Phantom Newsgroup Message
David E. Ross
mozilla.dev.web-development. But when I go to open that newsgroup,
there are no messages. Why?
Is this a news server problem or a Thunderbird problem? Because I don't
know which, I have cross-posted this message. However, since
Thunderbird appears quite buggy as a news reader, I set the Followup-To
for mozilla.support.thunderbird.
--
David E. Ross
<http://www.rossde.com/>
Concerned about someone (e.g., Pres. Bush) snooping
into your E-mail? Use PGP.
See my <http://www.rossde.com/PGP/>
»Q«
<news:jpCdnegVMJ4...@mozilla.org>:
> Every time I launch Thunderbird, I see there is an unread message
> in mozilla.dev.web-development. But when I go to open that
> newsgroup, there are no messages. Why?
There are no messages in the group, but before messages are pulled all
Tb has to go by are the results of the nntp GROUP command; the server
gives the "estimated number" of articles as 1.
In general, results of the GROUP command are:
211 n f l s
(n = estimated number of articles in group,
f = first article number in the group,
l = last article number in the group,
s = name of the group)
For that particular group:
211 1 2 2 mozilla.dev.web-development
Trying to get article 2 results in "423 no such article in group", and
using XOVER gets no data at all.
Tb probably uses XOVER, sees nothing, and then doesn't know to mark
article 2 as read. (I'm assuming that, in general, Tb can mark
articles as read using article number; otherwise its unread article
counts would very often be inaccurate.)
Once the group actually has an article, XOVER will return something,
and after that using "mark all read" should work ok.
--
»Q«
Dave Miller
<nob...@nowhere.not> wrote:
> Every time I launch Thunderbird, I see there is an unread message in
> mozilla.dev.web-development. But when I go to open that newsgroup,
> there are no messages. Why?
>
> Is this a news server problem or a Thunderbird problem? Because I don't
> know which, I have cross-posted this message. However, since
> Thunderbird appears quite buggy as a news reader, I set the Followup-To
> for mozilla.support.thunderbird.
It's a server problem. If the group is empty (no messages in it),
Giganews claims it has a single message available. The first message
to show up in the group also gets the same ID as the one Giganews
claimed was there when it was empty, so many news clients mark it as
read because Giganews said it was there, and you'll never see that
first message unless you keep clearing your read messages and going
back to look.
--
Dave Miller http://www.justdave.net/
System Administrator, Mozilla Corporation http://www.mozilla.com/
Chris Cranford
the developer of this newsgroup server package, what should I ask or
tell them I am seeing so to avoid this issue?
When the "get new mail" process runs, it updates the newsgroups with
expected new messages; however clicking on the actual group results in
resetting the newsgroup to no new messages.
Is this the same issue and what is causing this so I can discuss with
the developer in more detail.
Thanks
Chris
Matt Nordhoff
> (I'm assuming that, in general, Tb can mark
> articles as read using article number; otherwise its unread article
> counts would very often be inaccurate.)
That's how it does mark messages as read in the newsrc file (why doesn't
it use the MSF?), and it often is incorrect.
--
Matt Nordhoff, aka Peng
Matt Nordhoff
> It's a server problem. If the group is empty (no messages in it),
> Giganews claims it has a single message available. The first message
> to show up in the group also gets the same ID as the one Giganews
> claimed was there when it was empty, so many news clients mark it as
> read because Giganews said it was there, and you'll never see that
> first message unless you keep clearing your read messages and going
> back to look.
Is that (partly) why most of the groups have a "Welcome to <group>"
message in them?
(Crossposted and Followup-To mozilla.dev.mozilla-org. This thread is a
mess. :-P Now if I had just crossposted my other message to
mozilla.general...)
Dave Miller
<Chris....@tkdsoftware.com> wrote:
> Dave Miller wrote:
> > It's a server problem. If the group is empty (no messages in it),
> > Giganews claims it has a single message available. The first message
> > to show up in the group also gets the same ID as the one Giganews
> > claimed was there when it was empty, so many news clients mark it as
> > read because Giganews said it was there, and you'll never see that
> > first message unless you keep clearing your read messages and going
> > back to look.
