Documentation
Newsgroup Reading with UNIX Pine
Documentation table of contents.
Introduction
This document assumes you are familiar with using UNIX Pine for email. If you are not, please see the CIT Document Pine before reading this document.
Conceptually, newsgroups in Pine are handled in the same fashion as mail folders; you can use the same functions and expect the same results. The primary difference involves ownership of the individual items being read. You own your email in the sense that you control its existence: you can delete it unconditionally, move it from folder to folder, and so forth. However, newsgroup articles are owned by the news machine news.buffalo.edu. When you read news, you are looking at temporary copies of the articles as they appear locally to you during a Pine session. Deleting a news article makes it unavailable to you, but neither deletes it from the news server nor prevents others from reading it. Similarly, you can save news articles to your mail folders (which you own), but not to other newsgroups (which you do not own).
Subscribing and Unsubscribing to Newsgroups
Subscribing or unsubscribing to a newsgroup is similar to adding or deleting a mail folder. Because Pine uses the same .newsrc file as other newsreaders (such as trn), your current subscriptions will carry over from other newsreaders. To subscribe to additional newsgroups, select L (Folder List) from the Main Menu and open the News collection. Newsgroups to which you are currently subscribed will be displayed in a fashion similar to the way in which folders are displayed for your mail collection.
A list of commands and their shortcuts will appear at the bottom of your Pine window. To subscribe to an additional group, select A (Add). Pine will prompt you for a newsgroup name. If you know the name of the group, enter it and press Enter or Return to subscribe. If you want to search for a newsgroup based on its name, enter a keyword (partial name). A list of possible groups will appear. Select L (ListMode), and then highlight and select the groups to which you wish to subscribe by selecting x. To unsubscribe from a newsgroup, highlight the group, press D (Delete) to unsubscribe, and reply with y to verify the choice.
Composing an Article
Composing articles and replies is similar to composing a mail message. When replying to an article, you will be given the option of replying to either the newsgroup, the author, or both. When composing from scratch, you will need to position your cursor within the header field, then use the command Ctrl r (RichHeader) to view all the message headers. List the newsgroups in the newsgrps field to which you wish to post this message.
You will also be reminded that news postings may go to thousands of users. Consider this carefully. If you wish to post, enter y. Finally, to satisfy security and authentication requirements, you will be asked to enter your UBITName and Password.
Threading a Newsgroup
Threading a newsgroup involves sorting it by similar Subject headings. While viewing a particular newsgroup, enter the following sequence:
$S
If you would like Pine to automatically thread all newsgroup messages and
mail folder messages, select S (Setup),
then C (Config),
and then turn on the following sort key:
(*) OrderedSubj
Catching Up on Newsgroups
The catch-up command will mark
all postings in a newsgroup as deleted. You could, of course, select D
(Delete) repeatedly, but with some
newsgroups posting hundreds of articles daily, this may be somewhat tedious.
A faster technique involves the use of the following sequence when viewing
a newsgroup:
;AAD
This sequence takes advantage of the Select (;) and Apply (A) commands, as well as the auto-zoom and unzoom features enabled above. After marking all messages within a group as deleted, you should then eXclude (X) these items to remove them from view.
Archives and Policies
Occasionally, an instructor may have a newsgroup available for his or her class. The instructor controls any posting policy pertaining to the class newsgroup. If the group is moderated by the instructor, any posting to that newsgroup will first be sent to the instructor for approval. If the instructor approves the posting, it will be sent back to the news machine for public consumption. If the instructor does not approve the posting, however, it will not be publicly accessible.
Articles posted to a newsgroup expire on a regular basis. Articles posted to class newsgroups will expire approximately two weeks after the end of the semester. Articles posted to other sunyab newsgroups will expire approximately 30 days after they are posted. Articles posted to non-sunyab groups will expire approximately two to three weeks after they are posted.
Note that there is no archival system for the news machine, so any expired
articles are irretrievable. Further information regarding policies is available
at
http://wings.buffalo.edu/computing/policies.