[Mailman-Users] mailman/nntplib.py/inn problem

[J Kinsley]

On Sat, 27 Feb 1999, Barry A. Warsaw wrote:

> Date: Sat, 27 Feb 1999 14:48:14 -0500 (EST)
> From: Barry A. Warsaw <bwarsaw at cnri.reston.va.us>
> To: J Kinsley <jkinsley at horus.bticc.net>
> Cc: mailman-users at python.org
> Subject: Re: [Mailman-Users] mailman/nntplib.py/inn problem
> 
---snip---
> 
>     JK> For the most part, my INN configuration is the default Redhat
>     JK> configuration for INN-2.0 with only paths, hostname, and
>     JK> newsfeeds changed.  I know the solution is probably quite
>     JK> simple such as a tweak in one of the INN configuration files,
>     JK> but I have not yet determined exactly what it is.  If anyone
>     JK> knows what tweak, I would greatly appreciate a hint.
> 
> Hmm, from my quick scan of nntplib.py from the Python 1.5.2
> distrib indicates that it just makes a normal ol' socket
> connection to the specified gateway host (it uses the default
> NNTP port tho').  So it must be an INN configuration problem
> you're having.  I have no idea what to do here though -- we have
> no local news server and I definitely don't have the time to get
> one installed to investigate this.  However if you (or anybody
> else) does come up with a solution, please post it here.  I doubt
> that'll be a patch to Python or Mailman, but I can include some
> text in the Mailman documentation.

Well, it took awhile, but I ultimately found the cause of the
problem.  I originally configured INN back when 1.4 was the latest
release, then upgraded to 2.0 when it was released.  INN 2.0
introduced some additional config files, and ditched the install.ms.*
documentation files.  After playing with hosts.nntp and nntpd.access
fo an hour or so, I decided to search for the missing documentation.
It turned out that some of the new changes were initially introduced
in INN 1.7 which also still had the documentation.  When I upgraded,
I just replaced the examples in the new config files with the local
configuration.  I had placed my news server in incoming.conf which
told INN that the news server was configured as a feeder instead of a
reader.  Feeders get a small subset of the NNTP commands, and POST
and GROUP are not part of that subset.  When I commented out the
local news server from incoming.conf, everything began working.

I had originally hacked GatewayManager.py to make a call to
nntplib.help() and determine whether or not POST or IHAVE was being
used, then send the message using the appropriate command.  That
worked, but then I discovered that gate_news did not work because it
used the NNTP GROUP command.  I guess that's good because it lead to
finding the real solution.

> 
>     JK> P.S.  Prior to finding Mailman, I had been contemplating a
>     JK> hack to hypermail to implement SQL based archive indexing.
>     JK> One of the lists I archive has over 36000 messages in it, and
>     JK> I would like to be able to do global subject, author, thread,
>     JK> date (and possibly keyword) lookups over the entire archive.
>     JK> Right now each month has its own set of indexes.  Has anyone
>     JK> proposed such an idea for Mailman?  I might tinker around with
>     JK> it after I familiarize myself with the internal workings of
>     JK> Mailman and after I get a more pressing project finished.
> 
> Greg Stein's been talking about improving the archiving subsystem.
> You might check the Mailman archives for some of Greg's ideas.  I

I will do that.

> agree that we could do something better, although we'll always need a
> pure-Python solution that we can bundle with Mailman even if it's

Well, in this case, the solution I was looking at would probably make
an addition to the contrib section.  I was thinking about using
PostgreSQL as the database server with a Python interface.  Perhaps a
middleware dB interface that could use any database server.  It's not
something I'm going to be doing anytime soon, but if and when I do,
I'll send the code to the list or wherever.

> limited.  However, it's very likely that no more development will ever
> be done on Pipermail, so other options are also very important,
> whether bundled with Mailman or not.
> 
> -Barry
> 


Regards,
Jarrod