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1994-04-05
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Path: bloom-beacon.mit.edu!hookup!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!news.mentorg.com!sdl!not-for-mail
From: tal@Warren.MENTORG.COM (Tom Limoncelli)
Newsgroups: news.software.nntp,news.software.b,news.answers
Subject: Changes to INN FAQ Part 3/4: Operational and Misc. Questions
Supersedes: <inn-faq-changes-3-765518416@Warren.MENTORG.COM>
Followup-To: news.software.nntp
Date: 5 Apr 1994 11:37:14 -0400
Organization: Mentor Graphics - IC Group, Warren, NJ, USA
Lines: 508
Sender: tal@Warren.MENTORG.COM
Approved: news-answers-request@MIT.Edu
Distribution: world
Expires: 04/20/94
Message-ID: <inn-faq-changes-3-764139608@Warren.MENTORG.COM>
References: <inn-faq-changes-2-764139608@Warren.MENTORG.COM>
Reply-To: Tom_Limoncelli@Warren.MENTORG.COM (Tom Limoncelli)
NNTP-Posting-Host: sdl.warren.mentorg.com
Xref: bloom-beacon.mit.edu news.software.nntp:5495 news.software.b:4177 news.answers:17712
Posted-By: auto-faq 2.4
Archive-name: inn-faq/diff3
No differences encountered
--
Tom Limoncelli -- tal@warren.mentorg.com (work) -- tal@plts.org (play)
"Psst! Hey, Anthony! Y'know what I | Disclaimer: I do not
like about existing?" "Uh... uh... what?" | speak for Mentor Graphics.
"Possessing a physical extension." -TSA |
*** 1.48 1994/01/17 14:30:24
--- FAQ-inn.3 1994/03/31 21:14:54
***************
*** 1,4 ****
! Last Changed: $Id: FAQ-inn.3,v 1.48 1994/01/17 14:30:24 tal Exp $
Part 3 of 4
--- 1,4 ----
! Last Changed: $Id: FAQ-inn.3,v 1.61 1994/03/15 20:09:03 tal Exp $
Part 3 of 4
***************
*** 32,37 ****
--- 32,39 ----
Suddenly my active and history files are owned by root!
How come my host name comes out twice in the Path line?
Expire had problems last night, and while I fixed the problem,
+ expire reports "Group not matched (removed?) --
+ Using default expiration"
Why doesn't this newsfeeds entry do what I want?
Why am I forwarding cancel messages for articles in comp.foo
Debugging someone that is feeding you.
***************
*** 42,55 ****
Directories are being created with wrong permissions.
Why am I getting alt.sex.pictures even though I have
More about the "to.*" groups
HOW DO I... (Big changes you can make to the system):
How do I set up a delayed IHAVE/SENDME over NNTP?
Can I use gzip with INN?
What do I do if /var/spool/news is set up over many partitions?
BUGS IN 1.4:
! (this section currently empty)
BUGS IN 1.3:
7-bit encoded batches are not correctly processed. Why is this?
BUGS IN 1.2:
Why doesn't nntpget work?
--- 44,65 ----
Directories are being created with wrong permissions.
Why am I getting alt.sex.pictures even though I have
More about the "to.*" groups
+ What's a decent syslog.conf configuration?
+ INN batcher writing "#!rnews 0" separators
+ Posting while throttled doesn't work
+ "innd: overview! spooling" and the file "overview!" in /usr/spool/news/out.going
+ "newgroup" control messages aren't being executed
HOW DO I... (Big changes you can make to the system):
How do I set up a delayed IHAVE/SENDME over NNTP?
Can I use gzip with INN?
What do I do if /var/spool/news is set up over many partitions?
+ archiving expired articles
BUGS IN 1.4:
! Security Patch
! Looping Select Patch
BUGS IN 1.3:
7-bit encoded batches are not correctly processed. Why is this?
+ NOV (overchan) doesn't work well.
BUGS IN 1.2:
Why doesn't nntpget work?
***************
*** 74,79 ****
--- 84,93 ----
Subject: Safe way to edit the "active" file?
+ First of all, you could manipulate the active file using the ctlinnd
+ "newgroup", "rmgroup" and "changegroup" commands. However, sometimes
+ you just need to do a lot of editing all at once:
+
The following sequence is the shortest:
ctlinnd pause "edit active"
***************
*** 81,87 ****
ctlinnd reload active "edit active"
ctlinnd go "edit active"
! Simple! No need to "flush", the "pause" does that.
------------------------------
--- 95,142 ----
ctlinnd reload active "edit active"
ctlinnd go "edit active"
! Simple! No need to "flush" since the "pause" does that.
!
! > What if I need to delete 3000 lines from my active file?
!
! I would definately edit the active file manually (using
! the above procedure).
!
! > What if I need to delete 10 lines from my active file?
!
! For a couple quick changes, I recommend using "ctlinnd". This is a
! little slow because all channels are closed and reopened after each
! "rmgroup", "newgroup", and "changegroup". However, it's easier than
! remembering the above sequence.
