News to Mail and Back Again
Sabahattin Gucukoglu
My situation: mail is a remote IMAP mailbox, news is a local ISP
server. The email client is Mail.app.
Mail.app would make a fine newsreader if I had the ability to get news
from my provider, drop it somewhere where Mail will find it (or
download it, and ideally from my remote mailbox, but if not from some
locally set up POP server) and if I could send news by writing to an
address like the numerous mail2news gateways.
So far, whichever way I turn, I have to write something, and I've even
thought of an IMAP/SMTP to NNTP proxy. But I suspect life's too short
for that. There is newsfetch, for the first half, and readily
available MTA software (Xmail should be good enough) to provide POP
and a sendmail interface, but then I'd need a way to spew news into my
provider. I might have to parse the body for added headers if I ever
wanted a Followup-To that could not be encoded in the recipient line.
But still, I was hoping someone new of the ultimate solution for a
situation like this. The world would be a better place if Mail.app
did news, but it doesn't, so I'll have to treat news like lists and
drop it into a place where Mail can read from and arrange to be able
to post news with the same and no changes to the interface, using the
destination address to specify the newsgroup.
Any thoughts/recipes welcome.
Cheers,
Sabahattin
Frank Slootweg
the more appropriate of the two groups.]
You don't mention your platform/OS, but for the moment it does not
really matter. I'll assume UNIX/Linux, but (MS-)Windows is fine as well.
I advise to have a look at doing the pulling of News articles with the
newsreader tin. I.e. you do *not* use tin as a newsreader, but only to
pull the News articles.
tin can pull the News articles to local files ('-S', Save News) or
mail it to an e-mail address ('-M', Mail News). See the tin(1) manual
page at <http://www.tin.org/bin/man.cgi?section=1&topic=tin> for
details.
AFAIK, mailed articles can be threaded if your mailer knows how to do
that.
Other options, might be suck, slrnpull, leafnode, etc.. I.e. anything
which can pull News articles and put them into files. Getting the files
read by your mailer should be too hand. Perhaps a script is needed to
format them, but that should be all.
For the posting part, there's inews(1), which works for news just like
"sendmail -t" does for mail, i.e. you just generate the required
headers, append the body, and pass the lot to inews.
Whiskers
Why not just use a newsreader? There seem to be several to choose from for
Mac <http://www.newsreaders.com/mac/clients.html> and it is also possible
to get Unix and Linux programs to work on OS/X, with a bit of effort.
--
-- ^^^^^^^^^^
-- Whiskers
-- ~~~~~~~~~~
Indi
Another method might be to subscribe to the newsgroup via google
groups, which will allow you to treat it as a mailing list. This may
actually be a legit reason to use GG, for those who'd rather use their
MUA for usenet. Of course the downside is that when posting you'll get
a GG message ID and be filtered by people like me who have blocked all
GG posts...
--
indi
Steve Bonine
> Why not just use a newsreader? There seem to be several to choose from for
> Mac<http://www.newsreaders.com/mac/clients.html> and it is also possible
> to get Unix and Linux programs to work on OS/X, with a bit of effort.
This was also my reaction. The only reason I could see to cobble
together a scheme to pound a square peg into a round hole is if it's the
cobbling process that is the fun part. It's not for me, but some people
get their kicks by coercing software to do different things.
Whiskers
> Whiskers wrote:
>
>> Why not just use a newsreader? There seem to be several to choose from for
>> Mac<http://www.newsreaders.com/mac/clients.html> and it is also possible
>> to get Unix and Linux programs to work on OS/X, with a bit of effort.
>
> This was also my reaction.
Glad I wasn't the only one!
> The only reason I could see to cobble
> together a scheme to pound a square peg into a round hole is if it's the
> cobbling process that is the fun part.
I find that getting programs to do what they're intended to do, is enough
challenge for me ;))
> It's not for me, but some people
> get their kicks by coercing software to do different things.
e-Masochism?
mechanic
> I find that getting programs to do what they're intended to do, is enough
> challenge for me ;))
Unfortunately it's often too much of a challenge for the developers.
--
mechanic
Mike Yetto
I have a cup of coffee right here in front of me. Fortunately I
was not taking a sip at the time.
However, that was too close.
Mike "you have been warned" Yetto
--
In theory, theory and practice are the same.
In practice they are not.
Sabahattin Gucukoglu
Nah. Even in CLI, mutt was my favourite newsreader, which of course
is when it isn't a mail reader. Mailreaders and newsreaders have no
business being separate in this day and age, and even if they were,
the only one I really liked for Mac was Unison and it costs money.
Since I only read a few low-traffic groups, and since ideally they'd
be in IMAP mailboxes for me to pick up from wherever, I still maintain
that doing it in Mail.app (where I get good spam filtering that
actually works) would be better for me. I have already experimented
with newsfetch on some groups, and Mail makes reading those a real
pleasure.
Cheers,
Sabahattin
Sabahattin Gucukoglu
Doesn't work, unfortunately. Google provides no email gateway to
usenet, and when subscribed to a usenet group your only choice is
digest or summary, neither of which works for me since they are
intended to send you to Google's web interface. (That interface isn't
nearly as bad as some people make out, but it's no cruise, either.)
Cheers,
Sabahattin
Frank Slootweg
And your response to *my* response is?
I.e. you quote Indi, who's quoting me, but you don't respond to my
response, which AFAICT does exactly what you want.
BTW, you may want to look at Google Groups' mailing facility again,
because what you describe does not match what badgolferman describes
in his thread "e-mail groups" in this group.
Sabahattin Gucukoglu
Nothing. Hard to believe, isn't it? :-)
I only quoted you quoting because it made my entire post hold
together. In all other respects it was entirely redundant.
But be assured, I have heard you. There is nothing to write because
there is nothing more to be said. I'll know when it (probably
newsfetch or tin) has been tested. Tin is a bit much just for this
operation, and it has some annoying requirements like needing separate
rcfiles just to operate with multiple NNTP servers. But we'll see.
Also inews will have to be a fake, because I'm not installing an
entire news server to make this work, which discards leafnode and, to
a certain extent, slrnpull (though I'll have a look at the spool
format).
> BTW, you may want to look at Google Groups' mailing facility again,
> because what you describe does not match what badgolferman describes
> in his thread "e-mail groups" in this group.
Of course, I had the good grace to read that thread before posting
this one. Nothing's changed - he is talking about a mailing list, not
a newsgroup. Google's mailing lists operate just like the real thing,
only with more spam. When Google handles usenet groups like Google
Groups and everybody is nicely confused, I imagine the assumption that
they are treated the same is reasonable. But they aren't. I'd love
it if they were, and have sent off a note to Google, which I fully
expect them to ignore.
Cheers,
Sabahattin
andrew
> Also inews will have to be a fake, because I'm not installing an
> entire news server to make this work, which discards leafnode and, to
> a certain extent, slrnpull (though I'll have a look at the spool
> format).
Mind you although leafnode is a server it is certainly not a _full_ news
server in the way that INN is a news server, it has much smaller aims
and is relatively easy to setup and administer. I should qualify this
remark with the admission that although I have run the alpha version of
Leafnode for some time I have not ever used INN, just read the
documentation. slrnpull, as you note, is of course not a server at
all...
Andrew
--
Do you think that's air you're breathing?
Whiskers
>> On 2009-12-15, Sabahattin Gucukoglu <ma...@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com> wrote:
>> > Hi all,
>> >
>> > My situation: mail is a remote IMAP mailbox, news is a local ISP
>> > server. The email client is Mail.app.
>> >
>> > Mail.app would make a fine newsreader if I had the ability to get news
>> > from my provider, drop it somewhere where Mail will find it (or
>> > download it, and ideally from my remote mailbox, but if not from some
>> > locally set up POP server) and if I could send news by writing to an
>> > address like the numerous mail2news gateways.
[...]
>> Why not just use a newsreader? There seem to be several to choose from for
>> Mac <http://www.newsreaders.com/mac/clients.html> and it is also possible
>> to get Unix and Linux programs to work on OS/X, with a bit of effort.
>
> Nah. Even in CLI, mutt was my favourite newsreader, which of course
> is when it isn't a mail reader. Mailreaders and newsreaders have no
> business being separate in this day and age, and even if they were,
> the only one I really liked for Mac was Unison and it costs money.
> Since I only read a few low-traffic groups, and since ideally they'd
> be in IMAP mailboxes for me to pick up from wherever, I still maintain
> that doing it in Mail.app (where I get good spam filtering that
> actually works) would be better for me. I have already experimented
> with newsfetch on some groups, and Mail makes reading those a real
> pleasure.
>
> Cheers,
> Sabahattin
<shrug> If 'newsfetch' doesn't offer a facility for posting to newsgroups,
perhaps the simplest way for you to get messages into newsgroups using your
email client would be to use a mail-to-news gateway service - essentially,
you send a specially-formatted email to the gateway which inserts proper
newsgroup headers and posts to the newsgroup(s) you have specified.
Although it would probably be possible to build such a gateway on your own
computer, why not use a service that's on offer? See for example
<http://www.bananasplit.info/m2n.html>.
Gene E. Bloch
> Bada bing mechanic <mech...@example.net> bada bang:
>> Whiskers wrote:
>>
>>> I find that getting programs to do what they're intended to do, is enough
>>> challenge for me ;))
>>
>> Unfortunately it's often too much of a challenge for the developers.
>>
> I have a cup of coffee right here in front of me. Fortunately I
> was not taking a sip at the time.
> However, that was too close.
> Mike "you have been warned" Yetto
Is what I did to the subject line the sort of thing that is needed?
--
Gene Bloch 650.366.4267 lettersatblochg.com
Mike Yetto
It's all in the timing.
Mike "and it's time to be careful" Yetto
Indi
>
> BTW, you may want to look at Google Groups' mailing facility again,
> because what you describe does not match what badgolferman describes
> in his thread "e-mail groups" in this group.
>
It works exactly as I said, or at least here in the US it did about
4 months ago when I set it up for someone with a similar fetish.
It's possible GG changed their implementation or that it's only a
service that works in the US...
--
indi
Kathy Morgan
which is, as Frank Slootweg already pointed out, more appropriate.]
Sabahattin Gucukoglu <ma...@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com> wrote:
> User-Agent: G2/1.0
> X-HTTP-UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; Intel Mac OS X 10_6_2; en-us)
> AppleWebKit/531.21.8 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.4
> Safari/531.21.10,gzip(gfe),gzip(gfe)
>
> Hi all,
>
> My situation: mail is a remote IMAP mailbox, news is a local ISP
> server. The email client is Mail.app.
For this post, you did not use a local ISP for news. You used a web
browser and Google Groups.
Using a newsreader with a news server provides a much better news
reading experience; I think you're trying to invent a newsreader because
you're not aware that there are already many of them out there.
My personal preference for the Mac is MacSOUP, which is an offline
reader that includes a mail client. (You have the option in the
preferences, though, of using either Eudora or Claris Emailer instead of
the built-in mail client.)
Other popular Mac newsreaders include Newswatcher-X, YA-Newswatcher,
MT-Newswatcher, and Mozilla, and there are others at
<http://www.newsreaders.com>, or as Frank mentioned you could use a *nix
newsreader.
--
Kathy
Frank Slootweg
"Tin is a bit much just for this operation"? It is *one* executable,
what more do you want? And *per definition* multiple NNTP servers will
require multiple .newsrc files.
> Also inews will have to be a fake, because I'm not installing an
> entire news server to make this work, which discards leafnode and, to
> a certain extent, slrnpull (though I'll have a look at the spool
> format).
Of course you can use a standalone inews. I never said otherwise. And
it will be as real as it gets, not 'fake'.
No offense, but not wanting to "install an entire news server" is
rather silly. First of all it's *you* who wants the kludge of using a
mail program as a newsreader. Secondly, leafnode is hardly "an entire
news server" and to call slrnpull a news server is a big stretch.
It looks to me - and I'm sure not only to me - that you want to do
things the hard way - i.e. using a mail-only program to read News -, but
at the same time want it to be easy. A tad inconsistent, I would say.
> > BTW, you may want to look at Google Groups' mailing facility again,
> > because what you describe does not match what badgolferman describes
> > in his thread "e-mail groups" in this group.
>
> Of course, I had the good grace to read that thread before posting
> this one. Nothing's changed - he is talking about a mailing list, not
> a newsgroup. Google's mailing lists operate just like the real thing,
> a newsgroup. Google's mailing lists operate just like the real thing,
> only with more spam. When Google handles usenet groups like Google
> Groups and everybody is nicely confused, I imagine the assumption that
> they are treated the same is reasonable. But they aren't. I'd love
> it if they were, and have sent off a note to Google, which I fully
> expect them to ignore.
Nitpicks aside, badgolferman was indeed talking about a "Google Group"
- i.e. a *non*-Usenet group which is carried by Google GroupS (plural) -,
while you are talking about Usenet Newsgroups (which are also carried by
Google GroupS).
