RELAYNEWS(8) UNIX System V(16 March 1991) RELAYNEWS(8)
NAME
relaynews - store and forward netnews articles
SYNOPSIS
relaynews [ -inrs ] [ -d fhlmt ] [ -o days ] [ -x excluded-site ]
DESCRIPTION
Relaynews installs locally and broadcasts (network) news articles read
from its standard input. Typically the articles will be in a batch (see
news(5)), which must not be compressed (see compress(1)). Articles are
usually queued for transmission to one's netnews neighbours via
newsbatch(8) and thence via uux(1) or mail(1).
-d turns on debugging of filing, headers, locking, matching,
transmission. -r redirects stdout and stderr to /usr/dell/cnews/lib/log
and /usr/dell/cnews/lib/errlog. -i redirects stdout only to
/usr/dell/cnews/lib/log. -n enables ``NNTP mode'' in which history
entries are generated as articles are rejected. -s makes discarding an
article a serious matter, justifying a non-zero exit status (for the
benefit of inews). -o causes articles with dates (in Date: headers)
more than days old to be dropped (usually to stop accidentally-
retransmitted old articles). -x excludes excluded-site from the list of
netnews neighbours to receive article(s).
Control messages, recognised by their Control: headers (or for backward
compatibility ONLY a Newsgroups: header containing a single newsgroup
ending in .ctl), are filed under the control pseudo-group only, but are
forwarded as usual, by examining their Newsgroups: and Distribution:
headers. Note that posting to the control pseudo-group will not cause a
message to be treated as a control message; control is not a real
newsgroup.
An article which contains an Also-Control: header is treated normally
except that the contents of the header are executed as if they were the
contents of a Control: header. Such an article is a form of hybrid
message since it functions as an ordinary article yet also causes control
functions to be executed. The Supersedes: header is a special case and
is rewritten internally only to Also-Control: cancel.
Articles which contain no locally-known (to the active file) newsgroups
yet accepted by the local subscription list are filed exactly once, in
the junk pseudo-group, and forwarded as usual. If all newsgroups in the
article are refused by the local subscription list or are refused by an x
in active file entries, then the article will be discarded and not filed
in junk.
Locally-generated articles need not be permitted by the local
subscription list but are otherwise processed normally; this is for
backward compatibility and perhaps to keep the local subscription list
short by not requiring general and the like to be named.
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RELAYNEWS(8) UNIX System V(16 March 1991) RELAYNEWS(8)
FILES
/var/spool/news netnews article tree
/var/spool/news/comp/unix/wizards
example newsgroup directory (for comp.unix.wizards)
/var/spool/news/out.going/system/togo
default sys file F, f and I flags filename
/usr/dell/cnews/lib/sys
determines who receives broadcast netnews articles,
which ones, and how they are to be sent articles
/usr/dell/cnews/lib/active
contains locally-legal newsgroups and (un)moderated
flag
/usr/dell/cnews/lib/history
record of articles received
/usr/dell/cnews/lib/history.{dir,pag}
dbm(3) index into history
/usr/dell/cnews/lib/whoami
if present, contains news system's site name,
overriding any other host names
/usr/dell/cnews/lib/log
log of incoming articles
/usr/dell/cnews/lib/errlog
log of errors, should be empty
/usr/dell/cnews/lib/bin
system-specific directory of programs to override
/usr/dell/cnews/newsbin and its subdirectories
/usr/dell/cnews/newsbin/ctl
directory of programs to implement control messages
/usr/dell/cnews/newsbin/relay/relaynews
the lean, mean news-relayin' machine
/usr/dell/cnews/newsbin/newsreply
generates a return address from article headers
SEE ALSO
compress(1), mail(1), uux(1), dbm(3), news(5), newsbatch(8)
ARPA Internet RFCs 1036 and 850
DIAGNOSTICS
Usually found in /usr/dell/cnews/lib/errlog.
Relaynews's exit status is a bit vector of status bits; see
news/include/news.h for the bit definitions.
If relaynews cannot establish safe standard file descriptors and
standardise its environment (notably PATH, SHELL and IFS), probably due
to failure of malloc(3), it will exit with status of 1 and without
writing any complaints on standard error (errlog), as a security
precaution.
HISTORY
Written by Geoff Collyer at the University of Toronto as part of the C
news project.
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RELAYNEWS(8) UNIX System V(16 March 1991) RELAYNEWS(8)
BUGS
An article with a header that does not fit entirely in a static buffer
and on a machine without real links (e.g. something like Eunice but on a
PDP-11) will be filed incorrectly: any symbolic links under
/var/spool/news will point at a non-existent filename.
A control message which cannot be filed in the control pseudo-group and
which cannot be filed in the junk pseudo-group because junk is not in the
active file will generate an error message which refers to the groups in
its Newsgroups: header instead of referring to the control pseudo-group.
Relaynews could run faster in some circumstances and would be simpler if
Control: were required to be the first header, if present, and if
Newsgroups: were required to be the next.
The whole control message and hybrid message situation is a festering
bug. Either control messages should be eliminated, or all forms of
backward compatibility should be dropped (including Control: and
Supersedes:) and only Also-Control: should be supported.
Use of the = active file flag can result in a cross-posted article being
filed multiple times in the same group, though with the Xref: header set
appropriately so that newsreaders should suppress showing the redundant
links.
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