Anyone wanna try out Usenet on their System 7 Mac?



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Author	Anyone wanna try out Usenet on their System 7 Mac? (Read 123042 times)
cballero 1024 MB Posts: 1176 System 7, today and forever	Reply #60 on: June 18, 2025, 20:46 Thanks for that bit of network security advice, Lauland!

Bolkonskij Administrator 1024 MB Posts: 2023	Reply #61 on: June 24, 2025, 18:41 Some news, at last. Internews 2.0.2 will run on System 6 as well. It complains upon startup about being an outdated developer version but if you set the system clock back to 1996 or something, it will start up. I was able to retrieve the usenet groups (take that, Newswatcher!) with Internews. However, I wasn't able to open any group due to a generic error (unexpected NNTP status received). Maybe an auth issue? Anybody with more luck? Posted from a lovely IIci and a 13" color monitor using MacLynx

MTT 256 MB Posts: 394 SSW7 Oldtimer	Reply #62 on: June 24, 2025, 23:59 Greetings to your lovely IIci, monitor and MacLynx I would think that if while you try to read usenet news, if your date and time settings are set somewhere in the past, this could be a problem. Was there any code number associated with the error message? It wouldn't hurt to post a request in the hacking thread at the MG, asking if the date check could be removed... [Edit] Looks like you mightn't need to do this... despite what it says in the About window. The MG has copies located on the MacFormat 53A CD which appear to be non-time-bombed @DL #11 "MacFormat-53a-Aug97.zip" They have separate 68k and PPC (not FAT) versions located in the Internet > usenet folder on that ROM. These appear to be usable as is without needing to reset the clock. i.e.; I didn't get any nags about it being expired. I've only tried the 68k version so far but assume the PPC copy will be the same. These, if they work out, could replace the time-bombed copy at the MG. [Edit 2] I was unable get the groups list to DL got this error after it got up to around 32K+ groups. I suspect simply too many groups on the news server to DL (paganini.bofh.team). I also tried version 1.1 out, and got the same error message. Oh well, that you were able to get the groups list to DL is a plus.
Last Edit: June 25, 2025, 03:49 by MTT
Bolkonskij Administrator 1024 MB Posts: 2023	Reply #63 on: June 26, 2025, 16:22 Interesting you could get it to load the groups? It worked for me - here's a screen to prove it. I'll give this another try with the not-timebombed version of Internews and the date set correctly. I do suspect an auth issue being responsible for not being able to read the contents of the group - so far I haven't found any way to authentificate in Internews but I've only briefly worked with it.

MTT 256 MB Posts: 394 SSW7 Oldtimer	Reply #64 on: June 28, 2025, 08:52 No, I was unable to DL the Group list with this. That you can isn't that surprising. Some usenet providers carry a lot more groups than others. I was testing it out with paganini.bofh.team which lists 46K or more. and InterNews broke at approx 32K or so for me. No matter, I could try ES I guess... Anyway, I did upload to the MG the 68k and PPC copies I had located. The 68k version didn't complain about being expired and seems to work as is.

Bolkonskij Administrator 1024 MB Posts: 2023	Reply #65 on: June 28, 2025, 17:42 Good point! I'm paying 10 euros / year using the service from the Free University Berlin at individual.net. They retain 25.000 newsgroups, so there you go, might explain things. Anyway, thanks for your Internews upload to the Garden - just downloading and will give this another try with the date set correctly this time.