The mailing formats that Google GroupS provides for a mail
subscription to a Usenet Newsgroup, are indeed not practical for reading
and posting News via a mail program. Reading, while akward, is possible,
but for posting one misses essential information like "References:".
There's a lesson in all of this! :-(
Indi
>
> The mailing formats that Google GroupS provides for a mail
> subscription to a Usenet Newsgroup, are indeed not practical for reading
> and posting News via a mail program. Reading, while akward, is possible,
> but for posting one misses essential information like "References:".
>
Yes, I just went to GG and tried subscribing via email as I had suggested
and they did indeed change it so there is no more individal mail option.
> There's a lesson in all of this! :-(
>
So far it actually looks like two lessons:
(1) Don't recommend GG for anything, they've removed all traces of
redeeming vale.
(2) No need to edit my scorefile to allow the OP trough my GG filter.
I can't imagine why the OP would call your post redundant.
But then in his initial post he claimed he was getting usenet via his ISP,
so perhaps he's a rank n00b and has no idea what you were talking about.
--
indi
Frank Slootweg
> On 2009-12-21, Frank Slootweg <th...@ddress.is.invalid> wrote:
> > There's a lesson in all of this! :-(
>
> So far it actually looks like two lessons:
>
> (1) Don't recommend GG for anything, they've removed all traces of
> redeeming vale.
>
> (2) No need to edit my scorefile to allow the OP trough my GG filter.
>
> I can't imagine why the OP would call your post redundant.
> But then in his initial post he claimed he was getting usenet via his ISP,
> so perhaps he's a rank n00b and has no idea what you were talking about.
Yes, it's getting rather tiresome, these posters who have (read:
create) a 'problem' and then are not interested whatsoever in real world
solutions, and invent all kinds of 'reasons' why they can't implement
the presented solutions.
We (T*I*W) need a term for this kind of poster/behaviour. In my head,
I call it a RM (or CG (or bgm?)), but we need somthing catchy and
descriptive, ie, like we have 'drive-by' for other posters/behaviour.
Indi
"Grouper" seems to cover most of them.
So far I have created just four exceptions in my GG filter;
that is one miniscule s2n ratio.
--
indi
Steve Bonine
> So far I have created just four exceptions in my GG filter;
> that is one miniscule s2n ratio.
I'm curious how you know. Have you gone back and examined the discarded
articles to see if any of them have redeeming social grace?
Frankly, four is significant. Did you create those based on a followup
to something that you had killed?
I know that this newsgroup discusses news readers, and that in the
traditional sense Google is not a "news reader", even though it is the
method that a lot of folks use to read news. And I know that Google
generates a lot of spam into Usenet, and a lot of articles from newbies
who seem pretty clueless. But if we're going to attract anyone new into
Usenet, chances are that their first contact with Usenet will be via
Google. If the reaction to their attempt is a slap in the face, they
won't stay around.
Of course, that's exactly the goal for a lot of Usenet old timers.
Indi
> Indi wrote:
>
>> So far I have created just four exceptions in my GG filter;
>> that is one miniscule s2n ratio.
>
> I'm curious how you know. Have you gone back and examined the discarded
> articles to see if any of them have redeeming social grace?
>
> Frankly, four is significant.
>
Out of tens of thousands?
I definitely wouldn't call that significant...
Actually I just looked at my scorefile and I see
there are entries allowing five GG posters through.
All of them are for comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc.
Not sure why some of the otherwise intelligent
people posting there keep using GG, but that is
their choice to make.
> Did you create those based on a followup
> to something that you had killed?
>
Exactly. If someone posts something worthwhile
via GG I expect someone else will reply to it,
then I can decide whether or not to create a
loophole for them.
> I know that this newsgroup discusses news readers, and that in the
> traditional sense Google is not a "news reader", even though it is the
> method that a lot of folks use to read news. And I know that Google
> generates a lot of spam into Usenet, and a lot of articles from newbies
> who seem pretty clueless. But if we're going to attract anyone new into
> Usenet, chances are that their first contact with Usenet will be via
> Google. If the reaction to their attempt is a slap in the face, they
> won't stay around.
>
> Of course, that's exactly the goal for a lot of Usenet old timers.
>
There's no such malevolence on my part, I just
don't want to read a bunch of spam, trolling,
and other nonsense. I know others will read
everything and probably reply to anything
noteworthy (and plenty which is not, as well).
--
indi
Doug Freyburger
> Steve Bonine <s...@pobox.com> wrote:
>> Indi wrote:
>
>>> So far I have created just four exceptions in my GG filter;
>>> that is one miniscule s2n ratio.
Once I switched to eternal-september I decided that my most filtering
filtering strategy would be based on cross-post counts. So many trolls
cross post and so few spammers do repeat posts. It catches a very large
fraction of the noise including responses and cascades.
Blocking spammers works best by filtering by the NSP/ISP. Since spam
gets very few responses and is well filtered I've never seen it on the
same order of magnitude as trolls.
I've ended up blocking webtv with no exceptions for about the same
non-spam reasons folks mention.
> Not sure why some of the otherwise intelligent
> people posting there keep using GG, but that is
> their choice to make.
I first started posting through a web interface because I travelled for
work at the time. I never knew what the network of the week would block
but it never blocked web. The more I read "get a real newsreader"
comments the more I viewed those comments as elitist nonsense. To me a
"real newsreader" IS a web browser, but for that to work some NSP needs
to offer one that supports filtering. So far the only one I have found
that does that is recgroups.com and it's newsgroup list is so short it
only has one group I use regularly. But as soon as a good NSP starts to
offer a web interface with a killfile I'm there as soon as I learn of
it.
I live in the wrong century to have kitchedn stuff that does not go in
the dishwasher. I live in the wrong century to have to install some
extra software just to read a network service. The arguments for a
"real newsreader" are exactly the same sort of elitist nonsense that
gets used to buy knives that can't be put in the dishwasher.
>> I know that this newsgroup discusses news readers, and that in the
>> traditional sense Google is not a "news reader", even though it is the
>> method that a lot of folks use to read news. And I know that Google
>> generates a lot of spam into Usenet, and a lot of articles from newbies
>> who seem pretty clueless. But if we're going to attract anyone new into
>> Usenet, chances are that their first contact with Usenet will be via
>> Google. If the reaction to their attempt is a slap in the face, they
>> won't stay around.
>
>> Of course, that's exactly the goal for a lot of Usenet old timers.
Trolls fight a battle of attrition trying to reduce the size of UseNet.
It's taken them decades and UseNet continues to live but they have been
winning for a very long time. Trolls often hate it when I point out
that's what they are doing but so far not one of them has corrected me
with data. Trolls are crazy but not stupid - They know it's what they
are doing.
Use the Google archives (yet another reason why intelligent readers use
web interfaces) and compare the quality of any group in January 1980,
1990, 2000, 2010. The quality difference is clear.
The reason is simple - Any new subscriber arrives on UseNet with an
empty filter file, and what they get is blame-the-victim elitist
responses. So many leave UseNet immediately and it isn't even
really because of the trolls. It's because of the lack of acceptable
help by the non-trolls. Any new subscriber arrives on any one newsgroup
with an empty filter file, so what they see are the trolls and spammers.
So far there's one newsgroup I subscribe to where folks post slices of
their filter files so newbies can see how it's done. That's pitiful.
Same as so far I've only found one NSP with a web interface that
supports filters. Even more pitiful.
> There's no such malevolence on my part, I just
> don't want to read a bunch of spam, trolling,
> and other nonsense. I know others will read
> everything and probably reply to anything
> noteworthy (and plenty which is not, as well).
I have users in my killfile who are not exclusively abusers. They are
in the filter because their signal to noise makes it not worth reading
all of their posts for the good parts. I spent a lot of years reading
without a killfile and I appreciate the folks who still do that.
For the top of the topic - Solutions spoil perfectly good "problems".
Is the issue "not invented here", or is the issue "blame the victim"?
How many times does a reader have to read "get a real newsreader" before
they get tired of such blame-the-victim non-help? I was tired of that
type of discussion when I switched from "readnews" to "rn" on a BSD 4.1
VAX over a 2400 baud dial-up.
The poster who started the discussion really needs a mail-to-usenet
gateway and help to set it up.
Indi
>
> The poster who started the discussion really needs a mail-to-usenet
> gateway and help to set it up.
>
He was offered at least one perfectly good solution and rejected it,
plus was rude to boot. That's not the way to get help, is it?
So I think your sympathy is misplaced.
Also, I fail to see what is "elitist" about using a news reader (vs a
browser or email-based kludge) to read news...
--
indi
Frank Slootweg
[...]
> For the top of the topic - Solutions spoil perfectly good "problems".
>
> Is the issue "not invented here", or is the issue "blame the victim"?
The issue of *my* post/subject_change, is that a poster who asks for
help, should be thankful for the help (s)he gets or/and not to dismiss
real world solutions to *their* problem for rather/totally bogus reasons.
The underlying issue is to use the right tool for the right job, i.e.
not use a mail-*only* agent to read News. But such 'kludges' are the
asker's perogative, and the (potential) responders are free to not
respond.
> How many times does a reader have to read "get a real newsreader" before
> they get tired of such blame-the-victim non-help?
That did not happen here, for the simple reason that I also hate that
attitude, which indeed is elitist.
> I was tired of that
> type of discussion when I switched from "readnews" to "rn" on a BSD 4.1
> VAX over a 2400 baud dial-up.
>
> The poster who started the discussion really needs a mail-to-usenet
> gateway and help to set it up.
I don't dispute that in any way, but does he also 'need' to dismiss
all suggested solutions for such dubious/bogus reasons? I.e. what is
*his* responsibility in all of this, and what is *his* justification for
- effectively - wasting our (posters'and readers') time?
Note that the OP didn't even bother to acknowledge my attempt to help,
let alone answer my (very important) implicit question "You don't
mention your platform/OS" (Yes, I could have guessed that from his
headers, because *GG* is so nice to say which OS was used for *posting
the question*.)
Also note his rude response when I asked for his response to my
solutions ("Nothing. ... There is nothing to write because there is
nothing more to be said.").
Yes, the OP really needs help, but IMO no so much with a
mail-to-usenet gateway. :-(
XS11E
> The more I read "get a real newsreader" comments the more I viewed
> those comments as elitist nonsense.
Hardly, a newsreader just works better and makes it MUCH better for
others in the newsgroup.
> To me a "real newsreader" IS a web browser
No it's not, not to anybody. I believe the term "real newsreader" as
used on Usenet specifically excludes a web browser.
--
XS11E, Killing all posts from Google Groups
The Usenet Improvement Project:
http://twovoyagers.com/improve-usenet.org/
Whiskers
> Doug Freyburger <dfre...@yahoo.com> wrote:
[...]
> Yes, the OP really needs help, but IMO no so much with a
> mail-to-usenet gateway. :-(
I'm beginning to wonder how many trolls there are in this thread ;))
We seem to have two posters for whom it is a matter of principle not to
use a newsreader for reading newsgroups; one thinks a mail reader is the
only tool to use, the other wants to do it in a web browser - and neither
has managed to find a way to do it to their satisfaction (so one gets half
the job done using an obscure and unusual NNTP-to-mbox tool and moans about
not being able to do the other half, and the other ... actually uses a
newsreader).
I've seen a hammer used to get a screw in, and a spoon or a knife to get a
screw out. Such things are not /impossible/ - but I've never found people
to be antagonistic when offered the use of a screwdriver. So I'm puzzled
about resistance to the suggestion that a newsreader might be a good tool
for reading newsgroups.
Doug Freyburger
>
> I'm beginning to wonder how many trolls there are in this thread ;))
Chortle. More than just me and the OP. It's a religious topic.
> the other wants to do it in a web browser -
Right. I checked the century digit on my wrist watch and it doesn't say
19 any more. Hence it's the wrong time to use custom software for a
network service.
> and neither
> has managed to find a way to do it to their satisfaction (so one gets half
> the job done using an obscure and unusual NNTP-to-mbox tool and moans about
> not being able to do the other half, and the other ... actually uses a
> newsreader).
I also keep my Google account current and use it semi-regularly until I
find or write one that does support filters and NoCems and so on.
I've been a developer in the past. It's unlikely but possible I could
try some development in the future. Doing a web widget that handles
user login sessions and supports filter files per user is maybe the
fourth of fifth item on the list of applications I'd like to write.
> I've seen a hammer used to get a screw in, and a spoon or a knife to get a
> screw out. Such things are not /impossible/ - but I've never found people
> to be antagonistic when offered the use of a screwdriver. So I'm puzzled
> about resistance to the suggestion that a newsreader might be a good tool
> for reading newsgroups.
March of technology issue. At some point all software goes obsolete.
Consider - The right answer is a newsreader because those are the tools
that exist. To someone who's never been a developer it's an answer that
makes sense. But developers exist out there. Using that approach
there's never a need for next generation programs.
