PCbanter

PCbanter (http://www.pcbanter.net/index.php)
-   General XP issues or comments (http://www.pcbanter.net/forumdisplay.php?f=18)
-   -   Free Newsservers (http://www.pcbanter.net/showthread.php?t=1084855)

Jeff T[_3_] March 25th 12 04:09 PM

Free Newsservers
 
Are there any good, free newsservers?



BillW50 March 25th 12 04:15 PM

Free Newsservers
 
In ,
Jeff T typed:
Are there any good, free newsservers?


I like "news.eternal-september.org" myself. If you want binary
newsgroups, then that would be a bad one.

--
Bill
Asus EeePC 701 ~ 2GB RAM ~ 16GB-SDHC
Windows 2000 SP4 - OE5.5 - OE-QuoteFix v1.19.2



Stefan Patric[_3_] March 25th 12 04:38 PM

Free Newsservers
 
On Sun, 25 Mar 2012 10:09:52 -0500, Jeff T wrote:

Are there any good, free newsservers?


Yes. A plethora of them. But most are "limited" in some way. Just do a
search for "free Usenet servers."

I use www.aioe.org as it has SSL servers in addition to the open,
unsecured ones, and doesn't require registration.

Stef

BillW50 March 25th 12 05:15 PM

Free Newsservers
 
In ,
Mayayana typed:
Are there any good, free newsservers?


I was just looking into that the other day. I've been using
eternal-september, which requires registration but has no
fee. I'm happy with it, and they seem to have a non-
commercial attitude, but lately I've had almost daily problems.
I get "unable to connect", "too many connections from
your IP address", etc. I'm guessing that they're overloaded,
though there's no indication of that from their website.

The other day I got tired of waiting to log on and decided
to try aioe.org, which doesn't even require registration. I
posted a message and received the error: "Unable to post
because header is more than an hour old." ! I've never seen
an error like that, and it doesn't seem to make sense.

I did some looking around but didn't find any promising
solutions, so for now, at least, I'm staying with eternal-
september.


Your clock is one hour ahead which explains that one. And too many
connections means that your newsreader is using too many threads (or is
it ports?) accessing the server. Some newsreaders you can set this and
some you can't. And once you get this error, I think the server gives
you a timeout for an hour (or is it a few minutes?).

--
Bill
Asus EeePC 701 ~ 2GB RAM ~ 16GB-SDHC
Windows 2000 SP4 - OE5.5 - OE-QuoteFix v1.19.2



Jeff T[_3_] March 25th 12 05:17 PM

Free Newsservers
 

"Stefan Patric" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 25 Mar 2012 10:09:52 -0500, Jeff T wrote:

Are there any good, free newsservers?


Yes. A plethora of them. But most are "limited" in some way. Just do a
search for "free Usenet servers."

I use www.aioe.org as it has SSL servers in addition to the open,
unsecured ones, and doesn't require registration.

Stef



What I'm looking for is, being able to log into
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (for example) from a public computer..

Jeff



Jeff T[_3_] March 25th 12 06:06 PM

Free Newsservers
 

"BillW50" wrote in message
...
In ,
Jeff T typed:
Are there any good, free newsservers?


I like "news.eternal-september.org" myself. If you want binary
newsgroups, then that would be a bad one.

--
Bill
Asus EeePC 701 ~ 2GB RAM ~ 16GB-SDHC
Windows 2000 SP4 - OE5.5 - OE-QuoteFix v1.19.2

I tried news.eternal-september.org but all I could get were
news.eternal-september.org newsgroups.

Jeff



Mayayana March 25th 12 06:13 PM

Free Newsservers
 
| Are there any good, free newsservers?
|

I was just looking into that the other day. I've been using
eternal-september, which requires registration but has no
fee. I'm happy with it, and they seem to have a non-
commercial attitude, but lately I've had almost daily problems.
I get "unable to connect", "too many connections from
your IP address", etc. I'm guessing that they're overloaded,
though there's no indication of that from their website.

The other day I got tired of waiting to log on and decided
to try aioe.org, which doesn't even require registration. I
posted a message and received the error: "Unable to post
because header is more than an hour old." ! I've never seen
an error like that, and it doesn't seem to make sense.

I did some looking around but didn't find any promising
solutions, so for now, at least, I'm staying with eternal-
september.



BillW50 March 25th 12 06:15 PM

Free Newsservers
 
In ,
Jeff T wrote:
"BillW50" wrote in message
...
In ,
Jeff T typed:
Are there any good, free newsservers?


I like "news.eternal-september.org" myself. If you want binary
newsgroups, then that would be a bad one.