!
! DO NOT THROTTLE THE SERVER WHEN DOING MULTIPLE rmgroup COMMANDS. There
! is a bug in INN (all versions) that will shred your active file if you
! do multiple "rmgroup" messages while the server if throttled. This is
! a common mistake. People think the "rmgroup"'s will go faster if the
! server is throttled. It will go faster, it will also shred your active
! file.
!
! If you have a large number of groups to remove or create, you can use
! awk to write a script to do the work for you.
!
! % cat thelist
! alt.foo.bar
! alt.delete.me
! comp.sys.mac
! % awk <thelist '{ print "ctlinnd rmgroup " $1 }'
! ctlinnd rmgroup alt.foo.bar
! ctlinnd rmgroup alt.delete.me
! ctlinnd rmgroup comp.sys.mac
!
! Now, you can either send the output of that to "| sh -x",
! or you can redirect the output to a file, and "source" the
! file.
!
! If you want to create a bunch of newsgroups, the awk
! command might be like this:
!
! % awk <thelist \
! '{ print "ctlinnd newgroup " $1 " y user@host" }' | sh -x
------------------------------
***************
*** 132,139 ****
STEP 6: When you feel you are ready to install the new $INN/site files:
! % cd $INN/site
! % make install
STEP 7: Re-start the system:
--- 187,194 ----
STEP 6: When you feel you are ready to install the new $INN/site files:
! # cd $INN/site
! # make install
STEP 7: Re-start the system:
***************
*** 140,146 ****
% sh /usr/lib/news/etc/rc.news
STEP 8: If everything was done right you should be up and running.
! Part ??? of the FAQ gives tips on testing your configuration.
------------------------------
--- 195,201 ----
% sh /usr/lib/news/etc/rc.news
STEP 8: If everything was done right you should be up and running.
! Part 2 of the FAQ gives tips on testing your configuration.
------------------------------
***************
*** 211,218 ****
------------------------------
! Subject: Expire had problems last night, and while I fixed the problem,
! it still won't run.
When expire starts up it "reserves" the server so that nobody else can
pause or throttle it. This prevents anyone else from coming in and
--- 266,273 ----
------------------------------
! Subject: Expire had problems last night, and while I fixed the
! problem, it still won't run.
When expire starts up it "reserves" the server so that nobody else can
pause or throttle it. This prevents anyone else from coming in and
***************
*** 225,230 ****
--- 280,300 ----
------------------------------
+ Subject: expire reports "Group not matched (removed?) --
+ Using default expiration"
+
+ Expire says:
+ Group not matched (removed?) alt.techno-shamanism -- Using default expiration
+ Group not matched (removed?) misc.computers.forsale -- Using default expiration
+ Group not matched (removed?) de.rec.sf.startrek -- Using default expiration
+
+ That just means that you've removed those newsgroups groups and expire
+ is slowly removing articles from the spool as they expire. Eventually
+ the articles will all have been deleted and so will these messages.
+
+
+ ------------------------------
+
Subject: Why doesn't this newsfeeds entry do what I want?
"foo.com:alt,!alt.sex"
***************
*** 369,377 ****
it. If a control message is posted to a group whose name
ends with the four characters ``.ctl'' then the suffix is
stripped off and what is left is used as the group name.
! For example, a cancel message posted to ``news.admin.ctl''
will be sent to all sites that subscribe to ``control'' or
! ``news.admin.''
There is also a pointer to this in newsfeeds(5).
--- 439,447 ----
it. If a control message is posted to a group whose name
ends with the four characters ``.ctl'' then the suffix is
stripped off and what is left is used as the group name.
! For example, a cancel message posted to ``news.admin.misc.ctl''
will be sent to all sites that subscribe to ``control'' or
! ``news.admin.misc''.
There is also a pointer to this in newsfeeds(5).
***************
*** 380,385 ****
--- 450,593 ----
Yes.
+ ------------------------------
+
+ Subject: What's a decent syslog.conf configuration?
+
+ The configuration will be different for each site, but here is what
+ Greg Earle recommends as the lines for the "news.*" related part.
+ Remember that most syslog's require tabs, not spaces.
+
+ Greg's canonical SunOS 4.1.x INN-related syslog.conf entries (which can
+ be merged into your current configuration):
+
+ #
+ # INN stuff
+ #
+ ## Send critical messages to everyone who is logged in and to the console.
+ news.crit *
+ news.crit /dev/console
+
+ ## Log news messages to separate files.
+ ## Note that each level includes all of the above it.
+ ## =()<news.crit @<_PATH_MOST_LOGS>@/news.crit>()=
+ news.crit /var/log/news/news.crit
+ ## =()<news.err @<_PATH_MOST_LOGS>@/news.err>()=
+ news.err /var/log/news/news.err
+ ## =()<news.notice @<_PATH_MOST_LOGS>@/news.notice>()=
+ news.notice /var/log/news/news.notice
+
+
+ ------------------------------
+
+ Subject: INN batcher writing "#!rnews 0" separators
+
+ >Outgoing UUCP batches from here are going out with "#!rnews 0" at
+ >the head of each article.
