No news is bad news--where are my groups?

[Jordan Katz <underlevel@abas.host4u.net>]

Hi,

  Yesterday I switched from Red Hat 6.0 + Emacs 20 to Debian 3.0 (woody) 
with Emacs21.  I downloaded the latest version of Gnus, plugged in my old 
.gnus file, but it didn't quite work.  When I loaded Gnus it said that the 
nntp server couldn't be opened (I'm using mindspring.com to connect and 
I'm pretty sure the server's just mindspring.com--if anyone knows 
otherwise let me know) but I press 'y' to continue without.  Then, all my 
email messages were correctly downloaded, but no groups other than the 
ndrafts group were shown.  I have my .gnus file split my mail into groups, 
and I checked in ~/Mail and indeed the groups are there--there's a 
directory for each group and messages in it.  However, none are displayed.  
I tried doing M-x gnus-activate-all-groups but that didn't work.. I also 
tried doing U <name of group>, for example U mail.other  but it also 
didn't work.  Can someone please help me fix this issue?  My entire .gnus 
file is pasted below for reference. 

;; Basic settings
(setenv "MM_CHARSET" "iso-8859-1")
(setq gnus-select-method '(nntp "mindspring.com"))
(setq gnus-secondary-select-methods '((nnml "private")))
(setq mail-sources
      '((file)
        (pop :server "mail.underlevel.net"
             :user "underlevel"
             :password "mycoolpassword")))
(setq nnmail-split-methods
  '(("mail.xemacs-list" 
"^\\([Cc][Cc]\\|To\\|Sender\\).*xemacs@xemacs.org")
    ("mail.emacs-list" "^\\([Cc][Cc]\\|To\\|Sender\\).*cm@emacs.org")
    ("mail.umlug-list" 
"^\\([Cc][Cc]\\|To\\|Sender\\).*um-linux@Glue.umd.edu")
    ("mail.emacs-mail" "^\\([Cc][Cc]\\|To\\|Sender\\).*katz@emacs.org")
    ("mail.rdf-list" 
"^\\([Cc][Cc]\\|To\\|Sender\\).*www-rdf-interest@w3.org")
    ("mail.other" "")))
(setq gnus-permanently-visible-groups "\\(mail.*\\)")
(setq message-sendmail-f-is-evil t)

;; Fix the Sender: line
(setq user-mail-address "katz@underlevel.net")
(defun message-make-sender () "katz@underlevel.net")
(setq mail-use-rfc822 t)
(setq message-dont-reply-to-names "webmaster\\|katz")

;; Constantly check mail 
(setq gnus-use-demon t)
(defun gnus-demon-scan-news ()
  (when (gnus-alive-p)
    (save-excursion
      (set-buffer gnus-group-buffer)
      (gnus-group-get-new-news))
    )
  )
(defun gnus-demon-my-scan-mail ()
  (when (and (gnus-alive-p) mail-here)
    (save-excursion
      (set-buffer gnus-group-buffer)
      (gnus-group-get-new-news 3)
      )
    )
  )
(gnus-demon-add-handler 'gnus-demon-scan-news 20 5)
(gnus-demon-add-handler 'gnus-demon-my-scan-mail 20 5)
(gnus-demon-init)
(setq gnus-treat-display-smileys nil)
(setq gnus-local-organization "Initech")
(setq gnus-visible-headers 
"^From:\\|^To:\\|^Newsgroups:\\|^Subject:\\|^Date:\\|^Followup-To:\\|^Organization:\\|^To:\\|^Cc:\\|^X-Newsreader:\\|^X-Mailer:")
(setq user-mail-default-reply-to "webmaster@underlevel.net")
(setq message-user-organization "Initech")
(setq user-full-name    "Jordan Katz")
(setq message-cite-function 'message-cite-original-without-signature)

;; Set topics
(add-hook 'gnus-group-mode-hook 'gnus-topic-mode)

;; Line formatting
(setq gnus-group-line-format "%M%S%p%P%5y: %(%G %z%)\n")
(setq gnus-large-newsgroup 100)

;; Old article groups
;; Old mail group
(setq gnus-message-archive-group
      '((let ((current-archive-date-string
	       (format-time-string "%Y-%m" (current-time))))
	  (concat (if (message-news-p)
		      "news-"
		    "mail-")
		  current-archive-date-string))))
(setq gnus-total-expirable-newsgroups ".")
(setq nnmail-expiry-wait-function
      (lambda (group)
	(cond ((string-match "umlug-list" group)
	       14)
	      ((string-match "emacs-list" group)
	       1)
	      ((string-match "xemacs-list" group)
	       1)
       	      ((string-match "default" group)
	       365)
	      (t
	       31))))


Thanks a lot!
--
Jordan Katz <webmaster@underlevel.net>