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Reading News At Purdue

Greg Roslansky

While at Purdue you will most likely be required to read a newsgroup to gain information for a particular class, current research projects and/or general information gathering. In particular reading the purdue.ecn.announce newsgroup will keep you up-to-date on what is happening at the ECN. There also exists a large number of newsgroups that are not directly related to Purdue. Some of the other areas of interest are: jobs, announcements, sports, current affairs, politics, cultures, .etc. Currently there are over 2500 newsgroups that can be read from most Engineering Computer Network (ECN) computers. The Gould NP1's cn, gn and mn have fewer newsgroups to read due to limited resources.

There are a variety of news readers available for reading news:

/usr/ecn/rn

RN attempts to minimize the amount of "dead" time spent reading news. RN tries to get things done while the user is reading or deciding whether to read, and attempts to get useful information onto the screen as soon as possible, highlighting spots that the eye makes frequent reference to, like subjects and previously read lines. RN can be run from all ECN terminals and workstations. For more information type "man rn".

/usr/ecn/nn

NN is a `point-and-shoot' news interface program, or a news reader for short (not to be confused with the human news reader). When you use NN, you can decide which of the many newsgroups you are interested in, and you can unsubscribe to those which don't interest you. NN will let you read the new (and old) articles in each of the groups you subscribe to using a menu-based article selection prior to reading the articles in the newsgroup. NN can be run from all ECN terminals and workstations. For more information type "man nn".

/usr/ecn/X11R5/bin/xrn

XRN is an X-based interface to the news system. Although it isn't based on the RN news reader, XRN uses the same terminology and contains many of the features of RN. In order to use XRN, you must be running the X window system or OpenWindows. For more information about XRN, type "man xrn".

Reading News on a Newsreader

--------------------------------

demo> rn purdue.ecn.announce
Unread news in purdue.ecn.announce            1 article

***1 unread article in purdue.ecn.announce
            --read now? [ynq]

y > < return >

Article 29 (1 more) in purdue.ecn.announce
                    (moderated):
From: roslansk@harbor.ecn.purdue.edu (G. Roslansky)
Subject: Welcome
Organization: Purdue University
                         Engineering Computer Network
Distribution: purdue
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 1993 18:41:04 GMT
Lines: 12

           Greetings, Welcome and Salutations
               to "purdue.ecn.announce".

              The informed user's choice.

Articles will  address  such  issues  as  software  updates,  ECN
sponsored  short  courses computer/network down time and anything
else that may affect the ECN user.
End of article 29 (of 30)--what next? [npq]

q >

demo>

Reading news, using the XRN newsreader.

1.) Make sure /usr/ecn/X11 is in your path.

2.) From a local window type in "xrn", if you are using a remote window, make sure your DISPLAY variable is set to the your local machine name.

3.) Select "Subscribe".

4.) Type "purdue.ecn.announce" . If the newsgroup has messages to be read, you will see purdue.ecn.announce in the index. If there are no messages, xrn will not display the newsgroup in the index.

Reading news, using the NN newsreader.

  demo>nn -g
  Enter Group or Folder (+./~) purdue.ecn.announce < return >
  Number of articles (juasne)  (j) <  return >

  Newsgroup: purdue.ecn.announce     Articles: 1 of 419/9

  a Greg Roslansky   12  Welcome

  -- 13:52 -- SELECT -- help:? -----All-----

   < return >

                Greetings, Welcome and Salutations
                    to "purdue.ecn.announce".

                    The informed user's choice.

  Articles will address such  issues  as  software  updates,  ECN
  sponsored short courses computer/network down time and anything
  else that may affect the ECN user.
  -- 14:01 --.ecn.announce-- LAST --help:?--All--

  < return >


                --------------------------------

Subscribing To A Newsgroup


Subscribing to  individual  newsgroups  is  done  in  a  slightly
different  manner  for  each of the three newsreaders.  Comparing
the following  examples  will  illustrate  these  differences  by
demonstrating    how    to    subscribe    to    the    newsgroup
purdue.ecn.announce with each newsreader.


                               RN


Make sure /usr/ecn is in your path.

Type "rn" .

Type "g purdue.ecn.announce" at the "rn" prompt.  If the group is
unsubscribed,  it  will  ask  you if you want to subscribe to it.
Answer yes to subscribe.

                               NN


Make sure /usr/ecn is in your path.

Type "nn -X purdue.ecn.announce".

If there are any articles to read, an index will be displayed.

Type "U" and nn will ask  if  you  want  to  unsubscribe  if  you
already  subscribe  to  the  group  or to re-subscribe if you are
currently unsubscribed.  Answer with "y" or "n".

"Q" will quit the newsreader.

                               XRN

Note: "xrn" is meant to be run on a bit-mapped display  terminal.
(Suns, X-terminals, HP's)


Make sure /usr/ecn/X11 is in your path.

From a local window type "xrn"  ,  if  you  are  using  a  remote
window,  make sure your DISPLAY variable is set to the your local
machine name.

Select "Subscribe".

Type "purdue.ecn.announce".  If the newsgroup has messages to  be
read,  you will see "purdue.ecn.announce" in the index.  If there
are no messages, xrn will not display the newsgroup in the index.

If you need further assistance, please contact  a  consultant  in
your nearest major terminal room.





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Last modified: Wednesday, 04-Mar-98 18:17:28 EST




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