys file.
Enclosed are the relevant parts with the names changed to protect the
innnocent :-)
-----------
ME:all
downstream:to.downstream,news.announce,fido,alt.kids-talk,alt.msdos.programmer,\
comp.ai,comp.ai.neural-nets,comp.lang.c,comp.org.eff,\
comp.os.msdos.programmer,rec.games.frp,rec.mag.otherrealms:f:
mainfeed/mainfeed.com:all,!fido/all,!to.downstream,!local/all:L:
------------
The problem I'm having is this: When I post something to a group that
site "downstream" gets (or is supposed to get), he doesn't ever get it.
Instead, it goes to site 'mainfeed' (my main news feed site). For example,
if I post to fido.test (ficticious group), it doesn't go to downstream,
but goes to mainfeed, even though I (think) I have it explicitly excluded
from that site.
What am I doing wrong? I bet this is something simple I'm overlooking.
Thanks in advance.
Bill
p.s. The downstream site is also getting miscellaneous stuff that he
shouldn't be getting, stuff that comes in from mainfeed that downstream
hasn't asked for!
--
bill@unixland.uucp The Think_Tank BBS & Public Access Unix
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508-655-3848 (2400) 508-651-8723 (9600-HST) 508-651-8733 (9600-PEP-V32)henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) (05/19/91)
In article <1991May19.014130.25630@unixland.uucp> bill@unixland.uucp (Bill Heiser) writes: >----------- >ME:all > >downstream:to.downstream,news.announce,fido,alt.kids-talk,alt.msdos.programmer,\ >comp.ai,comp.ai.neural-nets,comp.lang.c,comp.org.eff,\ >comp.os.msdos.programmer,rec.games.frp,rec.mag.otherrealms:f: > >mainfeed/mainfeed.com:all,!fido/all,!to.downstream,!local/all:L: >------------ We have three separate misunderstandings here. First, you need a "/all" on the end of the second field in the "downstream" line. Second, there can be only one slash in that field; your "mainfeed" line is nonsense. Third, "local" is not a magic word to C News. Please read news(5) instead of trying to wing it. -- And the bean-counter replied, | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology "beans are more important". | henry@zoo.toronto.edu utzoo!henry
bill@unixland.uucp (Bill Heiser) (05/24/91)
In article <1991May19.023101.29200@zoo.toronto.edu> henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes: > >We have three separate misunderstandings here. First, you need a "/all" on >the end of the second field in the "downstream" line. Second, there can >be only one slash in that field; your "mainfeed" line is nonsense. Third, >"local" is not a magic word to C News. > >Please read news(5) instead of trying to wing it. Thanks for setting me straight. The reason I was "trying to wing it" as you say, is that I don't have a good way to read the troff-format documentation. Those of use running on systems without text processing packages have a real time of it when it comes to decyphering formatting characters and text from these documents. Sure, I could hand-carry (or mail) the stuff to work, and print it there, but that'd be unethical :-) You guys did well by putting lots of documentation with CNEWS, but unfortunately not all of us have the appropriate facilities for reading it. -- bill@unixland.uucp The Think_Tank BBS & Public Access Unix ...!uunet!think!unixland!bill ..!{uunet,bloom-beacon,esegue}!world!unixland!bill 508-655-3848 (2400) 508-651-8723 (9600-HST) 508-651-8733 (9600-PEP-V32)
jbuck@forney.berkeley.edu (Joe Buck) (05/24/91)
In article <1991May23.221143.8781@unixland.uucp>, bill@unixland.uucp (Bill Heiser) writes: > You guys did well by putting lots of documentation with CNEWS, but > unfortunately not all of us have the appropriate facilities for reading > it. But you do; there are several alternatives for troff-like document preparation without AT&T-supplied troff or nroff. First, there's awk, the Amazingly Workable Formatter, written by Henry Spencer, and available for anonymous FTP from cs.toronto.edu. Grab pub/awf.shar.Z. It's actually written in awk! It implements a subset of nroff, the -man macros, and the -ms macros. If you want a more serious package, there's groff from the Free Software Foundation. You need a C++ compiler to make this work, but the FSF supplies this too. groff (including tbl, eqn, pic, etc) is a much more complete emulation of nroff/troff. Curses on AT&T for unbundling the "Documenter's Workbench" to make extra money. -- Joe Buck jbuck@galileo.berkeley.edu {uunet,ucbvax}!galileo.berkeley.edu!jbuck
geoff@world.std.com (Geoff Collyer) (05/24/91)
Bill Heiser: >The reason I was "trying to wing it" as you say, is that I don't have a >good way to read the troff-format documentation. Those of use running on >systems without text processing packages have a real time of it when it >comes to decyphering formatting characters and text from these documents. That's no excuse! :-) Get Henry's mini-nroff, awf, from your local comp.sources.unix archive (e.g. uunet!~/comp.sources.unix/volume23/awf.Z) and use it. If you don't have an awk (which awf needs), get gawk from the same place (e.g. uunet!~/comp.sources.unix/volume22/gawk2.11/*). If you don't have an nroff, an awk, or a C compiler, you aren't going to be able to run C News, at least as we distribute it, sorry. There is no longer any reason to suffer without documentation, even on System V. -- Geoff Collyer world.std.com!geoff, uunet.uu.net!geoff
bill@unixland.uucp (Bill Heiser) (05/24/91)
In article <1991May23.235532.25748@world.std.com> geoff@world.std.com (Geoff Collyer) writes: > >That's no excuse! :-) Get Henry's mini-nroff, awf, from your local >comp.sources.unix archive (e.g. uunet!~/comp.sources.unix/volume23/awf.Z) I tried awf a while back and had problems with it (I don't remember exactly what the problem was, except that it didn't work on the file i was trying to read). I'll grab another copy and try again (but of course this isnt' the place for me to discuss it :-) -- bill@unixland.uucp The Think_Tank BBS & Public Access Unix ...!uunet!think!unixland!bill ..!{uunet,bloom-beacon,esegue}!world!unixland!bill 508-655-3848 (2400) 508-651-8723 (9600-HST) 508-651-8733 (9600-PEP-V32)
ronald@robobar.co.uk (Ronald S H Khoo) (05/24/91)
geoff@world.std.com (Geoff Collyer) writes: > That's no excuse! :-) Get Henry's mini-nroff, awf, from your local > comp.sources.unix archive (e.g. uunet!~/comp.sources.unix/volume23/awf.Z) > and use it. And before MS-DOS users (we know a rather vocal MS-DOS newsuser don't we?) complain, please note that awf has been re-cast into C by an MS-DOS user, and its binary is in the comp.binaries.ibm.pc archives as "cawf" or something like that. So you don't have an excuse either. Disclaimer: I only see the ibmpc binaries summary that gets posted at a local site. I don't tend to unpack or try out most of them, because I don't use MS-DOS much, so I can't tell you how good or bad cawf is, but it's THERE! :-) -- Ronald Khoo <ronald@robobar.co.uk> +44 81 991 1142 (O) +44 71 229 7741 (H)
randy@chinet.chi.il.us (Randy Suess) (05/24/91)
In article <1991May23.234055.1233@agate.berkeley.edu> jbuck@forney.berkeley.edu (Joe Buck) writes: >Curses on AT&T for unbundling the "Documenter's Workbench" to make extra >money. > Fixed in SysVr4..... (comes with the BSD compatibility stuff) -- Randy Suess randy@chinet.chi.il.us
darcy@druid.uucp (D'Arcy J.M. Cain) (05/24/91)
In article <1991May23.221143.8781@unixland.uucp> Bill Heiser writes: >Thanks for setting me straight. The reason I was "trying to wing it" >as you say, is that I don't have a good way to read the troff-format >documentation. Those of use running on systems without text processing >packages have a real time of it when it comes to decyphering formatting Bill, you are running Esix so you should have deroff. Give it a shot. It isn't perfect but it's better than reading troff source. Does Virtual Technologies still offer their printed man page set? For ~$50 I got 2 binders worth of stuff and Cnews docs were included along with Bnews, Gnu docs and tons of other stuff. Possibly a good deal even if you have a formatter. -- D'Arcy J.M. Cain (darcy@druid) | D'Arcy Cain Consulting | There's no government Toronto, Ontario, Canada | like no government! +1 416 424 2871 |
henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) (05/24/91)
In article <1991May24.032337.21171@unixland.uucp> bill@unixland.uucp (Bill Heiser) writes: >>That's no excuse! :-) Get Henry's mini-nroff, awf... > >I tried awf a while back and had problems with it (I don't remember >exactly what the problem was, except that it didn't work on the file >i was trying to read)... With the exception of one or two documents that inconveniently use tbl, a working awf should format all the C News documentation reasonably. That was my major set of test cases, in fact. -- And the bean-counter replied, | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology "beans are more important". | henry@zoo.toronto.edu utzoo!henry
henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) (05/25/91)
In article <1991May23.221143.8781@unixland.uucp> bill@unixland.uucp (Bill Heiser) writes: >Thanks for setting me straight. The reason I was "trying to wing it" >as you say, is that I don't have a good way to read the troff-format >documentation... What's wrong with printing it and reading it? Contrary to popular belief, the Formatter Police won't come drag you off and shoot you for trying to read troff source without formatting it first. Documents written using simple markup conventions are not that difficult to read "in the raw". About the only thing you have to know to read most of the C News docs, in particular, is that \fX shifts to font X. -- And the bean-counter replied, | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology "beans are more important". | henry@zoo.toronto.edu utzoo!henry