>
> I see this on other newsgroup servers as well. If I were to speak with
> the developer of this newsgroup server package, what should I ask or
> tell them I am seeing so to avoid this issue?
>
> When the "get new mail" process runs, it updates the newsgroups with
> expected new messages; however clicking on the actual group results in
> resetting the newsgroup to no new messages.
>
> Is this the same issue and what is causing this so I can discuss with
> the developer in more detail.
According to the RFC, if the group is empty, the GROUP command is
supposed to reply with a 0 for the message count, and then the first
and last message fields (which still have to be supplied) are just
ignored. Giganews is instead replying with a 1 for the message count,
and the message ID of a message that doesn't exist in the first and
last message fields. I already have a ticket filed with Giganews on
this. Whether they're doing anything or not I don't know. :)
clay
n.p.m.mac on this server had a phantom one on it (my .rc file was
fine...) until someone finally posted to the group over the weekend. Now
the count is correct and no phantom...
Chris Cranford
For a particular newsgroup server, I logged in and checked the output of
the system. This is what it shows:
200 Wildcat! NNTP v6.1.451.5 posting allowed
AUTHINFO USER [XXX]
381 More authentication information required.
AUTHINFO PASS [XXX]
281 Authentication accepted.
GROUP win.server.program
211 170 11294 11486 win.server.program
NEWNEWS win.server.program
230 list of new articles by message-id follows
.
QUIT
But what I see is that it shows "w.s.program(28)" in the navigational
pane and I have read all posts in this newsgroup. Is there something
that I am missing that is causing this strange behavior?
Chris
Chris Cranford
Also meant to include the following from my RC file:
win.server.program: 1-11292,11294-11298,11300-11331,11337-11343,
11351-11356,11361-11381,11383,11384,11386-11419,11422-11434,11438,
11440-11450,11452-11454,11457-11486
Does this help pin-point the issue?
Chris
Dave Miller
Cranford <Chris....@tkdsoftware.com> wrote:
> Chris Cranford wrote:
> > For a particular newsgroup server, I logged in and checked the output of
> > the system. This is what it shows:
> >
> > 200 Wildcat! NNTP v6.1.451.5 posting allowed
> > AUTHINFO USER [XXX]
> > 381 More authentication information required.
> > AUTHINFO PASS [XXX]
> > 281 Authentication accepted.
> > GROUP win.server.program
> > 211 170 11294 11486 win.server.program
> > NEWNEWS win.server.program
> > 230 list of new articles by message-id follows
> > .
> > QUIT
> >
> > But what I see is that it shows "w.s.program(28)" in the navigational
> > pane and I have read all posts in this newsgroup. Is there something
> > that I am missing that is causing this strange behavior?
>
> Also meant to include the following from my RC file:
> win.server.program: 1-11292,11294-11298,11300-11331,11337-11343,
> 11351-11356,11361-11381,11383,11384,11386-11419,11422-11434,11438,
> 11440-11450,11452-11454,11457-11486
OK, so that GROUP response says there are (approximately) 170 articles
available, ranging from ID 11294 to 11486. That ID range is 192, which
means there's probably articles that have been cancelled in that range.
The RC file contains a list of the IDs of the articles you've already
read. If you take the article list from your RC file and add up the
ones that *aren't* listed that are inside the range the server says are
available, you get 28 articles. So that's where the 28 comes from.
Chris Cranford
What can be done to force TB to say, I have read 1-11486 regardless so
that it stops showing this *(28)* ?? I doubt editing the RC file is the
right way to do this. It's just that it's annoying and furthermore miss
leading to see this and think there are new posts and find there isn't.
The Real Bev
Why not try it? The worst that can happen is you have to unsubscribe from the
group, resubscribe, and mark everything 'read'. And while you're tweaking
around you can re-order the newsgroups to your liking.
--
Cheers, Bev (Happy Linux User #85683, Slackware 10.2)
============================================================
Brian (Talking to crowd): You need to be independant minded.
