Buttons: HTTP <-> NNTP conversion (was: subscribe to lists without receiving mails)

Buttons: HTTP <-> NNTP conversion (was: subscribe to lists without receiving mails)

[Reiner Steib]

On Fri, Apr 25 2003, Dan Jacobson wrote:

> R> nntp://news.gmane.org/gmane.discuss/2094
>
> I put the mouse on top of these here in gnus, and nothing lights up.

Get a fresh Oort (or wait for 5.10).  "nntp" is correct (and recommend
by RFC), but wasn't implemented in Gnus.

> By the way, links like that aren't the best for us offline folks too
> it seems.

For me, it's just the other way round (sometimes): When people post
links like <URL:http://article.gmane.org/gmane.discuss:3191> I'd like
Gnus to behave as if there was a
<URL:news://news.gmane.org/gmane.discuss/3191> link instead.  Then I
don't have to switch to the browser.

Same for Google-MID-URLs:
<URL:http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&rnum=1&
threadm=87bs6teihl%2Efsf%40amaterasu%2Esrvr%2Enix> should behave as
<news:87bs6teihl.fsf@amaterasu.srvr.nix>.

I already wrote some HTTP->NNTP URL conversion (not yet committed):

,----[ C-h v gnus-button-prefer-nntp RET ]
| gnus-button-prefer-nntp's value is nil
| 
| Documentation:
| Try to convert Google or Gmane HTTP URLs to corresponding NNTP URLs.
| 
| If `nil', no conversion will be done.  If `t', all URLs will be
| converted.  If `ask', query the user what do do.
| 
| You can customize this variable.
`----

> I know, I will sed s/nntp/http/|xargs wwwoffle and see what happens.
[...]
> OK, I will try also sed s/nntp/http/\;s/news/article/|xargs wwwoffle

Hey, your using Gnus, it should be done in Lisp!  Maybe I can
implement the other way round too, i.e.:

  (news|nntp)://news.gmane.org/gmane.discuss/3191 -->
  http://article.gmane.org/gmane.discuss/3191
and
  news:some@foo.bar.invalid -->
  http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&rnum=1&threadm=some@foo.bar.invalid

Does this make sense?

Bye, Reiner.

PS: Does (or could) Gmane convert...

| Newsgroups: gmane.discuss,gmane.emacs.gnus.general
| Followup-To: gmane.emacs.gnus.general

... to something like ...

| To: ding@gnus.org,gmane-discuss@hawk.netfonds.no
| Mail-Followup-To: ding@gnus.org

I'm not sure.  Let's test it:
Crosspost & Followup-To: gmane.emacs.gnus.general

... failed:

,----[ leafnode log ]
| Posting /var/spool/news/out.going/9113-1051280870-1
| Unable to post /var/spool/news/out.going/9113-1051280870-1:
|    "441 You are not allowed to approve postings", 
|    moving to /var/spool/news/failed.
| news.gmane.org: 0 articles posted
`----

,----[ 9113-1051280870-1 ]
| Newsgroups: gmane.discuss,gmane.emacs.gnus.general
| Followup-To: gmane.emacs.gnus.general
[...]
| Date: Fri, 25 Apr 2003 16:27:49 +0200
| Message-ID: <v9vfx24pp6.fsf@marauder.physik.uni-ulm.de>
`----

I'll try by mail now...
| To: ding@gnus.org,gmane-discuss@hawk.netfonds.no
| Mail-Followup-To: ding@gnus.org
-- 
       ,,,
      (o o)
---ooO-(_)-Ooo--- PGP key available via WWW   http://rsteib.home.pages.de/

Re: Buttons: HTTP <-> NNTP conversion

[Jesper Harder]

Reiner Steib <4.uce.03.r.s@nurfuerspam.de> writes:

> On Fri, Apr 25 2003, Dan Jacobson wrote:
>
>> R> nntp://news.gmane.org/gmane.discuss/2094

I wish people wouldn't post references like that -- it's really annoying
if you're not using gmane and reading off-line[1].  What's wrong with a
message-ID?

[1] Also, if gmane ever disappears, noone will be able to track the
reference.

Re: Buttons: HTTP <-> NNTP conversion

[Reiner Steib]

On Fri, Apr 25 2003, Jesper Harder wrote:

> Reiner Steib <4.uce.03.r.s@nurfuerspam.de> writes:
>>> R> nntp://news.gmane.org/gmane.discuss/2094
>
> I wish people wouldn't post references like that -- 

Oops.  I don't recall why I wrote it in this way.  Normally I prefer
MIDs.  Maybe because I found the articles using Gmane's search
interface (alas, nobody has updated Gnus `nnweb.el' yet for Gmane's
new search interface) and I was too lazy to get the MID from the raw
article.  Or maybe I just wanted to test if the nntp URL and
`gnus-fetch-old-ephemeral-headers' work. :)

> it's really annoying if you're not using gmane and reading
> off-line[1].  What's wrong with a message-ID?

If not using Gmane in `gnus-refer-article-method', you won't be able
to fetch the article anyhow.  Users of other clients (e.g. Mozilla)
don't even have a builtin method for fetching by MID, but nntp or http
URLs should work in this case.

But you are right, that different users have different preferences.
Therefore, I'd like to let the user choose his preferred form, if
possible.

> [1] Also, if gmane ever disappears, noone will be able to track the
> reference.

Hm?  If Gmane will ever would disappear (why?), the messages from
`gmane.discuss' will probably disappear too, I guess.

Bye, Reiner.
-- 
       ,,,
      (o o)
---ooO-(_)-Ooo--- PGP key available via WWW   http://rsteib.home.pages.de/

Re: Buttons: HTTP <-> NNTP conversion

[Jesper Harder]

Reiner Steib <4.uce.03.r.s@nurfuerspam.de> writes:

> On Fri, Apr 25 2003, Jesper Harder wrote:
>
>> Reiner Steib <4.uce.03.r.s@nurfuerspam.de> writes:
>>>> R> nntp://news.gmane.org/gmane.discuss/2094
>>
>> I wish people wouldn't post references like that -- 
>
> Oops.  I don't recall why I wrote it in this way.  

Sorry, it wasn't aimed at your post or the specific link.  It was just
an observation about that using NNTP URLs is a bad idea in general.

>> [1] Also, if gmane ever disappears, noone will be able to track the
>> reference.
>
> Hm?  If Gmane will ever would disappear (why?), the messages from
> `gmane.discuss' will probably disappear too, I guess.

Dunno, some people (like me) never expire their local news spool, so it
might survive somewhere on somebodys hard drive.

Re: Buttons: HTTP <-> NNTP conversion

[Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen]

Jesper Harder <harder@myrealbox.com> writes:

> [1] Also, if gmane ever disappears, noone will be able to track the
> reference.

Well, that's true, but the same is true with Message-IDs, basically.
There is no central instance you can query to find a mailing list
message based on its Message-ID.  

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
   larsi@gnus.org * Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen