The ECN No Name Newsletter is no longer being published. This is an archived issue.
[previous article] [next article]At one time or another all of us who read the network news groups have wanted to track down an article we read a few days ago but forgot to save. Well, the rn news reader has some nice features for searching for those recent news articles.
To find an recent article first go to the desired news group by typing "g news-group-name" and type "y" at the ... read now? [ynq] prompt. Next type a "$" at the ... what next? [qnp] prompt to make sure you start the search from the end of the news group. Now type "?keyword or phrase?:m" and rn will search back through all the available articles (about a week's worth on most ECN systems) and mark any that contain the keyword or phrase as unread. If you now type a "=" you will see the subject lines of the recovered articles and you can use rn's "s" command to save the article to a file.
If you can't remember a keyword that appeared in the subject of the article you are looking for, you can use "?keyword or phrase?a:m" to cause rn to search the entire text instead of the subject of each recent article for the key word or phrase.
More information is available to you about using rn, type "help rn".
Example:
%defender% rn No unread news in subscribed-to newsgroups. To subscribe to a new newsgroup use the gcommand. ******** End of newsgroups--what next? [qnp] g purdue.general ******** 0 unread articles in purdue.general--read now? [ynq] y End of newsgroup purdue.general. What next? [qnp] $ End of newsgroup purdue.general. What next? [qnp] ?concert?:m Searching... 68 Marked unread 66 Marked unread 65 Marked unread done What next? [npq] = 65 Twilight Concert Series 66 Tuesday's Twilight Concert Cancelled 68 Wed's Twilight Concert Cancelled What next? [npq] 65s concerts 65 Saved to file /home/harbor/kcd/News/concerts What next? [npq] 65-68j 65 Junked 66 Junked 67 68 Junked What next? [qnp] q ******** End of newsgroups--what next? [qnp] q %defender%
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