I tried news.eternal-september.org but all I could get were
news.eternal-september.org newsgroups.
Jeff


That is because you need to create an account at:

https://www.eternal-september.org/Re...hp?language=en

Then ensure the following:

https://www.eternal-september.org/in...p?showpage=faq

--
Bill
Gateway M465e ('06 era) - OE-QuoteFix v1.19.2
Centrino Core Duo T2400 1.83GHz - 2GB - Windows XP SP3



J. P. Gilliver (John) March 25th 12 06:18 PM

Free Newsservers
 
In message , Jeff T
writes:

"BillW50" wrote in message
...
In ,
Jeff T typed:
Are there any good, free newsservers?


I like "news.eternal-september.org" myself. If you want binary
newsgroups, then that would be a bad one.

If you want binary 'groups, Teranews costs three dollars something to
register with, and is then free for ever after.
--
Bill
Asus EeePC 701 ~ 2GB RAM ~ 16GB-SDHC
Windows 2000 SP4 - OE5.5 - OE-QuoteFix v1.19.2

I tried news.eternal-september.org but all I could get were
news.eternal-september.org newsgroups.

Jeff


That means you didn't complete the registration (or whatever they call
it) process. They provide a newsserver that gives access to their own
'groups without any registration ("I'm only seeing the e-s 'groups" is
one of the FAQs on the site). When you register, they send you an email
containing a link you have to click on (once); this whole process can
take a few hours when they're busy.

Or, you might not have set up your news client to supply username and
password (or have entered them incorrectly) when collecting; I think
that also gives access to the e-s 'groups only.

I don't know what e-s's business model is. In case it suddenly isn't, I
know lots of people who are very satisfied with NIN, alias "the Berlin
server", which though not free is something trivial like ten euros a
year.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G.5AL-IS-P--Ch++(p)Ar@T0H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

"He hasn't one redeeming vice." - Oscar Wilde

Paul March 25th 12 06:18 PM

Free Newsservers
 
Jeff T wrote:
"Stefan Patric" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 25 Mar 2012 10:09:52 -0500, Jeff T wrote:

Are there any good, free newsservers?

Yes. A plethora of them. But most are "limited" in some way. Just do a
search for "free Usenet servers."

I use www.aioe.org as it has SSL servers in addition to the open,
unsecured ones, and doesn't require registration.

Stef



What I'm looking for is, being able to log into
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (for example) from a public computer..

Jeff



Yes, AIOE is perfect for that. It has a limit on how many
text messages you can post a day, but in a coffee shop/Wifi
scenario, it's perfect.

It does not need "Always Request Authentication" tick box,
because you don't register for it, and there is no USER
or PASS to use. It's ready to accept postings as soon
as you connect to it. Port details here.

http://www.aioe.org/

"Currently, active servers a

1. nntp.aioe.org which opens the following ports:

* 119 (Plain Text and TLS)
* 563 (SSL Only)
* 443 (SSL Only)
* 22 (SSL Only)
* 80 (Plain Text and TLS)"

Your news reader software, may default to port 119. That results
in anyone "looking at the packets in flight", being able to
see the message. But since your message is public anyway,
all this detail means, is they can theoretically track the
source of a new posting, to the coffee shop it's being sent
from. If you use SSL, it means that big warehouse in Utah,
has to work a little harder to crack the content :-)

Eternal-September.org is an equally useful server, with the
main difference being, it requires registration, and when
using the news reader software, you have to remember to
"push" a USER and PASS to it, so all the newsgroups will be
visible.

You could also use groups.google.com to read and post, but
as users of "real" news servers, we don't like to promote
services that are not "good USENET citizens". Google doesn't
do enough, to control abuse from its end. Some of the people
reading USENET postings, have a "Google filter" to remove all
posts originating from the Google server. If you post through
Google, at least some participants won't see your message.
Odds are slightly better, with real servers like AIOE or E-S.

Paul

Ant[_3_] March 25th 12 06:22 PM

Free Newsservers
 
On 3/25/2012 8:15 AM PT, BillW50 typed:

Are there any good, free newsservers?


I like "news.eternal-september.org" myself. If you want binary
newsgroups, then that would be a bad one.


I don't think there are any free binary news servers.
--
"Cheerios: Hula-hoops for ants." --unknown
/\___/\ Ant(Dude) @ http://antfarm.ma.cx (Personal Web Site)
/ /\ /\ \ Ant's Quality Foraged Links: http://aqfl.net
| |o o| |
\ _ / If crediting, then use Ant nickname and AQFL URL/link.
( ) If e-mailing, then axe ANT from its address if needed.
Ant is currently not listening to any songs on this computer.