Crowd: We are! We are!
Person in crowd: I'm not! -- Monty Python
Chris Cranford
win.server.program: 1-11486
Now it doesn't show that strange stuff any longer, wow! Now I also
posted another thread near this same kind of logic ... If the newsgroup
contains a ':' in the newsgroup name, it seems that TB will not know how
to handle this when it tries to reparse the .rc file on a restart.
Any idea how I can correct this? One newsgroup server I use heavily
uses this character in the names and in the past I haven't had a problem
with OE. That's the *ONLY* quam I have at the moment with TB.
--
Chris
--
--
Chris
Asrail
> Every time I launch Thunderbird, I see there is an unread message in
> mozilla.dev.web-development. But when I go to open that newsgroup,
> there are no messages. Why?
>
> Is this a news server problem or a Thunderbird problem? Because I don't
> know which, I have cross-posted this message. However, since
> Thunderbird appears quite buggy as a news reader, I set the Followup-To
> for mozilla.support.thunderbird.
>
This is the cookbook to got it (well, it's not 100% reproducible, it
depends on the air humidity, how many people are in your home, for what
purposes your bandwidth were being used):
1 - subscribe to a lot of newsgroups
2 - to go clicking through every newsgroup, don't waiting to load all of
the messages
3 - some of the messages you set to don't download (because there are
too many or the body is too old, the later is your case)
So Thundebird and Mozilla, sometimes, don't mark these message as reads.
You can use "Mark newsgroup as read" at your desire and it won't works.
I unsubscribe and subscribe again when it happens.
»Q«
<news:k7idnaUQd4azkWze...@mozilla.org>:
> This is the cookbook to got it (well, it's not 100% reproducible,
> it depends on the air humidity, how many people are in your home,
> for what purposes your bandwidth were being used):
>
> 1 - subscribe to a lot of newsgroups
> 2 - to go clicking through every newsgroup, don't waiting to load
> all of the messages
> 3 - some of the messages you set to don't download (because there
> are too many or the body is too old, the later is your case)
>
> So Thundebird and Mozilla, sometimes, don't mark these message as
> reads. You can use "Mark newsgroup as read" at your desire and it
> won't works.
>
> I unsubscribe and subscribe again when it happens.
If I am reading this correctly, ISTM this is a (small) bug. When Tb
enters a group, the server immediately tells it what the last article
number is (among other things). After that, whether any/all/none of
the headers or bodies are downloaded, ISTM that "Mark newsgroup as
read" should mark everything with an article number less than or equal
to that last number as read.
--
»Q«
Chris Cranford
I would agree entirely on that! There shouldn't be any additional logic
other than using that number and performing this update in the .rc file.
--
Chris
David E. Ross
> In article <jpCdnegVMJ4...@mozilla.org>, David E. Ross
> <nob...@nowhere.not> wrote:
>
>> Every time I launch Thunderbird, I see there is an unread message in
>> mozilla.dev.web-development. But when I go to open that newsgroup,
>> there are no messages. Why?
>>
>> Is this a news server problem or a Thunderbird problem? Because I don't
>> know which, I have cross-posted this message. However, since
>> Thunderbird appears quite buggy as a news reader, I set the Followup-To
>> for mozilla.support.thunderbird.
>
> It's a server problem. If the group is empty (no messages in it),
> Giganews claims it has a single message available. The first message
> to show up in the group also gets the same ID as the one Giganews
> claimed was there when it was empty, so many news clients mark it as
> read because Giganews said it was there, and you'll never see that
> first message unless you keep clearing your read messages and going
> back to look.
>
WRONG! I sent a message (Subject: Hello) to
mozilla.dev.web-development. Later, I read that message.
Now, when I start Thunderbird, it shows 1 unread message for
mozilla.dev.web-development. If I select that newsgroup, there are no
messages.
If I change my viewing properties to All (from Unread), my message is
still on the server. Thus, the problem has nothing to do with there
being no messages on the server.
Chris Ilias
> WRONG! I sent a message (Subject: Hello) to
> mozilla.dev.web-development. Later, I read that message.
