Gnus hanging

Gnus hanging

[Richard Riley]

I'm frequently on a wireless connection that fails. Gnus hangs if I do a
"g" (or more accurately C-u 5 g) in the group buffer to get new headers
if the link has gone down and come back up again - I assume because of
non valid network stream handles or whatever. What would be the best way
to ensure Gnus closes all network links first and reconnects prior to
the refresh other than quitting or closing/opening from the server
buffer?

regards
r.

Re: Gnus hanging

[Dave Abrahams]

on Wed Jul 06 2011, Richard Riley <rileyrg-AT-googlemail.com> wrote:

> I'm frequently on a wireless connection that fails. Gnus hangs if I do a
> "g" (or more accurately C-u 5 g) in the group buffer to get new headers
> if the link has gone down and come back up again - I assume because of
> non valid network stream handles or whatever. What would be the best way
> to ensure Gnus closes all network links first and reconnects prior to
> the refresh other than quitting or closing/opening from the server
> buffer?

+1

Long-standing issue for me, too.

-- 
Dave Abrahams
BoostPro Computing
http://www.boostpro.com

Re: Gnus hanging

[Antoine Levitt]

08/07/11 13:14, Dave Abrahams
> on Wed Jul 06 2011, Richard Riley <rileyrg-AT-googlemail.com> wrote:
>
>> I'm frequently on a wireless connection that fails. Gnus hangs if I do a
>> "g" (or more accurately C-u 5 g) in the group buffer to get new headers
>> if the link has gone down and come back up again - I assume because of
>> non valid network stream handles or whatever. What would be the best way
>> to ensure Gnus closes all network links first and reconnects prior to
>> the refresh other than quitting or closing/opening from the server
>> buffer?
>
> +1
>
> Long-standing issue for me, too.

+1 for me also.

I also mentioned in some other thread the problem of suspending a laptop
with a local connection to an IMAP server (I use dovecot, but I guess it
isn't specific to the server on the end). Sometimes the connection will
live on, sometimes it will hang, sometimes it will silently fail and not
show any new messages.

I'm not sure if there's a right way for gnus to react to this sort of
things. Maybe it could listen via dbus to system events such as "link
has gone down/up"? NetworkManager does send some stuff, but I'm not sure
if there's a standard for this.

Re: Gnus hanging

[lee]

Dave Abrahams <dave@boostpro.com> writes:

> on Wed Jul 06 2011, Richard Riley <rileyrg-AT-googlemail.com> wrote:
>
>> I'm frequently on a wireless connection that fails. Gnus hangs if I do a
>> "g" (or more accurately C-u 5 g) in the group buffer to get new headers
>> if the link has gone down and come back up again - I assume because of
>> non valid network stream handles or whatever. What would be the best way
>> to ensure Gnus closes all network links first and reconnects prior to
>> the refresh other than quitting or closing/opening from the server
>> buffer?
>
> +1
>
> Long-standing issue for me, too.

Trying to trace the problem, I've been watching connections with
"netstat -t" and found that gnus hangs when the connection to the news
server is closed.  Gnus reopens the connection and hangs.  I've modified
the entry for the news server, adding `nntp-connection-timeout' for a
timeout of 15 seconds:


(add-to-list 'gnus-secondary-select-methods
	     '(nntp "news1.open-news-network.org"
		    (nntp-connection-timeout 15)))


Because it takes two hours for the connection to time out, I haven't
been able to see if it works yet.  If it doesn't work, an alternative
might be something like "(gnus-demon-add-handler 'gnus-demon-scan-news
10 nil)" to keep the connection open or "(gnus-demon-add-handler
'gnus-demon-close-connections 5 nil)" to close it before it times out,
in which case gnus might gracefully reopen it.

Perhaps you can come up with something similar for your POP3 and IMAP
connections as a workaround?  Closing the connections after a short time
or idle period might work for POP3 and IMAP ...

BTW, see http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=9020 .