One nice function of such a web based system is the ability to mine the
filters for commonalities and supply those functions automatically. If
some NSP offered me to block any use who appeared in X% of killfiles I'd
sign up for that feature immediately.
Frank Slootweg
> Whiskers wrote:
> >
> > I'm beginning to wonder how many trolls there are in this thread ;))
>
> Chortle. More than just me and the OP. It's a religious topic.
>
> > the other wants to do it in a web browser -
>
> Right. I checked the century digit on my wrist watch and it doesn't say
> 19 any more. Hence it's the wrong time to use custom software for a
> network service.
is *your* *opinion*.
I find it hard to believe you've been a developer. If you have, then
you should know/realize that 'webnews' (i.e. something like Google
Groups) is *also* "custom software". That that custom software happens
to run (mostly) on servers, instead of (only) on your client system,
doesn't make it any less "custom software" than a 'normal' newsreader.
(It's actually *more* "custom software", because it only works with a
*particular* service provider.)
I won't go into the "a network service" aspect, because that's
obviously your *preference*, not a fact. (I read and write without a
network connection, let alone a network "service".)
[...]
> I've been a developer in the past. It's unlikely but possible I could
> try some development in the future. Doing a web widget that handles
> user login sessions and supports filter files per user is maybe the
> fourth of fifth item on the list of applications I'd like to write.
IOW, you would be writing a web-based *newsreader*, a piece of
"custom software for a network service".
[...]
Anyway, the whole 'dispute' is silly. If we replace newsreader by
'mailer' (UMA) and 'webnews' by webmail, we wouldn't be having this
discussion, would we [1]?
[1] For the subset of "we with a clue".
Whiskers
>>
>> I'm beginning to wonder how many trolls there are in this thread ;))
>
> Chortle. More than just me and the OP. It's a religious topic.
>
>> the other wants to do it in a web browser -
>
> Right. I checked the century digit on my wrist watch and it doesn't say
> 19 any more. Hence it's the wrong time to use custom software for a
> network service.
How does the date have anything to do with it?
>> and neither
>> has managed to find a way to do it to their satisfaction (so one gets half
>> the job done using an obscure and unusual NNTP-to-mbox tool and moans about
>> not being able to do the other half, and the other ... actually uses a
>> newsreader).
>
> I also keep my Google account current and use it semi-regularly until I
> find or write one that does support filters and NoCems and so on.
>
> I've been a developer in the past. It's unlikely but possible I could
> try some development in the future. Doing a web widget that handles
> user login sessions and supports filter files per user is maybe the
> fourth of fifth item on the list of applications I'd like to write.
If all you want is to have a web-browser provide the user interface to
usenet, and the built-in tools in Opera or Seamonkey don't appeal to you,
there's "Newega" <http://newega.free.fr/>. But that's just a conventional
newsreader with a web-server-like front end. There are other offerings
that can present newsgroups in a web browser - see
<http://www.newsreaders.com/web/software.html>.
If you prefer to let the NSP run the newsgroup/webpage interface, then
instead of Google you might find something here
<http://www.dmoz.org/Computers/Usenet/Web_Based/> that appeals to you.
>> I've seen a hammer used to get a screw in, and a spoon or a knife to get a
>> screw out. Such things are not /impossible/ - but I've never found people
>> to be antagonistic when offered the use of a screwdriver. So I'm puzzled
>> about resistance to the suggestion that a newsreader might be a good tool
>> for reading newsgroups.
>
> March of technology issue. At some point all software goes obsolete.
> Consider - The right answer is a newsreader because those are the tools
> that exist. To someone who's never been a developer it's an answer that
> makes sense. But developers exist out there. Using that approach
> there's never a need for next generation programs.
Huh? Bodging is the new progress? Newsreaders are incapable of
development?
> One nice function of such a web based system is the ability to mine the
> filters for commonalities and supply those functions automatically.
I have no idea what that means. What filters do you want to mine? Where
are they? How is a web browser involved?
> If
> some NSP offered me to block any use who appeared in X% of killfiles I'd
> sign up for that feature immediately.
That sounds remarkably like "grouplens"
<http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/gnus/GroupLens.html>,
which is defunct. Gnus and slrn still have the capability available; I
don't know if any other newsreaders do. But such a system is very much a
newsgroup sort of thing, and entirely unlike anything that a web browser
or emailer is equipped to handle. Like any collaborative enterprise in
which anyone can take part, its usefulness depends entirely on who takes
part most often and what their motives and abilities are. Which is
probably why the concept failed.
There are discussions of score-file and kill-file techniques here from time
to time; but people seem to prefer to create their own battery of
'filters' rather than rely on mob rule to do their censorship for them.
If dropping spam and outright abuse (floods, sporge, etc) is something you
want to have done effectively, the best method is to rely on your NSP to
do it for you - Individual.net are very efficient at that without
noticeable 'false positives' in my experience. Datemas and some others
are also quite good at it - and of course, there are some who refuse on
principle to filter out anything, or lack the ability.
Steve Bonine
> (I read and write without a
> network connection, let alone a network "service".)
You obtain your news data telepathically?
Frank Slootweg
Did I say anything even remotely resembling "obtain"? I read,
apparently you don't.
Steve Bonine
Did it hurt much when they removed your sense of humor?
Yes, I figured that you meant that you had a news reader that allowed
you to literally "read and write" offline, without a network connection.
I suppose that could be an important facility, but now that we're past
the days of dialup I don't think it's important to most folks.
Have a happy holiday.
Frank Slootweg
> Frank Slootweg wrote:
> > Steve Bonine<s...@pobox.com> wrote:
> >> Frank Slootweg wrote:
> >>
> >>> (I read and write without a
> >>> network connection, let alone a network "service".)
> >>
> >> You obtain your news data telepathically?
> >
> > Did I say anything even remotely resembling "obtain"? I read,
> > apparently you don't.
>
> Did it hurt much when they removed your sense of humor?
There was too little context to determine whether you were joking or
just a smart-alec. Perhaps you should post more often! :-)
But thanks for asking! Nah, it didn't hurt a bit, but it was a
complete waste of time, because they didn't find anything. What *did*
hurt like hell, was the tin-foil hat that they had to remove first.
> Yes, I figured that you meant that you had a news reader that allowed
> you to literally "read and write" offline, without a network connection.
> I suppose that could be an important facility, but now that we're past
> the days of dialup I don't think it's important to most folks.
Probably not to most, but, especially for email [1], for (very) *many*.
Stationary networks are SO last century (Aren't they, Doug? :-)) and
when mobile/travelling, always-on networks are not always available, so
'off-line' is actually state-of-the-art these days. *Every* mobile
device/setup works that way, and yes, they *do*, *literally*, dial up!
:-)
Anyway, I (part-time) 'do' News and email via a HSDPA/UMTS mobile
connection, and there's NO way I'm going to pay multi-MB-per-message
data charges [2], just because people like Doug think web-based is
the way of the future.
Also travelling in the Australian Outback, where there's *nothing* -
i.e. also no network of *any* kind - for hundreds to thousands of
kilometers, tends to result in an actual clue. :-)
But 'even' when I'm on a stationary broadband connection, I still use
normal (non-web) email and News clients. That way, I allways have all my
'data' at hand, whether there's a network connection or not.
It probably all starts when one uses a notebook/netbook instead of a
'desktop'. Then one realizes what mobility *really* offers.
> Have a happy holiday.
You too. Have a nice chardy on me and I will enjoy some of that nice
pie and egg!
[1] (IMO) For email, the web client versus non-web client tradeoffs are
much more obvious than for News/Usenet, so (IMO) it's best to
concentrate on that.
[2] When roaming in another country, the cost could be easily upto some
40 US$ *per message*.
Mike Easter
> Right. I checked the century digit on my wrist watch and it doesn't
say
> 19 any more. Hence it's the wrong time to use custom software for a
> network service.
gakK! Instead of using nntp reader software with an nntp server, I
should use a web browser interfacing with a webserver interfacing with
some kind of web software of which I have no configurational control.
Instead of using ftp software with an ftp server, I should use a web
browser interfacing with a webserver interfacing with some kind of web
software of which I have no fine tuning control.
Instead of using pop/smtp/imap client software with a mailserver, I
should use a web browser interfacing with a webserver interfacing with
some kind of webmail software.
How do you conclude that everything which accesses via the internet
should function thru' the browser/webserver interface instead of highly
tuned and specific nonbrowser/webserver tools?
--
Mike Easter
Steve Bonine
> Perhaps you should post more often! :-)
Be careful what you wish for.
> Stationary networks are SO last century (Aren't they, Doug? :-)) and
> when mobile/travelling, always-on networks are not always available, so
> 'off-line' is actually state-of-the-art these days. *Every* mobile
> device/setup works that way, and yes, they *do*, *literally*, dial up!
> :-)
OK. For those of us who spend 99% of our time sitting at home, it's not
an issue. For those of you who gallivant around and must have the
newest and shiniest in technology . . . oh, never mind, you're not using
Usenet anyway, the vast majority of you.
> Anyway, I (part-time) 'do' News and email via a HSDPA/UMTS mobile
> connection, and there's NO way I'm going to pay multi-MB-per-message
> data charges [2], just because people like Doug think web-based is
> the way of the future.
OK, help me with this. Seriously. Is there really that much difference
in data transfer volume, "doing" news or email with the "right" client
versus doing it via the web? (And I do happen to agree that the browser
is NOT the "right" client, unless it's the only thing that is available.)
> Also travelling in the Australian Outback, where there's *nothing* -
> i.e. also no network of *any* kind - for hundreds to thousands of
> kilometers, tends to result in an actual clue. :-)
Not much you can do there unless you revert to the telepathic method.
Yeah, you can download news and mail before you enter the no-network
zone, but pretty soon you'll have done with what you downloaded and be
ready for more.
> But 'even' when I'm on a stationary broadband connection, I still use
> normal (non-web) email and News clients. That way, I allways have all my
> 'data' at hand, whether there's a network connection or not.
I understand the desirability of this structure. There are a lot of
Sidekick phone users on the T-Mobile network who understand it, too.
(Well, maybe there aren't a lot of Sidekick users any more. Do people
learn, and change vendors when burned sufficiently?)
> It probably all starts when one uses a notebook/netbook instead of a
> 'desktop'. Then one realizes what mobility *really* offers.
A lot of people who are using laptops these days are doing it at home,
sitting in a comfortable chair. I'm not sure who is buying desktops.
Peter Huebner
says...
>
> Also travelling in the Australian Outback, where there's *nothing* -
> i.e. also no network of *any* kind - for hundreds to thousands of
> kilometers, tends to result in an actual clue. :-)
>
> But 'even' when I'm on a stationary broadband connection, I still use
> normal (non-web) email and News clients. That way, I allways have all my
> 'data' at hand, whether there's a network connection or not.
>
> It probably all starts when one uses a notebook/netbook instead of a
> 'desktop'. Then one realizes what mobility *really* offers.
>
you're moving your 'puter around.
I'd like to add that about half the people whom I support in their
computing activities do NOT have broadband, but still are on dialup, for
the simple reason that they're pensioners who consider broadband too
expensive. The days of dialup are not over for many.
---
Of course, there's the opposite example also of my nephew who moves from
connected place to connected place to connected place and doesn't fancy
shlepping his 'puter around, so he uses imap rather'n pop3 for instance.
Horses for courses.
---
I can see the use of a Swiss Army Knife or a Leatherman (in fact I own
one of each) but for usability and convenience I prefer to use a knife
to cut, pliers to ply and a screwdriver to screw, and that's exactly as
I see the use of a web browser to access news or mail: 2nd best & a
kludge.
-P.
Peter Huebner
>
> A lot of people who are using laptops these days are doing it at home,
> sitting in a comfortable chair. I'm not sure who is buying desktops.
>
Hate those dinky keyboards, don't like those small screens, dislike
working on them if things go wrong ... I want a decent sized keyboard,
my 30" monitor, the sound system that the 'puter is plugged into, the
cabled network ... not to mention that you get a lot more bang for your
buck, hardware-wise.
:-)
Be different if I was spending a lot of time on trains and planes, but I
don't, and so I can please myself. It's totally incomprehensible to me
why those armchair users would want to buy schlepptops. Having younger
eyes and smaller fingers is probably an advantage there.
-P.
Frank Slootweg
> > Anyway, I (part-time) 'do' News and email via a HSDPA/UMTS mobile
> > connection, and there's NO way I'm going to pay multi-MB-per-message
> > data charges [2], just because people like Doug think web-based is
> > the way of the future.
>
> OK, help me with this. Seriously. Is there really that much difference
> in data transfer volume, "doing" news or email with the "right" client
> versus doing it via the web? (And I do happen to agree that the browser
> is NOT the "right" client, unless it's the only thing that is available.)
