From: joel@crpi.UUCP (Joel C. Justen)
Newsgroups: alt.sys.amiga.uucp
Subject: Re: Cnews?  Help!
Date: Sun, 27 Sep 1992 21:28:37 EST
Organization: Crazyrat Software Productions
X-Newsreader: Arn V1.00 beta rel2

In article <1992Sep27.012941.1538@ckctpa.UUCP>, Frank "Crash" Edwards writes:

> bobl@bobsbox.rent.com (Bob Lindabury - SysAdmin) writes:
> >Well, I've setup CNews on my system and I seem to be in hell!
> 
> I take full credit (and full blame) for things that don't work in my
> port of CNews for AmigaDOS.  Before I start answering some of the
> questions that were posted, I'd like to point out that further
> changes/enhancements have pretty much come to a standstill since I've
> gotten Amiga Unix 2.1 up and running.  I just very rarely use AmigaDOS
> anymore (I'm a Unix freak -- what can I say? :-)
> 
> >I have setup in.coming and out.going directories in NewsArts: (UUNEWS:)
> >and have also setup directories for each site that receives batches
> >inside of the out.going directory.
> 


























> Good.
> 
> >RNews seems to run fine after news is transfered into my system. It then
> >produces *.z files in the in.coming directory which are processed fine
> >by the unbatch.e script.  However, this script doesn't seem to work with
> >uncompressed items.  The *.z files are uncompressed and then posted to
> >the appropriate directories, the sys file is read and appropriate togo
> >files are created in the newsarts:out.going/[system] directories.
> 
> Yes.  I presume you got the Fred Fish distribution which had incorrect
> filenames in the UnBatch.#? script(s).  Unshar the one below and see
> if it is the same as what you're using -- it's the latest one I've
> got.  (I've heard of people finding bugs in the scripts, telling me
> that they've fixed them, and then I never receive a copy.  How am I
> supposed to distribute fixed versions [for bugs I haven't seen] when I
> don't get a copy.  I've stopped trying.)
> 
> >However, relaynews doesn't seem to update the .next files in the
> >NewsArts: (UUNEWS:) directories.  Is this the way it is suppose to work?
> >GRn doesn't recognize the new articles because the .next files are not
> >updated.  How can I fix this?
> 
> Yes.
> 
> I don't know what GRn expects to see in the .next file, so I can't
> tell you what to fix.  Perhaps the author of GRn would consider using
> the files provided with the stock (Unix) CNews as an option?  [The
> "active" file keeps track of new articles; and "history" contains
> information on what has been expired and what hasn't.]
> 
> Otherwise, find out what the .next files should have and execute
> another script after you do UNBATCHing which fixes those files.
> 
> >Also, anything posted locally doesn't get posted.  It gets queued into
> >NewsArts:incoming as an uncompressed article and unbatch doesn't
> >recognize it.  How can I get articles posted to queue out?
> 
> You point out after this that the batching scripts fail.  The blame
> here is 100% mine as I did not fully test these.  I had two (count'em
> -- TWO) beta testers, one who supplied the ARexx scripts you mention.
> Unfortunately the other individual didn't have the batching problem --
> he was a leaf site.  (Perhaps this will encourage people to become
> beta testers -- the software won't improve without someone to run it
> and point out problems.)
> 
> I have seen postings from people claiming they've fixed the batching
> scripts (quite a few people said my 2.04 scripts wouldn't run on their
> 1.3 systems -- sorry).  Of course, *I've* never gotten a copy of
> these, nor even any word that they're available for anon ftp.  So I'm
> afraid I can't send you replacements.
> 
> Concerning the manually created batch_#?.z files:  yes, you must
> provide the transport interface.  CNews _is not_ a transport, it's a
> message handling package.  UUCP is a transport agent.  I would suggest
> either adding a line to DoBatch.e to queue up the transfers at the end
> of the batching or run a separate program to do it after DoBatch
> finishes.