Re: Gnus hanging

[Richard Riley]

lee <lee@yun.yagibdah.de> writes:

> Dave Abrahams <dave@boostpro.com> writes:
>
>> on Wed Jul 06 2011, Richard Riley <rileyrg-AT-googlemail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> I'm frequently on a wireless connection that fails. Gnus hangs if I do a
>>> "g" (or more accurately C-u 5 g) in the group buffer to get new headers
>>> if the link has gone down and come back up again - I assume because of
>>> non valid network stream handles or whatever. What would be the best way
>>> to ensure Gnus closes all network links first and reconnects prior to
>>> the refresh other than quitting or closing/opening from the server
>>> buffer?
>>
>> +1
>>
>> Long-standing issue for me, too.
>
> Trying to trace the problem, I've been watching connections with
> "netstat -t" and found that gnus hangs when the connection to the news
> server is closed.  Gnus reopens the connection and hangs.  I've modified
> the entry for the news server, adding `nntp-connection-timeout' for a
> timeout of 15 seconds:
>
> (add-to-list 'gnus-secondary-select-methods
> 	     '(nntp "news1.open-news-network.org"
> 		    (nntp-connection-timeout 15)))
>
> Because it takes two hours for the connection to time out, I haven't
> been able to see if it works yet.  If it doesn't work, an alternative

Simpy unplug the network or "sudo ifdown -a"?

Re: Gnus hanging

[lee]

Richard Riley <rileyrg@googlemail.com> writes:

> lee <lee@yun.yagibdah.de> writes:
>> Because it takes two hours for the connection to time out, I haven't
>> been able to see if it works yet.  If it doesn't work, an alternative
>
> Simpy unplug the network or "sudo ifdown -a"?

Well, I didn't want to have different conditions for testing than for
normal operation.  I had started to write a reply to a question Lars had
sent me in reply to the bug report I had sent and was watching the
connections to the two news servers I'm using and experimenting.

The connection to the news server that doesn't require authentication
(gmane) closes after 15 or 20 minutes or so, and gnus brings it back up
just fine when checking for new news and doesn't hang.  The connection
to the other news server which does require authentication stays for two
hours, and though gnus brings it back up again, gnus will hang.

Who knows, interrupting the network connection may be very different
from a connection closing or timing out normally, perhaps especially so
when authentication is involved.


It seems interesting that gnus hangs when authentication is involved and
doesn't hang when authentication is not involved.  If I kept track
correctly, all the other users reporting this problem have it with
connections that do require authentication (POP3 and IMAP).  Now
remember the message about the TLS error showing up in the *Messages*
buffer: Do you see this message, too?

Re: Gnus hanging

[Richard Riley]

Dave Abrahams <dave@boostpro.com> writes:

> on Wed Jul 06 2011, Richard Riley <rileyrg-AT-googlemail.com> wrote:
>
>> I'm frequently on a wireless connection that fails. Gnus hangs if I do a
>> "g" (or more accurately C-u 5 g) in the group buffer to get new headers
>> if the link has gone down and come back up again - I assume because of
>> non valid network stream handles or whatever. What would be the best way
>> to ensure Gnus closes all network links first and reconnects prior to
>> the refresh other than quitting or closing/opening from the server
>> buffer?
>
> +1
>
> Long-standing issue for me, too.

Any info on this or any ideas how to customise something to restart the
connections on a "g"? Its hanging all the time on my netbook when the
wireless is dodgy.

Re: Gnus hanging

[lee]

Richard Riley <rileyrg@googlemail.com> writes:

> Dave Abrahams <dave@boostpro.com> writes:
>
>> on Wed Jul 06 2011, Richard Riley <rileyrg-AT-googlemail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> I'm frequently on a wireless connection that fails. Gnus hangs if I do a
>>> "g" (or more accurately C-u 5 g) in the group buffer to get new headers
>>> if the link has gone down and come back up again - I assume because of
>>> non valid network stream handles or whatever. What would be the best way
>>> to ensure Gnus closes all network links first and reconnects prior to
>>> the refresh other than quitting or closing/opening from the server
>>> buffer?
>>
>> +1
>>
>> Long-standing issue for me, too.
>
> Any info on this or any ideas how to customise something to restart the
> connections on a "g"? Its hanging all the time on my netbook when the
> wireless is dodgy.