Yes, there is very much difference in data transfer volume, because
everything *other* than the message, i.e. also all the graphics and
other 'neat' stuff, is schlepped over the network, again and again and
again.
Before posting my previous response, I checked stats for your article
to which I responded. In raw form, i.e. the article itself, it was 2 KB
including all headers (and some more). Viewing the same article via
Google Groups took 300 KB - i.e. 15 times as much - and that was while
most of the non-message stuff was still in my local cache, because I had
done similar things the day before.
> > Also travelling in the Australian Outback, where there's *nothing* -
> > i.e. also no network of *any* kind - for hundreds to thousands of
> > kilometers, tends to result in an actual clue. :-)
>
> Not much you can do there unless you revert to the telepathic method.
> Yeah, you can download news and mail before you enter the no-network
> zone, but pretty soon you'll have done with what you downloaded and be
> ready for more.
Let me give an example how 'off-line' use can be useful:
We were out of mobile reach for some 5 days and some 1200 kilometers.
Then we came to a roadhouse where there was mobile coverage. I used the
mail client in my mobile phone to check and download my mail and then we
went again on our way, back into non-coverage area.
Because of the 'off-line' feature, I didn't have to stay at the
roadhouse and write and send a series of messages, I just could write
the messages at my leisure at the next campground and send them at the
next opportunity. Without 'off-line' use, I would have to remember who
wrote what, etc.. How silly is that, when you have a 'computer' with
you?
> > But 'even' when I'm on a stationary broadband connection, I still use
> > normal (non-web) email and News clients. That way, I allways have all my
> > 'data' at hand, whether there's a network connection or not.
>
> I understand the desirability of this structure. There are a lot of
> Sidekick phone users on the T-Mobile network who understand it, too.
> (Well, maybe there aren't a lot of Sidekick users any more. Do people
> learn, and change vendors when burned sufficiently?)
>
> > It probably all starts when one uses a notebook/netbook instead of a
> > 'desktop'. Then one realizes what mobility *really* offers.
>
> A lot of people who are using laptops these days are doing it at home,
> sitting in a comfortable chair. I'm not sure who is buying desktops.
For the last decade or so, stationary use has also been my *main* use,
but at *multiple* places. For work that was work-at-home and
work-at-the-office. By carrying my notebook with me, I always had access
to everything. Same for private use: home, second home, someone else's
home and, as mentioned before, travelling.
At the moment I'm at home and indeed the couch is very comfy and the
chardy is quite nice as well. In a little while I'll be pressing 'post'
and that's the first time since starting composing this article that
I'll bother the network! :-)
Frank Slootweg
> In article <7pfd1c...@mid.individual.net>, s...@pobox.com says...
>
> > A lot of people who are using laptops these days are doing it at home,
> > sitting in a comfortable chair. I'm not sure who is buying desktops.
>
> Moi. Well not buy, exactly ... build more like.
>
> Hate those dinky keyboards, don't like those small screens, dislike
> working on them if things go wrong ... I want a decent sized keyboard,
> my 30" monitor, the sound system that the 'puter is plugged into, the
> cabled network ... not to mention that you get a lot more bang for your
> buck, hardware-wise.
>
> :-)
I ofcourse depends on what you want to do with your system, but for
most people - and this discussion - it's the web, mail and for us (TINU)
it's also News. For *that* use, a notebook is fine. The screen is big
enough and the keyboard is full size (just 'lacking' the numeric
keypad).
As to things going wrong: In over ten years, I had just *one*
'problem', a dying hard-disk. Replacing that is dead easy. But YMMV and
probably YMWV.
> Be different if I was spending a lot of time on trains and planes, but I
> don't, and so I can please myself. It's totally incomprehensible to me
> why those armchair users would want to buy schlepptops. Having younger
> eyes and smaller fingers is probably an advantage there.
Well, this youngster is 63, has somewhat unstable hands, but indeed
has good vision.
Whiskers
> Frank Slootweg wrote:
[...]
> OK, help me with this. Seriously. Is there really that much difference
> in data transfer volume, "doing" news or email with the "right" client
> versus doing it via the web? (And I do happen to agree that the browser
> is NOT the "right" client, unless it's the only thing that is available.)
[...]
Yes, a big difference:-
Fetching your article from a news-server: 3,590 Bytes
Reading your article in Google Groups: 303,469 Bytes
That comparison doesn't even take into account the additional 'overhead'
of navigating the web forum interface to actually find the thread and the
latest articles in it.
Even the minimalist site <http://al.howardknight.net/> which doesn't
display threads or anything other than the 'source' of one article at a
time, requires 9,054 Bytes to show your article.
Frank Slootweg
[...]
> Before posting my previous response, I checked stats for your article
> to which I responded. In raw form, i.e. the article itself, it was 2 KB
> including all headers (and some more). Viewing the same article via
> Google Groups took 300 KB - i.e. 15 times as much
Oops! 150 times as much.
Well, I *did* mention the chardy bit, didn't I!?
[...]
Eggs Zachtly
>> Frank Slootweg wrote:
>
> [...]
>
>> OK, help me with this. Seriously. Is there really that much difference
>> in data transfer volume, "doing" news or email with the "right" client
>> versus doing it via the web? (And I do happen to agree that the browser
>> is NOT the "right" client, unless it's the only thing that is available.)
>
> [...]
>
> Yes, a big difference:-
>
> Fetching your article from a news-server: 3,590 Bytes
> Reading your article in Google Groups: 303,469 Bytes
Does that size also take into account scripts and such, that have to be
fetched from elsewhere, or just the html page itself? =)
[snippage]
--
Eggs
-A halo has to fall only a few inches to become a noose.
Steve Bonine
> In article<7pfd1c...@mid.individual.net>, s...@pobox.com says...
>>
>> A lot of people who are using laptops these days are doing it at home,
>> sitting in a comfortable chair. I'm not sure who is buying desktops.
>>
> Moi. Well not buy, exactly ... build more like.
Interesting. I wonder how many folks are out there who still do that.
> Hate those dinky keyboards, don't like those small screens, dislike
> working on them if things go wrong ... I want a decent sized keyboard,
> my 30" monitor, the sound system that the 'puter is plugged into, the
> cabled network ... not to mention that you get a lot more bang for your
> buck, hardware-wise.
I'm sure you already know this, but you're well out of sync with the
mainstream here. My laptop has a full-size keyboard (no numeric keypad,
but I never use it) and the 17" screen is plenty for me. Yeah, I'd like
to have more screen real estate, but I'd rather sit in my easy chair and
multitask -- right now I'm watching TV while I read news. I don't use
sound on the computer and when I do I use earphones anyway, and the
wireless network is faster than my Internet connection, so it seldom
slows me down. Given that I buy a computer every 3-4 years, the cost
isn't a big factor.
Now this isn't to say somehow I'm "right" and you're "wrong". We have
different parameters going into the decision about what computer to
buy/use, so naturally we come to different conclusions.
> :-)
>
> Be different if I was spending a lot of time on trains and planes, but I
> don't, and so I can please myself. It's totally incomprehensible to me
> why those armchair users would want to buy schlepptops. Having younger
> eyes and smaller fingers is probably an advantage there.
I think that the issue here is that laptops are the best choice for most
of the buying market these days. The prices have come down and the
function has increased to the point that, for most people, it makes
little sense to buy a desktop. That means that the desktop market is
drying up and the number of choices will decrease.
Not a problem if you build your own . . .
Steve Bonine
> Steve Bonine<s...@pobox.com> wrote:
>> OK, help me with this. Seriously. Is there really that much difference
>> in data transfer volume, "doing" news or email with the "right" client
>> versus doing it via the web? (And I do happen to agree that the browser
>> is NOT the "right" client, unless it's the only thing that is available.)
>
> Yes, there is very much difference in data transfer volume, because
> everything *other* than the message, i.e. also all the graphics and
> other 'neat' stuff, is schlepped over the network, again and again and
> again.
>
> Before posting my previous response, I checked stats for your article
> to which I responded. In raw form, i.e. the article itself, it was 2 KB
> including all headers (and some more). Viewing the same article via
> Google Groups took 300 KB - i.e. 15 times as much - and that was while
> most of the non-message stuff was still in my local cache, because I had
> done similar things the day before.
OK. Makes sense. On the other hand, Whiskers writes in another
followup that a minamalist site "only" requires 9,054 bytes, compared to
3,590 to fetch it from a news server. That's still pretty obscene, but
it's better than a factor of 150 (yes, I read your correction). So if
the amount of data is a big factor, at least it's possible to find a
medium between the best tool and using a browser.
> Let me give an example how 'off-line' use can be useful:
>
> We were out of mobile reach for some 5 days and some 1200 kilometers.
> Then we came to a roadhouse where there was mobile coverage. I used the
> mail client in my mobile phone to check and download my mail and then we
> went again on our way, back into non-coverage area.
>
> Because of the 'off-line' feature, I didn't have to stay at the
> roadhouse and write and send a series of messages, I just could write
> the messages at my leisure at the next campground and send them at the
> next opportunity. Without 'off-line' use, I would have to remember who
> wrote what, etc.. How silly is that, when you have a 'computer' with
> you?
Very silly. Yes, I understand the value of offline capability. But I
also understand how important it is to me, personally . . . which is to
say, not at all. As I said before, that doesn't make it "good" or
"bad", just the way we live. My computer is virtually always connected
when I'm using it, so offline capability is just not something I care about.
> At the moment I'm at home and indeed the couch is very comfy and the
> chardy is quite nice as well. In a little while I'll be pressing 'post'
> and that's the first time since starting composing this article that
> I'll bother the network! :-)
And since I'm using a traditional network, I don't care how often I
bother it . . .
As for the libation of choice, come visit rec.crafts.brewing.
Peter Huebner
says...
>
> As to things going wrong: In over ten years, I had just *one*
> 'problem', a dying hard-disk. Replacing that is dead easy. But YMMV and
> probably YMWV.
>
Mmmh, of course, since I do a bit of servicing (it's only a side-line,
not my profession) I mostly get to see them when they're sick. Buggered
OS, virus attack, hard drive corruption, cd drive dead are the most
common. Buggered USB ports or whassaname [fpga] slot(?) Seen broken
monitor cable/connection to the lid also. Usually no OS CDs in hand,
and/or the proprietary rescue CD has gone missing (wouldn't happen to
mine, alas ...) and once you start undoing those weird little screws to
get at hardware ... 'nuff said.
I'm sure there are many out there that don't ever break for years and
years :)
But your surmise is correct: my 'puter does more than news/mail/web.
That only accounts for about 20-30% of my usage. Even www at 96 dpi on a
smaller monitor won't really work well for me any more; I can either see
the screen or the keyboard, but not both, depending on wether I wear
glasses or not.
I'm curious to see how the supposedly better scaling in the Aero
interface measures up ... the box with Win7 will arrive early next year.
I just bought a 1TB drive in preparation (try and squeeze that into your
lappy! <grin>) at very little cost.
We shall see how Gravity and Pegasus Mail cope with Win7, [that, and my
Delphi5 based accounting software] but I have few concerns on that
account.
-P.
Indi
> Peter Huebner wrote:
>> In article<7pfd1c...@mid.individual.net>, s...@pobox.com says...
>>>
>>> A lot of people who are using laptops these days are doing it at home,
>>> sitting in a comfortable chair. I'm not sure who is buying desktops.
>>>
>> Moi. Well not buy, exactly ... build more like.
>
> Interesting. I wonder how many folks are out there who still do that.
>
>> Hate those dinky keyboards, don't like those small screens, dislike
>> working on them if things go wrong ... I want a decent sized keyboard,
>> my 30" monitor, the sound system that the 'puter is plugged into, the
>> cabled network ... not to mention that you get a lot more bang for your
>> buck, hardware-wise.
>
> I'm sure you already know this, but you're well out of sync with the
> mainstream here. My laptop has a full-size keyboard (no numeric keypad,
> but I never use it) and the 17" screen is plenty for me.
>
For me 17" is too big to be portable and too small for home use.
I use a desktop computer for home, and a 15" laptop for the road.
Since my computer is also my stereo, TV, etc I would not like to
replace it with a laptop. And I think this is not uncommon, so it
may be you who's more outside the mainstream. Most people I kow
seem to have a desktop and a laptop/netbook.
--
indi
Kathy Morgan
> But as soon as a good NSP starts to
> offer a web interface with a killfile I'm there as soon as I learn of
> it.
Newsreader.com is a good NSP that includes a GNKSA web newsreader; I
can't remember if it supports killfiles or not.
--
Kathy
Gene E. Bloch
> In article <7pfifr...@mid.individual.net>, th...@ddress.is.invalid
> says...
>>
>> As to things going wrong: In over ten years, I had just *one*
>> 'problem', a dying hard-disk. Replacing that is dead easy. But YMMV and
>> probably YMWV.
