.lm 3 .rm 72 .sp1 .ap .p 0,1,3 .enable bar .c74;----------------------------------- .c74;| NEWS | .c74;| USENET News reading utility | .c74;| User's manual | .c74;----------------------------------- .c74;version 3.00 .c74;(c) 1988 Christopher Seline .sk 4 ^&Conventions used in this document:\& .begin bar Sections that describe advanced concepts are denoted by vertical bars in the left margin. This information is intended for the more experienced user, and can be skipped at the first reading. .end bar .sk 4 .c74;*** ^&Introduction\& *** ^&About USENET News\& "News" is a utility that enables users on a network site not directly on USENET (e.g., bitnet users) to read the news that is circulated around the world on USENET, commonly known as netnews. Netnews is a huge bulletin board of sorts: a forum of open discussion and/or announcements on many topics in which all of the thousands of readers are welcome to participate. Netnews is divided into well over 200 newsgroups, each of which is devoted to a particular topic. The subject names are split first into general areas, then into more specific topics. The root classifications are: .lit news - about netnews sci - science comp - computers soc - social rec - recreation misc - miscellaneous talk - discussions .el There are other initial names of groups that are specific to the network site. For example, 'att' denotes newsgroups specific to AT_&T, and can only be read by users using an AT_&T node. Beyond these classifications, the newsgroup names get progressively more specific. Examples: comp.sys.ibm.pc, rec.arts.startrek, soc.college, and rec.auto. Each newsgroup name should be sufficiently descriptive of the topic discussed. When you read netnews for the first time, the first newsgroup you go into will be "news.announce.newusers". READ EVERY ARTICLE IN IT. It contains information and guidelines about netnews that every reader is expected to know. ^&Getting started with NEWS\& Before running news, it is necessary to define the variable 'news__farsite', like so: .sk1 .c74;define news__farsite [local-value] This is a code that tells NEWS how to contact the nearest USENET site. Since this will be a different value on each system, your system manager will tell you what your local value is. It is easiest to put this definition in your login.com file, so you don't have to remember it each time you read the news. News is a VAX TPU (Text Processing Utility) program. This means that to run the program, you invoke the TPU editor with a special command file. This file should be stored in a public directory. Here is how the program is run at Oberlin: .sk1 .c74;edit/tpu/sec=softlib:[share]news Your system manager will be able to tell you where the program is on your system. Replace 'softlib:[share]news' above with the appropriate directory and file name. To make this procedure easier, you can define the above command as something else in your login.com file, like so: .sk1 .c74;$define news edit/tpu/sec=softlib:[share]news Again, replace this filename with the one specific to your system. After this is done, simply type 'news' to run the program. .sk3 .c74;*** ^&Your First NEWS Session\& *** ^&Establishing the link to netnews\& When you run NEWS for the first time it takes a minute to create a necessary information file in your directory. NEWS will tell you that it is creating a new subscription for you. Every time you invoke NEWS it will take several moments to access netnews at your USENET site. It should blink 'Loading active' near the bottom right corner of the screen until it establishes the link. If there is an outright error in accessing the USENET node, you will know right away, and will be prompted to hit 'q' to quit. If this happens, either the link is temporarily down or you are trying to access the USENET node incorrectly (due to an incorrect news__farsite value). If you are sure you have the correct news__farsite value defined, try again later. If it blinks 'Loading active' for more than a few minutes, either the network load is too high or the USENET node is having problems of its own. Try again later. ^&Screen layout\& The screen is split into two sections, separated by a bar of inverse text. The top (largest) part of the screen is the main display area; this is where the news articles are displayed. The area below the bar is where NEWS program messages and error messages are displayed. The inverse-video bar acts as a status line, and also reminds you of two important commands: -Z to exit, and '?' for help. The status information includes the newsgroup you are currently reading, the current article number, and the number of remaining articles in that newsgroup. The article number is probably already quite high. This is because the numbers have not been reset since the newsgroup began. You cannot read the articles before the one that NEWS starts you at; they have been discarded due to old age. ^&On-line help\& On-line command information is displayed with '?' or 'h'. Hit '1' to return to reading the news. On VT-100 type terminals, keypad information is also available with the PF2 key. '1' exits this help screen as well. ^&Newsgroup subscriptions\& When you run NEWS for the first time, you are automatically 'subscribed' to all the newsgroups, meaning you have the opportunity to read articles in every group. Since you will probably not be interested in all the topics, you will want to un-subscribe to most groups. After you un-subscribe to a newsgroup, you will not see any of its articles again unless you re-subscribe to it. See the section titled 'Selecting newsgroups' for a discussion of how to choose your subscriptions. Remember to read everything in 'news.announce.newusers' before moving on to the rest of netnews. .page .c74;*** ^&Reading Articles\& *** The up and down arrows scroll the screen in both directions. However, there are easier ways to page through the articles. The space bar scrolls down to next screen. If you are at the end of an article, this will also move to the next article. If you are at the end of the last article in a newsgroup, it will move to the next available newsgroup and wait for further instructions before reading any articles. Note that when you advance to the next article there is a delay as the program blinks 'Retrieving' in the message window. This is because it takes time to grab the file from the USENET node. Other commands: .lm 9 .p -6,1,3 >#####Go to the end of the current article. <#####Go to the top of the current article. n#####Advances to next article, even if you have not seen all of the current article. _######Go to a particular article number, which NEWS prompts you for. If you skip forward, NEWS will count the skipped articles as read when you exit. This means that when you re-enter NEWS, your current position in that newsgroup will be beyond those missed articles. s#####Save the current article to a file. NEWS will prompt you for a filename and inform you when the process is complete. c#####Catch up in the newsgroup. This marks all the active articles as read, so you can start fresh with all future articles. This is a good way to rationalize not sifting through all the remaining articles. C#####Un-catch up. This returns your current article number to the first active (and unread) article in the newsgroup. .sk1 The following commands utilize the keypad on VT-100 type terminals: .lm 9 .p -6,1,3 <0>###Page down. This differs from the space bar in that it will not advance any further when it reaches the end of the current article. <_.