Gnus apparently does re-open the connections when they were closed
(timed out). You can see that when watching them with "netstat -t".  Yet
that doesn't seem to help with connections that involve authentication.

So far, I've only found that neither setting nntp-connection-timeout nor
having a deamon like "(gnus-demon-add-handler
'gnus-demon-close-connections 5 nil)" makes any difference.

At the moment, gnus hangs every time I press `g' after it didn't happen
at all for about two days, all for no apparent reason.

It might help to find out what causes the problem if everyone adds their
backtrace[1] to the bug report[2], perhaps with some information added
under what conditions it occurs.


[1]: add "(setq debug-on-quit t)" to your ~/.emacs to get a backtrace
     when pressing C-g
[2]: http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=9020 --- I guess you
     can mail additional info by sending it to 9020@debbugs.gnu.org


-- 
html messages are obsolete

Re: Gnus hanging

[Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen]

Richard Riley <rileyrg@googlemail.com> writes:

> What would be the best way to ensure Gnus closes all network links
> first and reconnects prior to the refresh other than quitting or
> closing/opening from the server buffer?

`gnus-close-backends' will make Gnus close all the backends, but this
will shut down everything "gracefully".  If the network connections are
so b0rked that even sending "QUIT" without waiting for a response will
hang, I guess it won't help.

But it probably does the trick.

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
  bloggy blog http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no/

Re: Gnus hanging

[Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen]

lee <lee@yun.yagibdah.de> writes:

> It seems interesting that gnus hangs when authentication is involved and
> doesn't hang when authentication is not involved.  If I kept track
> correctly, all the other users reporting this problem have it with
> connections that do require authentication (POP3 and IMAP).

Yes, that's interesting.  Hm...

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
  bloggy blog http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no/

Re: Gnus hanging

[lee]

Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org> writes:

> `gnus-close-backends' will make Gnus close all the backends, but this
> will shut down everything "gracefully".

And how do you reopen them?

Re: Gnus hanging

[Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen]

lee <lee@yun.yagibdah.de> writes:

> And how do you reopen them?

It happens automatically when you `g'.

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
  bloggy blog http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no/

GNUS hanging.

[Ralph Loader]

Hi,

A while ago a contacted you about Gnus hanging on entering a newsgroup.
I've found how to reproduce this: post an article with a repeated entry in
the references header.  E.g.,

Path: news.ox.ac.uk!news
From: Ralph Loader <loader@maths.ox.ac.uk>
Newsgroups: ox.test
Subject: Re: where is my message?
Date: 19 Jul 1996 18:14:48 +0100
Organization: Merton College, Oxford.
Lines: 6
Sender: loader@oban.ox.ac.uk
Message-ID: <m1687kmagn.fsf@oban.ox.ac.uk>
References: <31EFAFC6.14C8@maths.ox.ac.uk>
 <31EFAFC6.14C8@maths.ox.ac.uk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: ermine.ox.ac.uk
X-Face: "\DEVKOBazdfo)a[qH[tA@i)|B?QlBd1:5\;#%#Rhqu0,V{SKg"4R4)=}3($4L<SR"}PmC!
 {qN!'4,sL2b)3&szw{2hM`y{r64A9(V*U4}8u7y0*O|89WkYO%&z)\5_~'%CMih>9b!&3|mbBEw>8t
 IgZB?hW`nnzLfO>N(3:ME'x\qB
X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.2.34/XEmacs 19.14
Xref: news.ox.ac.uk ox.test:1547

On re-entering the group, Gnus goes into an infinite loop, entering this
article in the summary buffer:

   [   6: Ralph Loader        ] Re: where is my message?
   [   6: Ralph Loader        ] Re: where is my message?
   [   6: Ralph Loader        ] Re: where is my message?

Hope this helps,

Ralph.