>>
> Mmmh, of course, since I do a bit of servicing (it's only a side-line,
> not my profession) I mostly get to see them when they're sick. Buggered
> OS, virus attack, hard drive corruption, cd drive dead are the most
> common. Buggered USB ports or whassaname [fpga] slot(?) Seen broken
> monitor cable/connection to the lid also. Usually no OS CDs in hand,
> and/or the proprietary rescue CD has gone missing (wouldn't happen to
> mine, alas ...) and once you start undoing those weird little screws to
> get at hardware ... 'nuff said.
> I'm sure there are many out there that don't ever break for years and
> years :)
> But your surmise is correct: my 'puter does more than news/mail/web.
> That only accounts for about 20-30% of my usage. Even www at 96 dpi on a
> smaller monitor won't really work well for me any more; I can either see
> the screen or the keyboard, but not both, depending on wether I wear
> glasses or not.
Perhaps your ophthalmologist, optometrist, or optician can set you up
with a suitable pair of bifocals. I'm luckier; I have single-strength
glasses with enough depth of field to see both, but it's the strength I
chose, not what my eye-doctor recommended for my "street" bifocals...
> I'm curious to see how the supposedly better scaling in the Aero
> interface measures up ... the box with Win7 will arrive early next year.
> I just bought a 1TB drive in preparation (try and squeeze that into your
> lappy! <grin>) at very little cost.
Soon that will be possible, I bet. I mean 2.5" 1TB...
> We shall see how Gravity and Pegasus Mail cope with Win7, [that, and my
> Delphi5 based accounting software] but I have few concerns on that
> account.
> -P.
--
Gene Bloch 650.366.4267 lettersatblochg.com
andrew
> For me 17" is too big to be portable and too small for home use.
> I use a desktop computer for home, and a 15" laptop for the road.
> Since my computer is also my stereo, TV, etc I would not like to
> replace it with a laptop. And I think this is not uncommon, so it
> may be you who's more outside the mainstream. Most people I kow
> seem to have a desktop and a laptop/netbook.
I will admit that I gave my desktop away a few months ago and now work
and play entirely from a laptop. Mind you I have never considered myself
to be 'mainstream' :).
Andrew
--
Do you think that's air you're breathing?
Frank Slootweg
> On 12/23/09, Peter Huebner posted:
> > But your surmise is correct: my 'puter does more than news/mail/web.
> > That only accounts for about 20-30% of my usage. Even www at 96 dpi on a
> > smaller monitor won't really work well for me any more; I can either see
> > the screen or the keyboard, but not both, depending on wether I wear
> > glasses or not.
>
> Perhaps your ophthalmologist, optometrist, or optician can set you up
> with a suitable pair of bifocals. I'm luckier; I have single-strength
> glasses with enough depth of field to see both, but it's the strength I
> chose, not what my eye-doctor recommended for my "street" bifocals...
Or perhaps 'even' *multi*-focals, i.e. where the 'strength' gradually
changes over the surface of the glasses.
I have such glasses and can do almost anything with them, computer,
reading a newspaper/magazine, watching TV, driving a car, etc.. The only
time I take them off are for small things very close by (the screws of
the notebook? :-)).
Multi-focals have a lot of options and qualities and they can become
very expensive (especially if you lose them in the ocean :-(). Mine are
some 2000 US$, but worth every cent.
Yet another alternative is a set of *computer* glasses. These are
fixed focus, but for a different/longer distance than reading glasses.
When I still worked, I had an extra pair of those (they're rather
cheap). Worked very well, but not for walking around in the office,
because then the image was too vague (not that I payed attention to
anyone anyway, but that's a different story).
I hope this helps.
Steve Bonine
> Or perhaps 'even' *multi*-focals, i.e. where the 'strength' gradually
> changes over the surface of the glasses.
The term I've seen for this is "progressive". Are the ones you have
something different?
> I have such glasses and can do almost anything with them, computer,
> reading a newspaper/magazine, watching TV, driving a car, etc.. The only
> time I take them off are for small things very close by (the screws of
> the notebook? :-)).
I also have this type (assuming my progressives are indeed what you're
describing) and am very happy with them. However, my wife tried this
style and could not get used to it. I had no problem adapting, but
other people do.
> Multi-focals have a lot of options and qualities and they can become
> very expensive (especially if you lose them in the ocean :-(). Mine are
> some 2000 US$, but worth every cent.
And this is why I asked about the terminology. That's an order of
magnitude more than mine cost, and I thought my prescription was about
as complex as they get, being as how it has lots of astigmatism in it.
> Yet another alternative is a set of *computer* glasses. These are
> fixed focus, but for a different/longer distance than reading glasses.
> When I still worked, I had an extra pair of those (they're rather
> cheap). Worked very well, but not for walking around in the office,
> because then the image was too vague (not that I payed attention to
> anyone anyway, but that's a different story).
A lot of older folks who wear contacts use this technique for close
vision. I tried contacts recently but decided that although I loved the
convenience of the contacts and my vision correction was great, I hated
the need for the auxiliary glasses to do close work.
Frank Slootweg
> Frank Slootweg wrote:
>
> > Or perhaps 'even' *multi*-focals, i.e. where the 'strength' gradually
> > changes over the surface of the glasses.
>
> The term I've seen for this is "progressive". Are the ones you have
> something different?
No, apparently they are the same thing. We (Dutch) use the terms
multi-focal and varifocal. I looked up the Dutch Wikipedia entry for
"Multifocaal" and then clicked "English" and that brought me to
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_lens>. That page also calls
them varifocal, but not multi-focal.
> > I have such glasses and can do almost anything with them, computer,
> > reading a newspaper/magazine, watching TV, driving a car, etc.. The only
> > time I take them off are for small things very close by (the screws of
> > the notebook? :-)).
>
> I also have this type (assuming my progressives are indeed what you're
> describing) and am very happy with them. However, my wife tried this
> style and could not get used to it. I had no problem adapting, but
> other people do.
My wife also had problems with them, so I got another one! :-)
> > Multi-focals have a lot of options and qualities and they can become
> > very expensive (especially if you lose them in the ocean :-(). Mine are
> > some 2000 US$, but worth every cent.
>
> And this is why I asked about the terminology. That's an order of
> magnitude more than mine cost, and I thought my prescription was about
> as complex as they get, being as how it has lots of astigmatism in it.
Well, mine are also self-coloring, so I hardly ever need sunglasses.
That adds substantially to the price, but makes that you don't have to
swap glasses all the time (nor carry multiple pairs around).
Also the different types of reflection-prevention add substantially to
the price.
[...]
Top
>
> We shall see how Gravity and Pegasus Mail cope with Win7, [that, and my
> Delphi5 based accounting software] but I have few concerns on that
> account.
>
> -P.
>
>
Gravity gets along well with Win 7 both 32bit and 64 bit varieties.
Top
--
For those who have trouble remembering the words for the song '99 Bottles of
Beer on the Wall', somewhere on the Internet there's a page with the
complete lyrics: all 100 verses!
Steve Bonine
> Well, mine are also self-coloring,
Ah well, since the off topic thread has gone this far . . .
How well does that work? The last time I checked the change was not
strong enough to really work as sunglasses, and it took a long time to
change. I suspect they've improved the technology.
Peter J Ross
<in...@16x108.local> wrote:
> On 2009-12-21, Frank Slootweg <th...@ddress.is.invalid> wrote:
>> Indi <in...@16x108.local> wrote:
>>> On 2009-12-21, Frank Slootweg <th...@ddress.is.invalid> wrote:
>> [...]
>>> > There's a lesson in all of this! :-(
>>>
>>> So far it actually looks like two lessons:
>>>
>>> (1) Don't recommend GG for anything, they've removed all traces of
>>> redeeming vale.
>>>
>>> (2) No need to edit my scorefile to allow the OP trough my GG filter.
>>>
>>> I can't imagine why the OP would call your post redundant.
>>> But then in his initial post he claimed he was getting usenet via his ISP,
>>> so perhaps he's a rank n00b and has no idea what you were talking about.
>>
>> Yes, it's getting rather tiresome, these posters who have (read:
>> create) a 'problem' and then are not interested whatsoever in real world
>> solutions, and invent all kinds of 'reasons' why they can't implement
>> the presented solutions.
>>
>> We (T*I*W) need a term for this kind of poster/behaviour. In my head,
>> I call it a RM (or CG (or bgm?)), but we need somthing catchy and
>> descriptive, ie, like we have 'drive-by' for other posters/behaviour.
>
> "Grouper" seems to cover most of them.
"Grouper" (or "Groper", as I prefer) covers most of them, but they're
not all alike.
There are so many of them that their stupidity does need to be
categorised.
> So far I have created just four exceptions in my GG filter;
> that is one miniscule s2n ratio.
Probably, some people discover Usenet through Google Gropes and become
useful contributors.
I can't name any such people, but there are literally hundreds of
newsgroups I don't read, so there *must* be a *few*, surely?.
--
PJR :-)
slrn newsreader v0.9.9p1: http://slrn.sourceforge.net/
extra slrn documentation: http://slrn-doc.sourceforge.net/
newsgroup name validator: http://pjr.lasnobberia.net/usenet/validator
Peter J Ross
Doug Freyburger <dfre...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> so few spammers do repeat posts
*giggle*
Repeating posts is exactly what spammers do. That's what makes them
spammers - or rather, that's what makes *you* spammers, since spamming
is what you, Doug Freyburger, are best known for. The fact that you
repeatedly and spammily advertise a dubious Asatru product instead of
dubious Viagra or Adidas products doesn't save you.
Your opinions are therefore of no interest, because you're a notorious
example of the lowest form of Usenet life.
To quote myself, from Message-ID: <slrnhhtnn...@pjr.gotdns.org>,
posted in 2005:
===[begin_verbatim_text]==============================================
The following is a selection of posts made by Doug Freyburger, a
moderator of news.groups.proposals, during the month of October 2005.
Each post consists of one of three brief boilerplate preambles
followed by upwards of 1000 lines of invariant text. The posts are
thus substantively identical, and the Breidbart Index for the cited
posts exceeds 40[1]. Many others of the same kind could be cited, but
I think these are enough to prove the point that an NGP moderator has
a history as a poster of cancellable spam. (I'd have stopped after
calculating BI>20, but I don't want the evidence to be dismissed if
I've inadvertently made any small clerical errors.)
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/ccd44d179b7382b0?dmode=source>
1 newsgroup; BI = 1.000
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/89b609bee8da591b?dmode=source>
5 newsgroups; BI = 2.236
<http://groups.google.com/group/rec.audio.car/msg/6c4607294ebe4e0f?dmode=source>
3 newsgroups; BI = 1.732
<http://groups.google.com/group/rec.audio.car/msg/c520e4b8c6619584?dmode=source>
4 newsgroups; BI = 2.000
<http://groups.google.com/group/rec.audio.car/msg/fce49e3f2faa5791?dmode=source>
5 newsgroups; BI = 2.236
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/be82dc448820d874?dmode=source>
1 newsgroup; BI = 1.000
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/21e8e6f5f64d3ed5?dmode=source>
1 newsgroup; BI = 1.000
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/1e033a2343b69dd4?dmode=source>
1 newsgroup; BI = 1.000
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/e6b301f3f476e8ef?dmode=source>
5 newsgroups; BI = 2.236
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/217abcfcc256e854?dmode=source>
4 newsgroups; BI = 2.000
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/23b83b79d64f3f72?dmode=source>
4 newsgroups; BI = 2.000
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.revenge/msg/f8f345385b54d021?dmode=source>
3 newsgroups; BI = 1.732
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.revenge/msg/6c46e590a74479c5?dmode=source>
2 newsgroups; BI = 1.414
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.revenge/msg/136b994d5685880c?dmode=source>
2 newsgroups; BI = 1.414
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.revenge/msg/4507af52ff67e765?dmode=source>
2 newsgroups; BI = 1.414
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.revenge/msg/e7050604dacc588a?dmode=source>
3 newsgroups; BI = 1.732
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/f550ff0ac45a0ac8?dmode=source>
1 newsgroup; BI = 1.000
<http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.nordic/msg/26377b0f2aa483fe?dmode=source>
3 newsgroups; BI = 1.732
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/df1ceffad0a35b3c?dmode=source>
5 newsgroups; BI = 2.236
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/a6b3b57a26f98fef?dmode=source>
1 newsgroup; BI = 1.000
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/9ec0e0f38f2645af?dmode=source>
1 newsgroup; BI = 1.000
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/a0c912a68d677410?dmode=source>
4 newsgroups; BI = 2.000
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/1671a55a23ff96eb?dmode=source>
1 newsgroup; BI = 1.000
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/f8f345385b54d021?dmode=source>
3 newsgroups; BI = 1.732
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/6c46e590a74479c5?dmode=source>
2 newsgroups; BI = 1.414
<http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.asatru/msg/136b994d5685880c?dmode=source>
2 newsgroups; BI = 1.414
Total BI for cited posts = 40.674
The above isn't a complete list of this particular spam run. More such
posts can be found where I found them:
<http://preview.tinyurl.com/yds4es>.
