Newsgroup question

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Ree
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Newsgroup question

Post by Ree »

I haven't used any newsgroups before so I've got a question regarding the same. I found a newsgroup that I'm interested in but how do I know the server it is hosted on? The group is comp.lang.java.programmer and it seems like it's hosted on multiple servers? For example, with PHP it's easy: the server is news.php.net and it lists all the groups in it. But how do I get to read the newsgroup which doesn't have one server indicated?
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Buddha443556
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Post by Buddha443556 »

You could use Google Groups. Sometime newsgroups have archives too (I can't find a good one for comp.lang.java.programmer). Otherwise you need some software. If you have MS Outlook or Outlook Express you could use that but it's not great as a newsreader. Helps if your ISP provides newsgroup access.
Ree
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Post by Ree »

Buddha443556 wrote:You could use Google Groups. Sometime newsgroups have archives too (I can't find a good one for comp.lang.java.programmer). Otherwise you need some software. If you have MS Outlook or Outlook Express you could use that but it's not great as a newsreader. Helps if your ISP provides newsgroup access.
Yeah, I did find Google Groups, but I don't find it convenient since you must go to the site to post messages. As for software, I use Thunderbird which is perfectly fine for that. Still, I'm not sure which news server to use to be able to read/post in the newsgroup.
timvw
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Post by timvw »

Most ISP's give you access to a pretty decent feed of usenet groups... And there are plenty of free servers too (just stfw)..

I usually hang around in comp.lang.php (the other active php group is alt.php)...
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Buddha443556
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Post by Buddha443556 »

Ree wrote:Still, I'm not sure which news server to use to be able to read/post in the newsgroup.
If your ISP doesn't provide newsgroups server (some don't) then here's a list of public servers[1].

Might try this public server: selenium.club.cc.cmu.edu

That server has the comp.lang.java.programmer group and many others.
Ree
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Post by Ree »

Thanks a lot, that really helped. Only if those servers had a newsgroup search...

One more thing. If a newsgroup is available on several different servers, does that mean all servers have the same messages (I mean the latest ones, the old ones probably get deleted after some time)?
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Buddha443556
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Post by Buddha443556 »

Ree wrote:One more thing. If a newsgroup is available on several different servers, does that mean all servers have the same messages (I mean the latest ones, the old ones probably get deleted after some time)?
No that doesn't mean they all have the same messages. Like the CMU server I posted is about 2 days behind but this isn't uncommon for public servers. You could also subscribe to a newsgroup server too.
timvw
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Post by timvw »

Ree wrote:Thanks a lot, that really helped. Only if those servers had a newsgroup search...

One more thing. If a newsgroup is available on several different servers, does that mean all servers have the same messages (I mean the latest ones, the old ones probably get deleted after some time)?
Depends from server to server (certainly for binaries). Afaik, most servers have a retention time of 30 days for alt.binaries.* groups... If you really don't want to miss an article you could setup your own nntp server (which gets its feeds from multiple sources)
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