>###Page up. As with '0', this will not move beyond the current article. .lm 14 .p -11,1,3 ###Advance to the next message. Identical to the 'n' command. .page .c74;*** ^&Selecting Newsgroups\& *** .lm 3 .p 0,1,3 ^&Moving between newsgroups\& The following commands allow you to choose your current newsgroup: .lm 9 .p -6,1,3 N#####Go to the next subscribed newsgroup. Note the difference between 'N' and 'n'. g#####Go to the next non-specific newsgroup. NEWS will prompt you for a newsgroup name, and will advance to the next newsgroup that contains the requested string. For example, enter 'ibm' and it will move to the next newsgroup that has 'ibm' in its name. If it does not find the specified keyword in any newsgroups, it will remain in the current group. G#####Go to the next specific newsgroup. This time, when NEWS prompts you for a newsgroup name, you must enter the full name of the newsgroup, such as 'comp.sys.ibm.pc'. If it does not find the specified newsgroup, it will remain in the current group. Also, on the VT-100 keypad: <,>###Go to the next subscribed newsgroup. Identical to the 'N' command. PF1###Go to the next non-specific newsgroup. Identical to the 'g' command. .lm 3 .p 0,1,3 With all commands that change the current newsgroup, NEWS will wait for you to decide if you want to read articles in that newsgroup. Hit the space bar or 'n' to read the first article. .sk1 ^&Subscribing to specific newsgroups\& The following commands allow you to choose which newsgroups to read and which ones to skip next time you read netnews. .lm 9 .p -6,1,3 u#####Unsubscribe to the current newsgroup. If you are reading an article, NEWS will advance to the next available newsgroup and wait for instructions. U#####Un-unsubscribe to the current newsgroup. Returns the current article number to the first unread article. 2#####(on the regular keyboard) Display the list of newsgroups. This will replace the article area on the screen with a list of all newsgroups available, as well as your current article number in that newsgroup. You can scroll around with the same commands as you use to read messages - the arrow keys, the space bar, '<', '>', and the keypad. '1' returns you to the current article. .lm 3 .p 0,1,3 The 'u' and 'U' commands are made considerably easier through the '2' command. With the newsgroup list on the screen, 'u' and 'U' affect the newsgroup marked by the cursor at the top of the screen. Note that when you unsubscribe to an article, the current article number changes to 99999, and un-unsubscribing changes it back to the first unread article. .begin bar What the '2' command is actually doing is making the newsgroup list buffer the active buffer in TPU. The '3' command will name the newsgroup file as the active buffer. The '1' command returns the article buffer to be the active buffer (note that this is why '1' exits help screens and returns to netnews). The newsgroup file contains the list of newsgroups in your home directory. One can edit this file outside of NEWS, putting the important newsgroups at the top of the list. Deleting newsgroups from this list, even if you think you will never ever want to read them, is not recommended. The extra information the file contains is the number of the latest posted article in the newsgroup, and the subscription status of that newsgroup. .end bar .sk3 .c74;*** ^&Miscellaneous commands\& *** To exit news, type Control-Z. This causes NEWS to remember which articles you read, so that the next time you read news you are at the same point in all your subscribed newsgroups. 'q' also exits the program, but does not remember which messages you read. To refresh the screen, type Control-W or Control-R. .begin bar The 'P' command pauses NEWS, returning to the operating system temporarily. This allows you to read mail, etc. and still remain in the NEWS program. On VT-100 terminals, the PF3 key also executes this command. To use this feature, NEWS must be invoked with SPAWN#NEWS in DCL. To re-enter NEWS, use the ATTACH#[process-name] command, where [process-name] was the name given by SPAWN to your command level process when you invoked NEWS. '5' assigns the message buffer (normally seen at the bottom of the screen) to be the current buffer. See 'Selecting Newsgroups: Subscribing to specific newsgroups' for a discussion of swapping buffers. .end bar .page .c74;*** ^&Command Summary\& *** .lit ?,h help page down, even through articles n next article N next newsgroup # go to article number c catch-up to latest article C un-catch-up (return to last unread article) g go to non-specific newsgroup G go to specific newsgroup s save article to file u unsubscribe to current newsgroup U un-unsubscribe to newsgroup < top of article > bottom of article ^Z exit (remember read articles) q quit (don't remember read articles) ^R,^W redraw screen 1 make text buffer active 2 make newsgroup buffer active | 3 make complete newsgroup file active | 5 make message buffer active | p pause .el .c74;VT-100 Keypad commands: .lit PF2 keypad help 0 page down . page up next article , next newsgroup PF1 go to non-specific newsgroup | PF3 pause .el .page .c74;*** Program Messages *** "Can't find the group you referred to: [group-name]" You asked to go to a newsgroup (with either g or G) and NEWS could not find a group by that name. You are returned to the newsgroup and article you are currently reading. "Nothing left to read in group [group-name] -- Moving to next Group" This is what happens when you finish the last article in a newsgroup and hit the space bar or 'n'. Note that although it moves to the next group, it does not start reading the articles; hit 'n' or the space bar again to continue. "Null News Body -- Hope that's OK" NEWS tried to read an article that turned out to be empty. This is most likely due to a numbering error in netnews, so you're not missing anything.