fogWraith 32 MB Posts: 59	Reply #66 on: June 28, 2025, 18:48 I gave version 1.1 of InterNews a shot, just to see what it does, I don't know what it expects when it says "Could not show the newsgroup because of a program error (unexpected NNTP status received)" As far as I can tell, it does the dance, but there could be something in the data it doesn't like, here's a bit of output. (I'll probably look at this for my own server to see if it can be resolved) Code: [Select] [INFO] Connection established from ('ip', connid) [INFO] Received command from ('ip', connid): MODE READER [INFO] Received command from ('ip', connid): Group server.testing.anonymous [INFO] Received command from ('ip', connid): xhdr Subject 1-17 [INFO] XHDR requested header: Subject [INFO] XHDR range: 1-17 [INFO] XHDR current newsgroup: server.testing.anonymous [INFO] XHDR found 15 articles in range 1-17 [INFO] Article 1 header keys: ['Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'Organization', 'X-Newsreader', 'Lines', 'XDisclaimer', 'From', 'Sender', 'Path', 'Message-ID', 'Date'] [INFO] Article 2 header keys: ['Path', 'From', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'Message-ID', 'X-Newsreader', 'Organization', 'Date'] [INFO] Article 3 header keys: ['Message-ID', 'Date', 'From', 'X-Mailer', 'X-Accept-Language', 'MIME-Version', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'References', 'Content-Type', 'Content-Transfer-Encoding', 'Organization', 'Path'] [INFO] Article 4 header keys: ['Date', 'From', 'Organization', 'User-Agent', 'X-Accept-Language', 'MIME-Version', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'Content-Type', 'Content-Transfer-Encoding', 'Path', 'Message-ID'] [INFO] Article 5 header keys: ['Path', 'From', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'Organization', 'References', 'User-Agent', 'Date', 'Message-ID'] [INFO] Article 6 header keys: ['Path', 'Date', 'From', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'Message-ID', 'Organization', 'X-Newsreader'] [INFO] Article 8 header keys: ['Message-ID', 'Date', 'From', 'X-Mailer', 'X-Accept-Language', 'MIME-Version', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'Content-Type', 'Content-Transfer-Encoding', 'Organization', 'Path'] [INFO] Article 9 header keys: ['Message-ID', 'Date', 'From', 'X-Mailer', 'X-Accept-Language', 'MIME-Version', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'Content-Type', 'Content-Transfer-Encoding', 'Organization', 'Path'] [INFO] Article 10 header keys: ['Path', 'From', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'Organization', 'References', 'User-Agent', 'Date', 'Message-ID'] [INFO] Article 11 header keys: ['Message-ID', 'Date', 'From', 'X-Mailer', 'X-Accept-Language', 'MIME-Version', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'References', 'Content-Type', 'Content-Transfer-Encoding', 'Organization', 'Path'] [INFO] Article 12 header keys: ['Message-ID', 'Date', 'From', 'X-Mailer', 'X-Accept-Language', 'MIME-Version', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'Content-Type', 'Content-Transfer-Encoding', 'Organization', 'Path'] [INFO] Article 14 header keys: ['Message-ID', 'Date', 'From', 'X-Mailer', 'X-Accept-Language', 'MIME-Version', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'Content-Type', 'Content-Transfer-Encoding', 'Organization', 'Path'] [INFO] Article 15 header keys: ['Message-ID', 'Date', 'From', 'X-Mailer', 'X-Accept-Language', 'MIME-Version', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'Content-Type', 'Content-Transfer-Encoding', 'Organization', 'Path'] [INFO] Article 16 header keys: ['Date', 'From', 'Organization', 'User-Agent', 'X-Accept-Language', 'MIME-Version', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'Content-Type', 'Content-Transfer-Encoding', 'Path', 'Message-ID'] [INFO] Article 17 header keys: ['Message-ID', 'Date', 'From', 'X-Mailer', 'X-Accept-Language', 'MIME-Version', 'Newsgroups', 'Subject', 'References', 'Content-Type', 'Content-Transfer-Encoding', 'Organization', 'Path'] [INFO] Connection closed from ('ip', connid)

