rsalz@bbn.com (Rich Salz) (12/21/90)
B2.11 and Cnews both support the a site named "ME" in the sys file as the localhost, defining what groups the site accepts. Is it really needed? Doesn't the active file tell you what newsgroups you receive? I suppose it could be used for checking distributions, right? How important is it, really? -- Please send comp.sources.unix-related mail to rsalz@uunet.uu.net. Use a domain-based address or give alternate paths, or you may lose out.
mju@mudos.ann-arbor.mi.us (Marc Unangst) (12/24/90)
rsalz@bbn.com (Rich Salz) writes: > B2.11 and Cnews both support the a site named "ME" in the sys file as the > localhost, defining what groups the site accepts. Is it really needed? > Doesn't the active file tell you what newsgroups you receive? I suppose > it could be used for checking distributions, right? How important is it, > really? It's very important for sites that don't receive a full feed. Let's say that I am one of those sites (since I am). I want to be able to crosspost messages to newsgroups that I don't receive, mostly so I don't get invalid newsgroup errors when I followup to a crossposted article. This means that I have to have an active file with most, if not all, of the groups in mainstream Usenet. However, if I have all these groups in my active file, articles that come in crossposted between groups I receive and groups I don't will be saved locally in all the groups, not just the ones I receive. Even though the article is linked between the groups instead of copied, thus conserving disk space, it creates the appearance to the user that this machine is fed groups that we don't get. This isn't a *large* problem, but it can confuse the user to no end, because they see only a part of the group. I don't really think that a ME: line is very difficult to keep in the code, and it does make life easier for some sysadmins. Why bother to take it out? -- Marc Unangst | mju@mudos.ann-arbor.mi.us | "Bus error: passengers dumped" ...!umich!leebai!mudos!mju |
henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) (12/28/90)
In article <3131@papaya.bbn.com> rsalz@bbn.com (Rich Salz) writes: >B2.11 and Cnews both support the a site named "ME" in the sys file as the >localhost, defining what groups the site accepts. Is it really needed? >Doesn't the active file tell you what newsgroups you receive? ... The active file defines which newsgroups you currently know about. The ME line defines which newsgroups you want to know about. Think about group-creation messages to see why there's a difference. Usenet is dynamic. -- "The average pointer, statistically, |Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology points somewhere in X." -Hugh Redelmeier| henry@zoo.toronto.edu utzoo!henry
ssb@quest.UUCP (Scott Sheldon Bertilson) (01/02/91)
I'm using "ME:" under C news and B news, but have a tendency to want to be able to say: ME:all,!to,to.ME/all: I sure wish the second "ME" was mapped internally to the system name so I wouldn't have to specify it. I suppose it might be a little foolish to have my "sys" file set this way, but it simplifies things when a new hierarchy pops up. Is there a good reason not to operate with this degree of anarchy? -- Scott S. Bertilson ...ssb@quest.UUCP scott@poincare.geom.umn.edu
jerry@olivey.olivetti.com (Jerry Aguirre) (01/04/91)
In article <1991Jan02.002015.17758@quest.UUCP> ssb@quest.UUCP (Scott Sheldon Bertilson) writes: > > I'm using "ME:" under C news and B news, but have a tendency to >want to be able to say: > ME:all,!to,to.ME/all: I think that this is incorrect. Unlike the feed entries the "ME" entry must have just "to", not "to.ME". While this won't cause problems for most sites consider what happens if you post to "to.neighbor" to send something just to that site. Because "to.neighbor" is blocked by the "ME" entry the posting will, or at least should, be rejected locally. Thus you might as well scrap your "to.neighbor" distributions in the other "sys" entries. You won't be able to use them. This is a, perhaps, unfortunate side effect of the way the software functions. It can not send an article to a neighbor without storing and processing it locally. Thus a sendsys, directed to a neighbor site, will return not only the neighbors sys file but your own as well! While it is possible that a "to.bogus" might reach your site and be acted apon I don't think it is something you should be worried about blocking. I suppose you could use: !to,to.ME,to.neighbor1,to.neighbor2,... At least you would only have to do it on the ME line. Is there documentation somewhere that recomends using "to.myname" on the "ME" line? Jerry Aguirre