mark (11/10/82)
Has anyone archived netnews, or does anyone plan to? Cheers, Mark Verber Ohio State University
ecn-pa:ecn-pb:rick (11/12/82)
I'm afraid to admit it, but I started archiving most "useful" newsgroups as of September 18. The newsgroups I consider useful are: net.general net.unix-wizards net.adm.site net.bugs net.dcom net.eunice net.info-micro net.info-terms net.lan net.lang.c net.mail net.micro net.news net.oa net.periphs net.sources net.usenix net.usoft net.works I did not archive the fa.* articles on the theory that they archived somewhere on the arpanet. (If you dont like my choice of newsgroups, put your disk space where your mouth is and start archiving that group yourself). I am willing to entertain serious requests that I start saving a newsgroup I omitted (dont even try net.jokes or net.ham-radio), but your argument had better be a good one. I am opreating on the (perhaps off base) theory that if I dont think it's useful enough to read, it's certainly not worth saving. I also have net.unix-wizards dating back to October 17,1981 and net.bugs dating back to Oct 30,1981. (note that net.bugs includes net.bugs.4bsd,etc) The reason I am afraid to admit it and haven't until now, is that I do not yet have a good method for retrieval. First, I am not going to do it manually (for reasons that should be obvious). Second, I am afraid of the potential phone costs caused by unreasonable queries to the as yet unimplemented automatic server. (I shudder at the thought of someone asking for the entire archive). So, in summary, I am archiving them, but there is no way for anyone else to retrieve them. I estimate that I can afford to keep about 1 year of news on line before I have to spool it to tape. If anyone wants to implement a scheme for retrieval, I will be willing to install it, but It must be workable. Eventually, I will write one myself "when I have time". I decided it would be better to start saving them without a method of retrieval than to wait until I had a method and small database. Rick Adams