> 
> >PLEASE.  Any help would be appreciated as I feed quite a few other sites
> >and normal AmigaUUCP 1.16 just is a bit too slow and incomplete to do
> >the forwarding I need to do.  Thanks in advance.
> 
> At the time I ported CNews, there were _no_ news facilities for
> Amigas.  I ran it on a dual floppy 1MB A500 for almost a year
> (development being on that same machine).  It is much faster, but it
> has the Unix method of doing things.  This sometimes makes it
> difficult to understand why a process is implemented the way it is and
> usually it's a "big system" approach that would have been hard to
> convert or just not worth the trouble.  Take INEWS for example.  On
> Unix machines, INEWS is the front-end for user programs to post an
> article (Pnews calls INEWS).  It's one _huge_ shell script.  It wasn't
> worth my time to port it, so I included the ability to post directly
> into my news reader.  That makes it tougher to change the method, but
> it very much simplified the overall scheme.
> 
> >Oh..please email me with any information.
> 
> Alright; I'm emailing a copy of this as well.
> 
> >---------- UULIB:CONFIG (partial)
> >Unbatch      Newsbin:unbatch.e
> >CUnbatch     Newsbin:unbatch.e
> >RNews        NewsBin:rnews
> >
> >This allows for CNews's RNews to be called instead of AmigaUUCP's.  I
> >threw in the unbatch and cunbatch for the hell of it..is it needed?
> 
> I don't believe so, but I've never used Dillon's UUCP; I had a hacked
> version of UUPC with lots of other features I wanted at the time.
> 
> >Then my CNews sys file...my site is bobsbox..my feed site is rutgers:
> >
> >---------- SYS
> 
> The SYS file looks okay.
> 
> >These are the Dobatch.e and Dobatch.e2 files that came with Cnews..
> >
> >---------- DOBATCH.E
>     .
>     .
>     .
> >Well, the above didn't work at all so I changed it to:
> 
> >----------
> >path add NewsBin:batch
> >
> >list newsarts:out.going/#? lformat "DoBatch.e2 %s" to T:List[$$]
> >sort T:List[$$] to T:Exec[$$]
> >Execute T:Exec[$$]
> >
> >Delete quiet T:List[$$] T:Exec[$$]
> >
> >echo "Now queue up the files in NewsArts:Out.Going/* that end in `.Z'"
> >echo "Ex. `search from newsarts:out.going file #?.Z all'"
> >echo "(see your transport medium documentation for details)"
> >echo ""
> >echo "Following is a list of files that failed to batch properly:"
> >search from newsarts:out.going file togo.failed all
> >echo "End of List."
> >----------
> >
> >The above seems to work.  I get a T:List[] file and then a sorted
> >T:Exec[] file which then gets executed.
> 
> That's correct.
> 
> >The following batching script fails miserably.  I had to change the
> >"batcher" command line to remove the -p (prefix) option as I kept
> >getting some sort of error about prefix specified twice.  Also, if there
> >isn't any "togo" file in the system's directory, the script seems to
> >just quit when it should return back and try to process the next
> >system's togo file. Here's the Dobatch.e2 script...
> 
> Hmmm; does it do that under 2.0 or 1.3?  I don't recall having a
> problem with DoBatch.e2 causing DoBatch.e to quit prematurely.  But
> again, I think I must've munged DoBatch.e and DoBatch.e2 while trying
> to create diffs using RCS.  That's the only reason I can think of why
> both scripts should be as back-dated as they were.
> 
> >---------- DOBATCH.E2
> >.key SYS
> >.bra [
> >.ket ]
> >
> >cd NewsArts:Out.Going/[SYS]
> >if not exists togo
> >        quit 5
> >endif
> >
> >if exists T:Batch.[SYS]
> >        echo "Batcher already running for [SYS]"
> >        quit 5
> >endif
> >
> >date >T:Batch.[SYS]
> 
> That little bit of locking against multiple processes running really
> isn't enough, but if you want to try to code it in SHELL language,
> please send me a copy when you have it working.
> 
> >delete quiet togo.last
> >rename togo togo.last   ; move `togo' in case relaynews creates more...