J. P. Gilliver (John) March 25th 12 06:24 PM

Free Newsservers
 
In message , Jeff T
writes:
[]
Are there any good, free newsservers?


Yes. A plethora of them. But most are "limited" in some way. Just do a
search for "free Usenet servers."

I use www.aioe.org as it has SSL servers in addition to the open,
unsecured ones, and doesn't require registration.

Stef



What I'm looking for is, being able to log into
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (for example) from a public computer..

Jeff


You don't "log in" to a newsgroup; you access it, from a news server,
using a news client set up on your computer.

The only ways to access newsgroups on a computer on which you haven't
set anything up are if its owner has set up a client and created an
account on a server (not usually done for public computers as anyone
could post something illegal etc. from it), or use a web-based system
such as Google Groups (there are plenty of others but they usually only
carry a few newsgroups). Most of these will allow you to _read_ news; to
_post_, you usually have to sign in to an "account" on that server, via
the web interface.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G.5AL-IS-P--Ch++(p)Ar@T0H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

"He hasn't one redeeming vice." - Oscar Wilde

Paul March 25th 12 06:27 PM

Free Newsservers
 
BillW50 wrote:
In ,
Mayayana typed:


The other day I got tired of waiting to log on and decided
to try aioe.org, which doesn't even require registration. I
posted a message and received the error: "Unable to post
because header is more than an hour old." ! I've never seen
an error like that, and it doesn't seem to make sense.


Your clock is one hour ahead which explains that one. And too many
connections means that your newsreader is using too many threads (or is
it ports?) accessing the server. Some newsreaders you can set this and
some you can't. And once you get this error, I think the server gives
you a timeout for an hour (or is it a few minutes?).


Paolo Amoroso has fooled around a *lot* with that clock check. At one time,
it was widened out to around a day, so it wouldn't trip up on
trivial daylight savings errors. If you're seeing that error again,
you'd need to complain over on aioe.news.helpdesk .

"Clock abusers" post in the future, in the hopes their posting
will always appear at the "top" of a date-listed screen. That's
why they do it. And some servers flag such attempts. But in this
case, the check is too tight.

Paul


J. P. Gilliver (John) March 25th 12 06:28 PM

Free Newsservers
 
In message , Paul
writes:
Jeff T wrote:

[]
What I'm looking for is, being able to log into
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (for example) from a public computer..

[]
Yes, AIOE is perfect for that. It has a limit on how many
text messages you can post a day, but in a coffee shop/Wifi
scenario, it's perfect.

[]
Your news reader software, may default to port 119. That results


By "public computer", I think Jeff meant one he hasn't been able to set
up news reader software on.
[]
You could also use groups.google.com to read and post, but
as users of "real" news servers, we don't like to promote
services that are not "good USENET citizens". Google doesn't
do enough, to control abuse from its end. Some of the people
reading USENET postings, have a "Google filter" to remove all
posts originating from the Google server. If you post through
Google, at least some participants won't see your message.
Odds are slightly better, with real servers like AIOE or E-S.


But it's your only option from a cybercafé or similar.
[]
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G.5AL-IS-P--Ch++(p)Ar@T0H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

"He hasn't one redeeming vice." - Oscar Wilde

Paul March 25th 12 06:34 PM

Free Newsservers
 
Ant wrote:
On 3/25/2012 8:15 AM PT, BillW50 typed:

Are there any good, free newsservers?


I like "news.eternal-september.org" myself. If you want binary
newsgroups, then that would be a bad one.


I don't think there are any free binary news servers.


If and when they exist, they usually have a transfer limit per
day. Like 50MB. Some users change accounts, to try to abuse
such a privilege, which may be why even the most feeble
attempts to offer a free binary service, have to stop.

If a person has a 200GB per month internet cap, and uses
that to do nothing but USENET binaries, I think you can
see why the operator of a free service, would be in
for a very expensive Internet bill at the end of the
month. Ten thousand leeches at 200GB per, would be
a pretty serious monthly bill for the server operator.
And that's where the 50MB per day cap idea comes in.

Some of these binary servers, operate as "test servers".
Say you run a commercial service, and a new version of
INN software becomes available. You load it on the
"free" server first, and ten thousand leeches check
the server software for stability for you. That's the
justification for running a free service - it's for the
free testing it provides. If the new server software
is stable, then it can be loaded on the "paying customer"
server. And thus, the "free loader" server will be up and
down, as software changes are made.

Paul


All times are GMT +1. The time now is 07:47 PM.

Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.6.4
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Copyright © 2004 - 2006 PCbanter
Comments are property of their posters