>
> Now, when I start Thunderbird, it shows 1 unread message for
> mozilla.dev.web-development. If I select that newsgroup, there are no
> messages.
>
> If I change my viewing properties to All (from Unread), my message is
> still on the server. Thus, the problem has nothing to do with there
> being no messages on the server.
Here, it doesn't indicate that there are any unread messages. I may have
marked all as read.
--
Chris Ilias
mozilla.test.multimedia moderator
Mozilla links <http://ilias.ca>
(Please do not email me tech support questions)
David E. Ross
> _David E. Ross_ spoke thusly on 20/02/2006 11:23 AM:
>> WRONG! I sent a message (Subject: Hello) to
>> mozilla.dev.web-development. Later, I read that message.
>>
>> Now, when I start Thunderbird, it shows 1 unread message for
>> mozilla.dev.web-development. If I select that newsgroup, there are no
>> messages.
>>
>> If I change my viewing properties to All (from Unread), my message is
>> still on the server. Thus, the problem has nothing to do with there
>> being no messages on the server.
>
> Here, it doesn't indicate that there are any unread messages. I may have
> marked all as read.
How did you mark all as read?
I can select the newsgroup and with a right-click, select Mark Newsgroup
Read from the pull-down. This doesn't correct the problem.
I can also select Message > Mark > All Read from the menu bar. This
doesn't correct the problem.
However, the Mark button on the toolbar is disabled (gray) when I select
the newsgroup because there are no messages to mark. So I can't do it
that way.
The Real Bev
> Chris Ilias wrote:
>> _David E. Ross_ spoke thusly on 20/02/2006 11:23 AM:
>>> WRONG! I sent a message (Subject: Hello) to
>>> mozilla.dev.web-development. Later, I read that message.
>>>
>>> Now, when I start Thunderbird, it shows 1 unread message for
>>> mozilla.dev.web-development. If I select that newsgroup, there are no
>>> messages.
>>>
>>> If I change my viewing properties to All (from Unread), my message is
>>> still on the server. Thus, the problem has nothing to do with there
>>> being no messages on the server.
>>
>> Here, it doesn't indicate that there are any unread messages. I may have
>> marked all as read.
>
> How did you mark all as read?
>
> I can select the newsgroup and with a right-click, select Mark Newsgroup
> Read from the pull-down. This doesn't correct the problem.
>
> I can also select Message > Mark > All Read from the menu bar. This
> doesn't correct the problem.
>
> However, the Mark button on the toolbar is disabled (gray) when I select
> the newsgroup because there are no messages to mark. So I can't do it
> that way.
Have you clicked the thingy in the read/unread column (little spectacles at
the top)? You can also select the message, hit control-a (to mark all) and
then press M to get rid of it.
Did you check the message numbers in that newsgroup's newsrc-<hostname> file
in your profilename/News subdirectory? This was discussed in another thread
-- the object being to change the entry for that newsgroup from the possibly
complex list of numbers to something like "mozilla.support.general: 1-220" (if
that was the newsgroup in question).
Sometimes brute force works if you have a big enough hammer :-)
--
Cheers, Bev (Happy Linux User #85683, Slackware 10.2)
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"Some people are alive only because it is illegal to kill them."
-- Lionel
David E. Ross
The "little spectacles" were disabled, grayed out. There was no message
to select. Per the subject line, this was a phantom message.
> Did you check the message numbers in that newsgroup's newsrc-<hostname>
> file in your profilename/News subdirectory? This was discussed in
> another thread -- the object being to change the entry for that
> newsgroup from the possibly complex list of numbers to something like
> "mozilla.support.general: 1-220" (if that was the newsgroup in question).
File news.mozilla.org.rc in my Thunderbird probile contained
mozilla.dev.web-development: 1,3
I changed that to
mozilla.dev.web-development: 1-3
which fixed the problem.
Note that this was not a very complex list of message IDs. Further, the
mozilla.dev.web-development newsgroup contains only one message, which
has ID=3.
It still seems to be a bug. If I see something like this again, I will
submit a report via Bugzilla.