Cashed 128 MB Posts: 192 System 7 Newcomer!	Reply #67 on: June 29, 2025, 03:14 Log mentions headers for articles 1 through 17 "XHDR range: 1-17". It's skipping article 7. There's also inconsistent in the header keys. E.g Article 1 includes 'Newsgroups', while Article 3 includes 'X-Mailer', which Article 1 does not. Check code to make sure that the log entries are formatted in a consistent way and that e.g. dates and times match -inconsistent formatting makes logs harder to read and parse.
Last Edit: June 29, 2025, 03:24 by Cashed
Bolkonskij Administrator 1024 MB Posts: 2023	Reply #68 on: June 29, 2025, 17:36 I've read into the manual that comes with Internews 2.0.2. I think I've found a show-stopper. Apparently, Internews 2.0.2 isn't able to do authentication on its own. It is but a "stupid" client that requires authentication happening via a server on its network. If I got that right, that would pretty much eliminate its value in 2025, since most Usenet providers require authentication these days.

fogWraith 32 MB Posts: 59	Reply #69 on: June 30, 2025, 17:08 Quote from: Cashed Log mentions headers for articles 1 through 17 "XHDR range: 1-17". It's skipping article 7. There's also inconsistent in the header keys. E.g Article 1 includes 'Newsgroups', while Article 3 includes 'X-Mailer', which Article 1 does not. Check code to make sure that the log entries are formatted in a consistent way and that e.g. dates and times match -inconsistent formatting makes logs harder to read and parse. It's skipping article 7 because it doesn't exist anymore, regarding the inconsistencies in the header keys, that's somewhat irrelevant as the right data is delivered correctly Already fixed the code in my server (which also wasn't relevant since they were most likely trying another server) , I was just interested in finding out why they got the error, if it existed in my code (it did) and if I could fix it. Here's some InterNews 1.1 working. boop
Last Edit: June 30, 2025, 17:10 by fogWraith
Cashed 128 MB Posts: 192 System 7 Newcomer!	Reply #70 on: July 01, 2025, 01:06 Awesome -great tinkering FW!

MTT 256 MB Posts: 394 SSW7 Oldtimer	Reply #71 on: July 03, 2025, 07:04 Hmmm, this topic has put on a little weight since I last saw it Quote from: Bolkonskij: "I've read into the manual that comes with Internews 2.0.2. I think I've found a show-stopper. Apparently, Internews 2.0.2 isn't able to do authentication on its own." This section in the manual seems to indicate otherwise: But yeah, I agree with you. At least that is. I have not been able to get it to authenticate with a registered news server. I have a subscription with "Eternal-September" which in some ways, fortunately, will download the E-S hierarchy only, if your newsreader cannot authenticate with it. Fortunate in the sense that I was able to download at least the E-S group hierarchy without crashing InterNews, and now know that InterNews has the potential to read newsgroups. I also hit my first InterNews "nag-screen", which on top of a 32K limitation, impossible to authenticate, and now a 30 day trial period, kind of seals the deal for me. But I thought this whole exercise was to find a news reader that will also run in System 6. I did some deeper searches into InterNews. The final resting place that I could find on the WA was from 2002, the page was last updated in 1998, but at least it had some relevant info: Quote *The InterNews Page:* Known Bugs If your server has more than 32,767 newsgroups, InterNews 2.0.2 will crash when it reads the group list or when you do a tune up. I have a fix in the works and it will be available "real soon". The Lastest Development Version The most recent development version is 2.0.3a8. This version handles news sites that insist on providing more than 32,000 newsgroups. There are a few other small changes: The Final Dartmouth Version The final Dartmouth version is 1.1. That version is short on features but is well proven over the years. It is the final version that will run under System 6. Anyone is now welcome to use InterNews 1.1 for free. No licensing fees apply for that version. Well I found out the hard way re the 32k newsgroups bug. The latest dev version, 2.0.3a8, would offer some respite, but all links on the page are FTP, so no go there either, via the WA. But, version 1.1 is free, so no nags, and would run under System 6. However, the authentication issues and < 32K groups will always be a negative factor.
Last Edit: July 03, 2025, 07:19 by MTT
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