I estimate that the total BI for such posts archived in Google during
the chosen period may be in the region of 60-70. However, I was
reading a couple of the groups to which Freyburger was crossposting,
and I know that many substantively identical messages were crossposted
to more than five groups, and are therefore not archived by Google.
The real BI is probably a long way over 100. This can be checked by
anybody who has access to an unfiltered archive.
Taking into account the length of the posts as well as their number,
it's arguable that Freyburger was flooding as well as spamming, but
the criteria for flooding are ill-defined, while the criteria for
spamming are precise enough to cover such obvious instances as I've
cited.
No apology has been forthcoming from Freyburger. Instead, he has
recently defended the posts by claiming that they constitute "FAQs"
and therefore can't be considered spam[2].
The charter for news.groups.proposals states that the Board can remove
unsuitable moderators. I can't imagine anything that would make a
poster less suitable to moderate such a group than Freyburger's
history as an unrepentant abuser of the net. Spammers are generally
regarded as the lowest form of net.life. So is Freyburger going to be
removed from the NGP panel of moderators, or is the evidence going to
be ignored as usual?
Endnotes:
[1]Further reading for those who are unsure what constitutes spam or
what the Breidbart Index is:
Spam Thresholds FAQ <http://www.killfile.org/~tskirvin/faqs/spam.html>
[2]I can't find Freyburger's attempt to defend himself in Google. The
discussion occurred within the past few weeks, and went something like
this:
Me: Freyburger is a spammer.
DF: No I'm not! FAQs aren't spam.
Me: The type of content is irrelevant to the spamminess.
DF: [resounding silence]
===[end_verbatim_text]================================================
Peter J Ross
<th...@ddress.is.invalid> wrote:
> Doug Freyburger <dfre...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> Whiskers wrote:
>> >
>> > I'm beginning to wonder how many trolls there are in this thread ;))
>>
>> Chortle. More than just me and the OP. It's a religious topic.
>>
>> > the other wants to do it in a web browser -
>>
>> Right. I checked the century digit on my wrist watch and it doesn't say
>> 19 any more. Hence it's the wrong time to use custom software for a
>> network service.
>
> is *your* *opinion*.
>
> I find it hard to believe you've been a developer.
It's a well-known fact that SPAMMERS LIE.
It's also a well-known fact that Freyburger is a spammer.
You can join the dots yourself.
Btw, Freyburger is on the fringes of a tiny and rather laughable
neo-Nazi presence on Usenet. Dirk Bruere and Matt Giwer are
technically accomplished neo-Nazis, but Freyburger is basically just a
joke. Even when he spammed with BI>100 he was too stupid to use a
script to do the work.
<...>
Peter J Ross
Bonine <s...@pobox.com> wrote:
> Frank Slootweg wrote:
>> Steve Bonine<s...@pobox.com> wrote:
>>> Frank Slootweg wrote:
>>>
>>>> (I read and write without a
>>>> network connection, let alone a network "service".)
>>>
>>> You obtain your news data telepathically?
>>
>> Did I say anything even remotely resembling "obtain"? I read,
>> apparently you don't.
>
> Did it hurt much when they removed your sense of humor?
Did it hurt much when they removed your ability to read?
*sigh*
Frank's sense of humour involves so much assumed pedantry that you and
he might be arguing until 2011.
<...>
> Have a happy holiday.
You too, Steve! I look forward to some vigorous arguments in
news.groups in the New Year.
Peter J Ross
Bonine <s...@pobox.com> wrote:
> Frank Slootweg wrote:
>
>> Or perhaps 'even' *multi*-focals, i.e. where the 'strength' gradually
>> changes over the surface of the glasses.
>
> The term I've seen for this is "progressive". Are the ones you have
> something different?
Frank's a Dutchman. His English isn't much better than an American's.
(I was thinking of adding a smiley to that line, but I think Frank and
I have known each other long enough to recognise attempts at humour
when we see them.
>> I have such glasses and can do almost anything with them, computer,
>> reading a newspaper/magazine, watching TV, driving a car, etc.. The only
>> time I take them off are for small things very close by (the screws of
>> the notebook? :-)).
>
> I also have this type (assuming my progressives are indeed what you're
> describing) and am very happy with them. However, my wife tried this
> style and could not get used to it. I had no problem adapting, but
> other people do.
I need new glasses. Increasingly, I have to squint when typing, and my
old long-distance glasses are now useless for seeing stuff indoors,
though they can still spot a beggar at 200 yards.
>> Multi-focals have a lot of options and qualities and they can become
>> very expensive (especially if you lose them in the ocean :-(). Mine are
>> some 2000 US$, but worth every cent.
>
> And this is why I asked about the terminology. That's an order of
> magnitude more than mine cost, and I thought my prescription was about
> as complex as they get, being as how it has lots of astigmatism in it.
I think they're usually called "varifocals" over here, but that might
be a trademark.
>> Yet another alternative is a set of *computer* glasses. These are
>> fixed focus, but for a different/longer distance than reading glasses.
>> When I still worked, I had an extra pair of those (they're rather
>> cheap). Worked very well, but not for walking around in the office,
>> because then the image was too vague (not that I payed attention to
>> anyone anyway, but that's a different story).
>
> A lot of older folks who wear contacts use this technique for close
> vision. I tried contacts recently but decided that although I loved the
> convenience of the contacts and my vision correction was great, I hated
> the need for the auxiliary glasses to do close work.
If I wanted to have things glued to my eyeballs, I'd become a
dissident in Orwell's 1984.
Peter J Ross
Morgan <kmo...@spamcop.net> wrote:
> Doug Freyburger <dfre...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> But as soon as a good NSP starts to
>> offer a web interface with a killfile I'm there as soon as I learn of
>> it.
>
> Newsreader.com is a good NSP
What's good about it?
> that includes a GNKSA web newsreader; I
> can't remember if it supports killfiles or not.
Newsguy.com also provides a Web newsreader (DirectReadNews, IIRC),
which has existed for about ten years. Having read and responded to
posts by its users, I'm unimpressed, though it's not as bad as Google.
Of course, Freyburger's idea of "a good NSP" is one that permits him
to spam with impunity, which I don't think Newsguy allows. I'm at a
loss to understand why you, Kathy my friend, are offering technical
help to a spammer. Did you read the evidence I posted about Freyburger
in news.groups in 2005 and occasionally elsewhere later?
Gene E. Bloch
> I hope this helps.
Actually, I use exactly that name for the glasses I had made up, and
your definition fits exactly the choice I made: a bit weaker (in
diopter terms) than normal reading glasses. I can't directly use cheap
reading glasses because my eyes differ from each other by a diopter,
but I have bought dollar-store reading glasses of several strengths,
and swapped lenses to make up suitable glasses of various strengths,
including strong enough to work on watches or other close work, such as
laptop screws :-)
I once tried varifocals to no good effect, although perhaps the
optometrist didn't set them up well. For one thing, they had only a
narrow area, placed high, for distant focus, which made driving awkward
at best and unsafe at worst...
Gene E. Bloch
>> Frank Slootweg wrote:
>>
>>> Or perhaps 'even' *multi*-focals, i.e. where the 'strength' gradually
>>> changes over the surface of the glasses.
>>
>> The term I've seen for this is "progressive". Are the ones you have
>> something different?
> No, apparently they are the same thing. We (Dutch) use the terms
> multi-focal and varifocal. I looked up the Dutch Wikipedia entry for
> "Multifocaal" and then clicked "English" and that brought me to
> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_lens>. That page also calls
> them varifocal, but not multi-focal.
>>> I have such glasses and can do almost anything with them, computer,
>>> reading a newspaper/magazine, watching TV, driving a car, etc.. The only
>>> time I take them off are for small things very close by (the screws of
>>> the notebook? :-)).
>>
>> I also have this type (assuming my progressives are indeed what you're
>> describing) and am very happy with them. However, my wife tried this
>> style and could not get used to it. I had no problem adapting, but
>> other people do.
> My wife also had problems with them, so I got another one! :-)
I also had trouble with contacts, but I couldn't get another me, so I
gave them up.
They were wonderful, but my eyes are crud factories, so I had to carry
my contact lens cases and spare glasses everywhere. It's hard to, for
instance, take out contact lenses in a dark concert hall, and then my
corneas had swollen so that I couldn't really see with the regular
glasses for an hour.
Here's a measure of my IQ: I continued to try to make contact lenses
work over a span of three or four years :-)
[...]
Gene E. Bloch
> Frank Slootweg wrote:
I have felt that those glasses wouldn't work in a car, since although
it's quite bright outside, a relatively small amount of light gets to
them, since the windows cover a fairly restricted solid angle. That's a
good excuse to buy a convertible, yes?
Last fall, when I was getting glasses, I mentioned that problem to the
optician, who told me that today's self-darkening glasses are much
improved and do work OK in a car. I still demurred, though.
I still could use a Porsche Roadster, but I don't have an angel to buy
me one.
Steve Bonine
> I once tried varifocals to no good effect, although perhaps the
> optometrist didn't set them up well. For one thing, they had only a
> narrow area, placed high, for distant focus, which made driving awkward
> at best and unsafe at worst...
I discovered that the size of the lens makes a significant difference
with varifocal/progressive/multifocals. I got new frames with a
prescription change and picked ones that had smaller lens. This made my
head position much more critical. It makes perfect sense that having a
larger area to look through results in effective larger areas for the
various focal lengths. I just didn't consider this until I observed the
effect.
Peter Huebner
>
> I discovered that the size of the lens makes a significant difference
> with varifocal/progressive/multifocals. I got new frames with a
> prescription change and picked ones that had smaller lens. This made my
> head position much more critical. It makes perfect sense that having a
> larger area to look through results in effective larger areas for the
> various focal lengths. I just didn't consider this until I observed the
> effect.
>
That's good to know [for future reference]. I also have a wife who had
lots and lots of trouble with her vari-focals, I think she had to go
back 5 times before she ended up with something that she can actually
see with. At least the optometrist was quite prepared to have new lenses
made until satisfaction was [approximately] achieved, at no further
cost.
Same optometrist warned me that those might not be suitable for me,
since I can have visually induced dizzyness & migraines.
At the moment I'm fine with my 120dpi screen and I can see the keyboard
without glasses. At 'normal' distances I have close to 20/20 vision at
this point, just close up things are getting more and more finicky.
Actually, they've settled quite a bit: 10 years ago things were in flux
and that was just plain aggravating with differences from week to week.
The brain constantly had to recompile the visual circuitry. Used to
drive me up the wall ...
-P.
Kathy Morgan
> In news.software.readers on Wed, 23 Dec 2009 16:28:32 -0900, Kathy
> Morgan <kmo...@spamcop.net> wrote:
>
> > Newsreader.com is a good NSP
>
> What's good about it?
Ah, sorry, I don't know that it's good. As far as I know it is, and the
owner, Curt Welch, is certainly one of the good guys. However, what I
should have said was that Newsreader.com is an NSP with a good web
newsreader.
> > that includes a GNKSA web newsreader; I
> > can't remember if it supports killfiles or not.
>
> Newsguy.com also provides a Web newsreader (DirectReadNews, IIRC),
> which has existed for about ten years. Having read and responded to
> posts by its users, I'm unimpressed, though it's not as bad as Google.
Yes, true, I'd forgotten about them having a web access option. Dunno
how I could have, but I did.
> I'm at a loss to understand why you, Kathy my friend, are offering
> technical help to a spammer. Did you read the evidence I posted about
> Freyburger in news.groups in 2005 and occasionally elsewhere later?
Yes, and his posts admitting to it, but so far as I'm aware he hasn't
repeated the offense now for several years. I believe he didn't then
but now does understand what spam is and that he shouldn't do it.
--
Kathy
Frank Slootweg
Yes, the technology has improved quite a bit in the last few decades,
and there are many different opition/quality_levels to choose from. But
again, quality has it's price.
My glasses work fine as sunglasses. In a car they work a little less,
but they were fine for our last trip in Australia, where the light is
normally very bright and we drove a white (*Is* there any other colour
in Oz? :-)) campervan with a large white engine-cover.
My wife's are newer, even better, and yes, more expensive.
Anyway, I advice to go to a specialist 'shop', i.e. not some 'cheap'
chain store. I.e. where they want to help instead of sell.
andrew
> My glasses work fine as sunglasses. In a car they work a little less,
> but they were fine for our last trip in Australia, where the light is
> normally very bright and we drove a white (*Is* there any other colour
> in Oz? :-)) campervan with a large white engine-cover.
With the recent dust storms even the white cars on the east coast are
all tinted now red....
Kathy Morgan
> Frank Slootweg wrote:
>
> > Or perhaps 'even' *multi*-focals, i.e. where the 'strength' gradually
> > changes over the surface of the glasses.
>
> The term I've seen for this is "progressive". Are the ones you have
> something different?
They're sometimes also called "blended bifocals."
> I also have this type (assuming my progressives are indeed what you're
> describing) and am very happy with them. However, my wife tried this
> style and could not get used to it. I had no problem adapting, but
> other people do.
My optometrist warned me that they might be hard to adapt to, but he was
certain I would like them much better than trifocals if I could adapt,
and that near-sighted people adapt more easily than far-sighted. It
took about 6 months for me to fully adapt, but now that I have, I love
them. At first, I'd look at for instance a large open floor that I knew
was straight and level, but it would look like it was full of frost
heaves and potholes. (For those of you who've never lived in a
permafrost area, frost heaves are ground swellings formed when
permafrost expands and pushes the ground up.)
I do make it a point, though, when I go to the optician to get the
prescription made up, to tell them to make the "bifocal line" higher
than normal because I spend so much time in front of the computer.
--
Kathy
Kathy Morgan
[self-darkening multifocal/progressive lenses]
> Last fall, when I was getting glasses, I mentioned that problem to the
> optician, who told me that today's self-darkening glasses are much
> improved and do work OK in a car. I still demurred, though.
Mine work just fine in a car. They darken fairly quickly and darken
sufficiently that I just never think about sunglasses. The main problem
is when you go from the convertible (or ordinary) car right into a
dimly-lit bar; the lenses are much slower to lighten up and you're
stumbling about in the dark for a bit.
--
Kathy
Doug Freyburger
>
> I discovered that the size of the lens makes a significant difference
> with varifocal/progressive/multifocals. I got new frames with a
> prescription change and picked ones that had smaller lens. This made my
> head position much more critical. It makes perfect sense that having a
> larger area to look through results in effective larger areas for the
> various focal lengths. I just didn't consider this until I observed the
> effect.
One of the things I find irritating about recent styles in glasses is
the smaller lenses. With old glasses there is at least a small area
where my periheral vision does not reach so I have to move my eyes to
see the edge. With glasses purchased in the last 10 years I can look
straight forward and in the peripheral area see all the way around the
lenses except in the places where my two semi-transparent noses block
the view. ;^)
I am far-sighted enough to wear driving glasses though I am technically
legal to drive without them. I recent years my range of focus has
declined so for a while I have been unable to wear my driing glasses at
the computer. I could get bifocals or graduals but I continue to resist.
Based on trying on the cheap reading glasses I think if the cheap ones
went down to +0.50 diopters I would like a pair as my computer glasses
nowadays.
Sabahattin Gucukoglu
> "Tin is a bit much just for this operation"? It is *one* executable,
> what more do you want? And *per definition* multiple NNTP servers will
> require multiple .newsrc files.
I wrote this as a replacement for newsfetch, cutting out the annoyances
of mboxes and of portability problems introduced by needing obscure
sendmail interfaces and scripts that have to shuffle rc files around
(tried leafnode, needs news user; tried slrnpull, directory format a
bit difficult to use):
http://get.sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/newsfetch
That answers both of those questions. I'm sorry to report that I
bought Unison in the end, but the nice people at Panic say they'll work
on the accessibility problems it still has with VoiceOver, so that's
good and maybe I don't mind having paid them after all.
But I'm happy to say that with BananaSplit's help (thanks Whiskers), I
now have a reasonably convenient mail2news interface for non-catchup
work to newsgroups. With this Unison, I can catch up, and also operate
in thirdparty newsgroups not on the global 'net (so unreachable to
mail2news). Also had the nice opportunity to cut out my ISP's
not-so-great news servers.
>> Also inews will have to be a fake, because I'm not installing an
>> entire news server to make this work, which discards leafnode and, to
>> a certain extent, slrnpull (though I'll have a look at the spool
>> format).
>
> Of course you can use a standalone inews. I never said otherwise. And
> it will be as real as it gets, not 'fake'.
The experience I had with previous inews' I used, written in perl and
suchlike, is that they were quite lame, not supporting authentication
or SSL for instance. That makes them "Fake."
>
> No offense, but not wanting to "install an entire news server" is
> rather silly. First of all it's *you* who wants the kludge of using a
> mail program as a newsreader. Secondly, leafnode is hardly "an entire
> news server" and to call slrnpull a news server is a big stretch.
>
> It looks to me - and I'm sure not only to me - that you want to do
> things the hard way - i.e. using a mail-only program to read News -, but
> at the same time want it to be easy. A tad inconsistent, I would say.
No. Mail and news formats are vanishingly unlike each other. There is
no good reason why a program built for one cannot handle another, and
no reason why either the idea or the task of converting between the
transports should be even remotely hard to understand or implement (see
above).
> There's a lesson in all of this! :-(
Probably for me, it is that people are more resistant to change than
perhaps they like to admit. No, seriously. If I'd known the stock
response was, "Get a newsreader and do it like real men" from the
start, instead of complaints about how impossible a task of gatewaying
to mail was, how ignorant I must be to use Google Groups or to talk
about ISP news service when using a web browser, how I have every
reason to use a newsreader, how my methods or motivations must be
flawed not to be using decades-old methods/software/techniques, etc etc
etc, I'd not have bothered asking. Which is not to say I'm not
ungrateful for the responses I've had, but to paraphrase what somebody
else on the thread said, I checked my watch and the century digits
display isn't 19 any more. Wake up; OE did news since it was Internet
Mail and News. Alpine does it. CONE does it. Gnus does it. Mutt
does it. Mozilla does it. If Apple ever puts my suggestion into
effect (I expect them to ignore it, of course), dammit, Mail.app will
do it too. I love NNTP and usenet, but it's the back alley bulletin
board of today's Internet *, and it belongs alongside my mail and RSS
feeds now.
Cheers,
Sabahattin
* Google Wave, now, there's another problem altogether.
Sabahattin Gucukoglu
>> Anyway, I (part-time) 'do' News and email via a HSDPA/UMTS mobile
>> connection, and there's NO way I'm going to pay multi-MB-per-message
>> data charges [2], just because people like Doug think web-based is
>> the way of the future.
Just so you know, Google has you covered even then, with Google Gears +
Offline. That's just in case you were thinking they'd not hold a
candle to your favourite news+mailer. (Yes, Mail.app always caches
everything too by default. No, you won't get me using the web for mail
or news on a regular basis, as with you, in preference to a client.)
My take: dependence on the 'net is not desirable, but connectivity is
preferable to not. This generally means that a hundred quid will get
spent on HSDPA while I'm abroad on holiday.
Cheers,
Sabahattin
andrew
> That answers both of those questions. I'm sorry to report that I
> bought Unison in the end, but the nice people at Panic say they'll work
> on the accessibility problems it still has with VoiceOver, so that's
> good and maybe I don't mind having paid them after all.
Just had a quick look at the Unison website:
and it looks very nice, in a glossy sort of Apple way :).
Frank Slootweg
[...]
> Probably for me, it is that people are more resistant to change than
> perhaps they like to admit. No, seriously. If I'd known the stock
> response was, "Get a newsreader and do it like real men" from the
> start, instead of complaints about how impossible a task of gatewaying
> to mail was, how ignorant I must be to use Google Groups or to talk
> about ISP news service when using a web browser, how I have every
> reason to use a newsreader, how my methods or motivations must be
> flawed not to be using decades-old methods/software/techniques, etc etc
> etc, I'd not have bothered asking. Which is not to say I'm not
> ungrateful for the responses I've had, but to paraphrase what somebody
> else on the thread said, I checked my watch and the century digits
> display isn't 19 any more. Wake up; OE did news since it was Internet
> Mail and News. Alpine does it. CONE does it. Gnus does it. Mutt
> does it. Mozilla does it. If Apple ever puts my suggestion into
> effect (I expect them to ignore it, of course), dammit, Mail.app will
> do it too.
Sorry, but that's some very serious straw man! *Nobody* said you
shouldn't use a *combined* mail/News client. What we 'objected' to -
especially because it gave *you* problems - is to *mis*-use a
mail-*only* client (Mail.app) as a newsreader.
> I love NNTP and usenet, but it's the back alley bulletin
> board of today's Internet *, and it belongs alongside my mail and RSS
> feeds now.
You're entitled to your opinion, much as we are entitled to our
opinion not to use hacks when perfectly good solutions, specifically
*designed* for the job at hand, exist.
Sabahattin Gucukoglu
:-) It is actually better than I first gave it credit for, obviously doing Format/Flowed and MIME right. It does go OTT sometimes with the usability, but it's worth it just the same, even if it misses out a few nice features that Hogwasher had. It is at least fully Cocoa and works really quite well with the Mac's screen reader, and the two-pane view is sorta proper. It's fast and crashes very infrequently. And the binaries, they're well awesome. Still not to rival Mail for threading or filtering IMHO, but, very nice.
Cheers,
Sabahattin
Indi
Well, he was asking about being able to use Apple's Mail.app for usenet,
which of course is possible, but not quite as easy as he needed it to be
-- so the solution he chose was switching to an integrated mail/news
client. Which just goes to show that many users don't actually know what
they want and thus ask the wrong questions. :)
--
indi
Sabahattin Gucukoglu
> Well, he was asking about being able to use Apple's Mail.app for usenet,
> which of course is possible, but not quite as easy as he needed it to be
> -- so the solution he chose was switching to an integrated mail/news
> client.
Eh? No, I'm now using Mail.app for Usenet, and it's really quite pleasant, ta very much. It was worth the effort to make that happen, because to be honest the myriad of alternatives for the Mac were not up to the same standard. It isn't of course as convenient as a full newsreader in the sense of having to write to a gateway or being able to peruse previous postings, but I now have one of those too for when I need to do more than just follow on my favourite groups, which is all I could hope for. Bonus, I can do it from an iPhone, courtesy of IMAP. Lovely. Dammit, Usenet is so twentieth-century, isn't it? :-)
In the course of searching for ready-made answers I came across this:
http://www.news2mail.com/
Apparently, I wasn't the only one. No posting though. The admin of bananasplit sent me the mail2news code, so I'll see what I can make of that, but the public gateway is just fine. I will need Unison (a dedicated newsreader) for dealing with private groups, though I'm already getting tired of those.
Cheers,
Sabahattin
Indi
I'd've sworn you said you switched to Unison...
--
indi
Mike Yetto
> On 28 Dec 2009, at 23:40, Indi wrote:
>> Well, he was asking about being able to use Apple's Mail.app for usenet,
>> which of course is possible, but not quite as easy as he needed it to be
>> -- so the solution he chose was switching to an integrated mail/news
>> client.
>
> Eh? No, I'm now using Mail.app for Usenet, and it's really quite pleasant, ta very much.
It would be more so for your readers if you bothered to wrap the
lines.
> It was worth the effort to make that happen, because to be
> honest the myriad of alternatives for the Mac were not up to
> the same standard. It isn't of course as convenient as a full
> newsreader in the sense of having to write to a gateway or
> being able to peruse previous postings, but I now have one of
> those too for when I need to do more than just follow on my
> favourite groups, which is all I could hope for. Bonus, I can
> do it from an iPhone, courtesy of IMAP. Lovely. Dammit,
> Usenet is so twentieth-century, isn't it? :-)
>
This has always struck me as meaningless. That may be due to the
fact that I never saw the timeline for when any particular
method, style or technique is scheduled for redundance or
obsolescence. Could you, possibly, post a URL for that
information?
> In the course of searching for ready-made answers I came across
> this: http://www.news2mail.com/
>
> Apparently, I wasn't the only one. No posting though. The
> admin of bananasplit sent me the mail2news code, so I'll see
> what I can make of that, but the public gateway is just fine.
> I will need Unison (a dedicated newsreader) for dealing with
> private groups, though I'm already getting tired of those.
>
> Cheers, Sabahattin
>
Mike "I suppose gopher is right out as well" Yetto
--
In theory, theory and practice are the same.
In practice they are not.
Frank Slootweg
Sabahattin Gucukoglu <ma...@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com> wrote:
[...]
> Eh? No, I'm now using Mail.app for Usenet, and it's really quite
> pleasant, ta very much. It was worth the effort to make that happen,
> because to be honest the myriad of alternatives for the Mac were not
> up to the same standard. It isn't of course as convenient as a full
> newsreader in the sense of having to write to a gateway or being able
> to peruse previous postings, but I now have one of those too for when
> I need to do more than just follow on my favourite groups, which is
> all I could hope for. Bonus, I can do it from an iPhone, courtesy of
> IMAP. Lovely. Dammit, Usenet is so twentieth-century, isn't it? :-)
Somewhat of a bummer that there are *multiple* News/Usenet
newsreaders - including free (of cost) ones - for the iPhone, isn't it?
But then, the iPhone is so twentieth-century, isn't it? :-(
[...]
Gene E. Bloch
I might be doing that in a bar without regard to the glasses :-)
Point well taken, though - and I am old enough that my eyes are slow to
readapt to brightness changes without adding external problems such as
the above.