> >
> >echo "News batched for `[SYS]' is in NewsArts:Out.Going/[SYS]/batch_#?.Z"
> >batcher -s 100000 -f togo.last ; -S [SYS]; (system name for batchparms)
> >if val $RC eq 0
> >        list batch_#? lformat "acomp %s" to temp
> >        sort temp exec.compress
> >        execute exec.compress
> >        delete exec.compress temp quiet
> >else
> >        echo "Hmmm.  Something in `batcher' didn't work!"
> >        date >>togo.failed
> >        join togo.last to togo.failed
> >        rm togo.last
> >fi
> >
> >----------
> >
> >Ok..fi..what the heck is fi??  If val $RC eq 0????  Is this value of
> 
> Oops.  Unix-ism.  And 2.0-ism.  Combined. :-(  This is the third of the
> three (known) problems in the batching scripts.
> 
> >return code?  When the script gets here it creates uncompressed batches
> >and then tells me it can't batch from togo.last..ARGH!  So, nothing gets
> >compressed.  I did the code in the if statement manually and it creates
> >the compressed batch file ok but then how does it get queued to go out??
> 
> Read the comments inside the ECHO statements at the end of DoBatch.e
> and see my comments above.
> 
> >The following is a sample togo file:
> >
> >---------- togo
> >NewsArts:comp/ai/philosophy/243 1354
> >NewsArts:alt/cyberpunk/3554 834
> >NewsArts:alt/cyberpunk/3555 3033
> >----------
> 
> Yep, looks okay.
> 
> >There also seemed to be a problem with this as batcher gave me errors
> >finding the articles as follows:
> >
> >NewsArts:NewsArts:alt/cyberpunk/3577 not found
> >
> >Where is it getting the additional "NewsArts:" from?  I deleted
> >NewsArts: out of a togo file and batched it manually and it worked fine
> >as far as batching goes.
> 
> Hmmm.  Sounds like BATCHER is expecting relative pathnames and
> RELAYNEWS is generating absolute pathnames.  There's a flag in the SYS
> file or on the RELAYNEWS command line that says what it should do.  I
> don't recall at the moment.  Perhaps the best fix, however, would be
> to modify batcher.c so that it only adds "NewsArts:" if there's not a
> colon already on the line...
> 
> >--
> > Bob Lindabury
> >InterNet: bobl@bobsbox.rent.com                | Raven Enterprises
> >    UUCP: ...rutgers!bobsbox!bobl              | 25 Raven Avenue
> >  BitNet: bobl%bobsbox.rent.com@pucc           | Piscataway, NJ 08854
> >  Home #: +1 908/560-7353                      | +1 908/271-8878
> 
> Sorry for the hassles.  After I sent CNews to Fred Fish for inclusion
> in the library, I contacted C= about being a developer.  Then I
> bought an A3000 and started beta testing Amiga Unix, and I've worked
> on CNews very little since then.  But I suppose it's just as well,
> since I never hear about anyone using it (except for the 3 or 4 people
> who sent me shareware donations and to whom I apologize about neglecting
> support when I jumped into Amiga Unix).  There was little or no reason
> to continue working on it since I wasn't using it and no one else was
> either.
> 
> Now, if you want patches to use an Archive Viper under Amix, or to
> allow a two-button mouse to pretend to be a three-button mouse, or if
> you wanna try out my Amix commands for reading an AmigaDOS hard disk
> and storing the files under Amix, then contact me.  But I don't use
> AmigaDOS much anymore.
> -- 
> Frank "Crash" Edwards            King Marine Electronics, Inc.
> Home: 813/786-3675               Work: 813/530-3411
>     Having trouble sleeping?  Try lying on the end of the bed.  With
>     luck you'll drop off.
> 	    -- Mark Twain
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
     /// Joel C. Justen                |    UUNET:  uunet!coplex.com!crpi!joel
\\\ ///  System Administrator          |    BITNET: jcjust01@ulkyvx.BITNET
 \XXX/   Crazyrat Software Productions |    UUCP:   joel@crpi.UUCP
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flames <NIL: >NIL: | "This is *MY* damn amiga and I'll say what I want to say!"