Newsreaders

All newsreaders use a file in your home directory called '.newsrc'. This file is used to register the newsgroups to which you subscribe and the news articles you have already seen. Unless you have a system manager who has created a '.defaultnewsrc' file for your machine, before using the newsreader 'nn' for the first time it is essential to create a '.newsrc' file in your home directory. It should contain the initial list of newsgroups, one per line, to which you want to subscribe. For example

cern.cern
cern.computing
cern.unix
cern.hp

If you don't create such a file you will be overwhelmed by interactive requests from every existing newsgroup (all 3000 of them!). You may also find it convenient to create such a '.newsrc' file before using mxrn but it is not so essential.

Three tools for reading news are proposed;-

mxrn

This is a Motif interface to the 'old fashioned' rn  newsreader. It is relatively easy to use since all the options are made available via the windows interface.. When you execute mxrn for the first time you will be presented with the complete list of newsgroups from which to select the ones to which you wish to subscribe. Luckily the list is presented in alphabetic order and a scroll bar is provided to help you get to the ones you want. As new newsgroups become available you will automatically be offered the chance to subscribe the next time you execute mxrn.

nn

  This calls itself 'an efficient' news reader and although it is more difficult for a new user to learn, offers an enormous variety of options and functions for someone who wants to scan, if not read, a large amount of news. Since it is not an X application it can be used from any type of terminal. Don't forget to create a '.newsrc' file before using 'nn' for the first time. Subsequently, each time you execute nn you will first be given the chance to examine newly created groups. If you are not interested in them type U to unsubscribe.

For each newsgroup to which you subscribe, you are first presented with a list of all new news articles from which you select the ones you want to look at by typing in the letter or number appearing to the left of the subject line. When you have finished selecting items, hitting the space bar will put you into 'reading mode' where the text of the selected articles will be presented one after the other.

nn commands are normally just one letter and are mostly CASE SENSITIVE.

?

help, summary of the commands that you can use at this moment

a-z,0-9

the letter or number corresponding to new item you want to look at

Q

quit - note upper case!

space

advance to the next page, next mode, next newsgroup,..

U

unsubscribe

www

You can also access news via the World Wide Web (www) using either 'mosaic' or the line mode browser 'www'. This method does not use the .newsrc file and so does not keep track of the newsgroups to which you are subscribed nor which news you have seen. However it could be useful for people who read very little news or who normally use 'mxrn' and have an occasional need to access news from a 'dumb terminal' and don't want to learn 'nn'. News is accessible from the CERN 'home page'. Note that if you are using mosaic you could add your favorite news groups to your 'hotlist'. The URL needed for accessing news is of the form

news:cern.computing
news:comp.unix.ultrix