Gene E. Bloch
>> Frank Slootweg wrote:
>>
>>> Or perhaps 'even' *multi*-focals, i.e. where the 'strength' gradually
>>> changes over the surface of the glasses.
>>
>> The term I've seen for this is "progressive". Are the ones you have
>> something different?
> They're sometimes also called "blended bifocals."
That's a different animal. It just means that the bifocal line is --
well, blended. Progressive has focal-length changes through a range of
strengths over a lot of the real esate of the lenses.
<SNIP>
> I do make it a point, though, when I go to the optician to get the
> prescription made up, to tell them to make the "bifocal line" higher
> than normal because I spend so much time in front of the computer.
Which is why I get single-strength glasses for the computer. It's
really just a variation of what you do...
Sabahattin Gucukoglu
> Mike "I suppose gopher is right out as well" Yetto
Unless you count lynx or Squid, pretty much. Or you can use:
http://www.floodgap.com/
Cheers,
Sabahattin
Sabahattin Gucukoglu
On 29 Dec 2009, at 18:13, Frank Slootweg wrote:
> [Wrapping of *new* text (How silly is *that*?) de-crapped. ]
Oh, I'm so sorry. MIME hasn't been invented yet, has it?
(Seriously though, I see it as wrapped to 72 with Format/Flowed in my newsreader, that's how I want it; if it's different please tell me.)
> Sabahattin Gucukoglu <ma...@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com> wrote:
>> Eh? No, I'm now using Mail.app for Usenet, and it's really quite
>> pleasant, ta very much. It was worth the effort to make that happen,
>> because to be honest the myriad of alternatives for the Mac were not
>> up to the same standard. It isn't of course as convenient as a full
>> newsreader in the sense of having to write to a gateway or being able
>> to peruse previous postings, but I now have one of those too for when
>> I need to do more than just follow on my favourite groups, which is
>> all I could hope for. Bonus, I can do it from an iPhone, courtesy of
>> IMAP. Lovely. Dammit, Usenet is so twentieth-century, isn't it? :-)
>
> Somewhat of a bummer that there are *multiple* News/Usenet
> newsreaders - including free (of cost) ones - for the iPhone, isn't it?
>
It might be if it were true, yes. But as there's only one, and it's crippled unless you pay for it, and as it doesn't do IMAP, it's of considerably less use that it could be. (Jailbreaking not under consideration.)
> But then, the iPhone is so twentieth-century, isn't it? :-(
Right. No other product could be so popular and yet be so passe. It's a rare treasure. And IMAP, well that's just a fad taken on by people with non-RAID laptop hard disk configurations who wouldn't know reliability if it slapped them in the face. Damn them and their newfangled nonsense!
Cheers,
Sabahattin
PS: Please �*can* you *stop* using *so* many *damn* asterisks? It's getting *very* hard *indeed* to read!
Sabahattin Gucukoglu
> On 29 Dec 2009, at 18:13, Frank Slootweg wrote:
>> [Wrapping of *new* text (How silly is *that*?) de-crapped. ]
>
> Oh, I'm so sorry. MIME hasn't been invented yet, has it?
>
> (Seriously though, I see it as wrapped to 72 with Format/Flowed in my
> newsreader, that's how I want it; if it's different please tell me.)
No, sorry, something's not right here; Format/Flowed isn't being
generated, but the lines are being broken before encoding, so that you
would see very long lines if you did MIME and QP encoding if not.
That's not right, so I'll fix that.
Cheers,
Sabahattin
Frank Slootweg
The lines were not being broken and there was no encoding. The headers
only *said* so:
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
> Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v1077)
> Date: Wed, 30 Dec 2009 05:41:58 +0000
> Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
> Message-ID: <5C553AD8-A6CD-4F59...@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com>
> X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.1077)
Frank Slootweg
> Okay, so I'm biting the troll. It's obvious now. I should kill
> myself, but I haven't the nerve. Maybe tomorrow. Or next week. Or
> the week after ...
It's not a troll, unless you consider people, who have the audacity to
talk back at you, as trolls. If so, you're - sadly enough - not alone
with that rather strange notion.
> On 29 Dec 2009, at 18:13, Frank Slootweg wrote:
> > [Wrapping of *new* text (How silly is *that*?) de-crapped. ]
>
> Oh, I'm so sorry. MIME hasn't been invented yet, has it?
>
> (Seriously though, I see it as wrapped to 72 with Format/Flowed in my
> newsreader, that's how I want it; if it's different please tell me.)
Addressed in my response to your fix.
> > Sabahattin Gucukoglu <ma...@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com> wrote:
> >> Eh? No, I'm now using Mail.app for Usenet, and it's really quite
> >> pleasant, ta very much. It was worth the effort to make that
> >> happen, because to be honest the myriad of alternatives for the Mac
> >> were not up to the same standard. It isn't of course as convenient
> >> as a full newsreader in the sense of having to write to a gateway
> >> or being able to peruse previous postings, but I now have one of
> >> those too for when I need to do more than just follow on my
> >> favourite groups, which is all I could hope for. Bonus, I can do
> >> it from an iPhone, courtesy of IMAP. Lovely. Dammit, Usenet is so
> >> twentieth-century, isn't it? :-)
> >
> > Somewhat of a bummer that there are *multiple* News/Usenet
> > newsreaders - including free (of cost) ones - for the iPhone, isn't
> > it?
>
> It might be if it were true, yes. But as there's only one, and it's
> crippled unless you pay for it, and as it doesn't do IMAP, it's of
> considerably less use that it could be. (Jailbreaking not under
> consideration.)
Google says it's true. I just used "iphone nntp newsreader". Hardly
rocket science.
> > But then, the iPhone is so twentieth-century, isn't it? :-(
>
> Right. No other product could be so popular and yet be so passe.
> It's a rare treasure. And IMAP, well that's just a fad taken on by
> people with non-RAID laptop hard disk configurations who wouldn't know
> reliability if it slapped them in the face. Damn them and their
> newfangled nonsense!
You seem to be under the impression that some of the respondents have
a problem with IMAP. We don't. The use of IMAP for non-mail messages
(i.e. in this case News articles) is just very uncommon. Hence - as you
found out -, there won't be much - if any - newsreading software that
uses IMAP.
> Cheers,
> Sabahattin
>
> PS: Please *can* you *stop* using *so* many *damn* asterisks? It's
> getting *very* hard *indeed* to read!
Nope. As long as people demonstrate that they can't read/understand
what was written *with* emphasis, there's no point to leave it out.
BTW, with a client which is somewhat upto scratch, you can configure
how the emphasis-asterisks are handled/displayed.
Steve Bonine
> Google says it's true.
Did you check that conclusion using WikiPedia?
:) <----- smiley
Mike Yetto
Do all your solutions to accessing data with any protcol always
involve http?
Mike "that must be a nail, I have a hammer" Yetto
Mike Yetto
>
> (Seriously though, I see it as wrapped to 72 with Format/Flowed
> in my newsreader, that's how I want it; if it's different
> please tell me.)
>
Communication is a cooperative task. If you wish to cooperate
only with yourself, be my guest.
Mike "in your own personal idiom?" Yetto
Indi
> Okay, so I'm biting the troll. It's obvious now. I should kill myself, but I haven't the nerve. Maybe tomorrow. Or next week. Or the week after ...
>
You do have a lot of drama, don't yu?
> On 29 Dec 2009, at 18:13, Frank Slootweg wrote:
>> [Wrapping of *new* text (How silly is *that*?) de-crapped. ]
>
> Oh, I'm so sorry. MIME hasn't been invented yet, has it?
>
> (Seriously though, I see it as wrapped to 72 with Format/Flowed in my newsreader, that's how I want it; if it's different please tell me.)
>
Yes, your text doesn't wrap though apparently your viewing of text does.
Embarrassing, isn't it? *So* last century...
:)
>>
> It might be if it were true, yes. But as there's only one, and it's crippled unless you pay for it, and as it doesn't do IMAP, it's of considerably less use that it could be. (Jailbreaking not under consideration.)
>
With tens of thousands of apps available?
Hard to believe.
>
> Right. No other product could be so popular and yet be so passe. It's a rare treasure.
>
No, it's not passe - just for "the masses" (vs "the clueful)". I understand the appeal,
but it's still the webTV of phones.
> And IMAP, well that's just a fad taken on by people with non-RAID laptop hard disk configurations who wouldn't know reliability if it slapped them in the face. Damn them and their newfangled nonsense!
>
> Cheers,
> Sabahattin
>
> PS: Please ?*can* you *stop* using *so* many *damn* asterisks? It's getting *very* hard *indeed* to read!
>
Hmmm. Asterisks don't seem to interfere with readability here.
--
indi
Indi
Netcraft confirmed it.
--
indi
Peter J Ross
Morgan <kmo...@spamcop.net> wrote:
> Peter J Ross <p...@example.invalid> wrote:
>
>> In news.software.readers on Wed, 23 Dec 2009 16:28:32 -0900, Kathy
>> Morgan <kmo...@spamcop.net> wrote:
>>
>> > Newsreader.com is a good NSP
>>
>> What's good about it?
>
> Ah, sorry, I don't know that it's good. As far as I know it is, and the
> owner, Curt Welch, is certainly one of the good guys. However, what I
> should have said was that Newsreader.com is an NSP with a good web
> newsreader.
I know that Curt is one of the good guys. I'm just a little tired of
unsubstantiated recommendations.
>> > that includes a GNKSA web newsreader; I
>> > can't remember if it supports killfiles or not.
>>
>> Newsguy.com also provides a Web newsreader (DirectReadNews, IIRC),
>> which has existed for about ten years. Having read and responded to
>> posts by its users, I'm unimpressed, though it's not as bad as Google.
>
> Yes, true, I'd forgotten about them having a web access option. Dunno
> how I could have, but I did.
If you work out how you brewed the brew of Lethe, let me know.
>> I'm at a loss to understand why you, Kathy my friend, are offering
>> technical help to a spammer. Did you read the evidence I posted about
>> Freyburger in news.groups in 2005 and occasionally elsewhere later?
>
> Yes, and his posts admitting to it, but so far as I'm aware he hasn't
> repeated the offense now for several years.
Yep. He stopped as soon as he realised that soc.religion.asatru would
serve his odious purposes better. (Check the dates.)
> I believe he didn't then
> but now does understand what spam is and that he shouldn't do it.
I believe that he has no idea what spam is, and will do it again if
his nasty Asatru cult is universally maligned on Usenet again.
Of course, soc.religion.asatru will have to rmgrouped before
Freyburger will expose himself to a debate he doesn't control.
And he'll have to lose such a debate before he'll resort to spamming
on a vast scale again.
But I notice that you haven't suggested that he's apologetic about his
net-abuse. At best, it's been a few years since he last did it and
he's not planning to do it again.
It's been a long time since Canter & Siegal last spammed Usenet, and
they're probably not planning to do it again. Perhaps they should be
invited to be moderators of a news.* newsgroup.
--
PJR :-)
slrn newsreader v0.9.9p1: http://slrn.sourceforge.net/
extra slrn documentation: http://slrn-doc.sourceforge.net/
newsgroup name validator: http://pjr.lasnobberia.net/usenet/validator
Kathy Morgan
> On 29 Dec 2009, at 18:13, Frank Slootweg wrote:
> > [Wrapping of *new* text (How silly is *that*?) de-crapped. ]
>
> (Seriously though, I see it as wrapped to 72 with Format/Flowed in my
> newsreader, that's how I want it; if it's different please tell me.)
The Format/Flowed is not working properly. With Format/Flowed, a client
which understands F/F should see the lines wrapped at the edge of the
window; clients which don't under F/F should see lines of 72 characters.
That's not what we're seeing; we're seeing very long lines.
> PS: Please �*can* you *stop* using *so* many *damn* asterisks? It's
> getting *very* hard *indeed* to read!
a) Please wrap your lines to 72 characters. It's getting *very* tedious
rewrapping your long lines. b) Many newsreaders (but apparently not
yours) interpret words wrapped in asterisks as bolded text and don't
show the asterisks.
--
Kathy
Whiskers
> Bada bing Sabahattin Gucukoglu <ma...@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com> bada bang:
>> On 29 Dec 2009, at 15:45, Mike Yetto wrote:
>>> Mike "I suppose gopher is right out as well" Yetto
>>
>> Unless you count lynx or Squid, pretty much. Or you can use:
>> http://www.floodgap.com/
>>
>
> Do all your solutions to accessing data with any protcol always
> involve http?
>
> Mike "that must be a nail, I have a hammer" Yetto
Lynx does the gopher:// protocol quite well. Gopher does it better, in
theory, but in practice it's hard to tell the difference. If you use
Gopher, you'll soon find you need a 'helper program' to handle any
hyperlinks - which Lynx handles natively.
--
-- ^^^^^^^^^^
-- Whiskers
-- ~~~~~~~~~~