+
+ Most common cause: your newsfeeds entry has "Wnm" not "Wnb".
+
+ Other reasons:
+
+ batchfiles have something other than a single space between article
+ filename and size
+
+ batchfiles lack size information (all the articles sizes will be read
+ from the batch file as zero)
+
+
+ ------------------------------
+
+ Subject: Posting while throttled doesn't work
+
+ >I want to be able to allow my users to be able to post articles when
+ >innwatch has throttled the system when the spool disk is "full".
+
+ Cannot be done in 1.4.
+
+ At a minimum, in 1.5 nnrpd will spool the post for the user.
+
+
+ ------------------------------
+
+ Subject: "innd: overview! spooling" and the file "overview!" in /usr/spool/news/out.going
+
+ > About once a month or so, I get the following warning messages:
+ >
+ > Jan 20 07:20:22 optima innd: overview!:31:proc:9193 cant flush count 14639 Operation would block
+ > Jan 20 07:20:22 optima innd: overview! spooling 14639 bytes
+ >
+ > And there's a file "overview!" in /usr/spool/news/out.going with stuff in it.
+ >
+ > Should I be doing anything more with this than ignoring it, and maybe
+ > occasionally deleting it (it just grows)?
+
+ This happens because innd is feeding info to overchan faster than
+ overchan can process it. The overflow is sent to the file
+ "overview!". This file can be deleted, as nnrpd will grab the missing
+ data out of the articles "manually". The slow-down won't be noticed.
+ However, you can "expireover -a" to "fill in the holes".
+
+ To prevent this in the future, you need to make overchan run faster.
+ This is easy to do. I found that moving the overview files into
+ /usr/spool/news/over.view made things fast enough that the problem went
+ away. Change "_PATH_OVERVIEWDIR" in config.data, recompile, and you're
+ done. (You will need to recompile any newsreaders that read via NFS or
+ off the local disk).
+
+ Why does that speed up overchan? overchan works by opening the proper
+ .overview file, appending 1 line to it, then closing the file. If you
+ have the .overview file in the same directory as 10000 articles then
+ opening the .overview file will take a huge amount of time. The open()
+ call literally searches though an average 5000 (half of 10000) file
+ names to find ".overview". If you move your .overview files so that
+ each one is in it's own directory, (say,
+ /usr/spool/news/over.view/{group}/{name}/.overview) then open() is
+ searching through 3 files ( ".", "..", and ".overview") to find 1
+ file. ( O(N/2) where N=10000 vs. N=3... and you thought those
+ freshman year CS classes would never be useful!)
+
+ There isn't much you can do to make the "append" and "close" steps much
+ faster, except maybe install a PrestoServe or similar write-cache, and
+ that won't help very much.
+
+ Profiling overchan (with PureSoft's Quantify product) found that the
+ open() (actually searching the directory to find the .overview file)
+ was around 80% of the execution time of overchan. That was reduced to
+ 40% when I moved the .overview files to their own directory. With the
+ change, overview's profiling statistics are pretty flat. (which is
+ good).
+
+ DO run "expireover -a" to fix the problem.
+
+ DO NOT try feeding the "overview!" file to overchan manually.
+ (1) overchan doesn't do any locking and you'll have two overchan's
+ running at once.
+ (2) overchan only appends to the .overview files. If you've gotten
+ any articles since the "overview!" file was created (you will
+ have) then you'll be appending told old entries that are out of
+ order. Your ".overview" files must be in sorted order for the
+ other utilities to work right.
+
+
+ ------------------------------
+
+ Subject: "newgroup" control messages aren't being executed
+
+ > "newgroup" control messages aren't be executed
+
+ The usual blame for this is _PATH_EGREP points to a grep that doesn't
+ understand regular expressions. For example, GNU grep only understands
+ regular expressions if it is called "egrep" (i.e. not "gnuegrep" or
+ "egnugrep").
+
+ Make sure you have a link or symlink between egnugrep and egrep. You
+ then need to modify config.data so that _PATH_EGREP is
+ /your/local/path/egrep and NOT /your/local/path/egnuegrep. Then
+ recompile and "make install" to have the new binaries and shell
+ scripts installed.
+
+
=====================================================================
HOW DO I... (Big changes you can make to the system)
=====================================================================
***************
*** 555,568 ****
find . -type l -print | grep '[0-9][0-9]*' | xargs -t rm
=====================================================================
BUGS IN 1.4
=====================================================================
! (this section currently empty, it will soon have the 2-3 unofficial
! patches that are sometimes needed.)
=====================================================================
BUGS IN 1.3
=====================================================================
--- 763,827 ----
find . -type l -print | grep '[0-9][0-9]*' | xargs -t rm
+ ------------------------------
+
+ Subject: archiving expired articles
+
+ In <2hmomh$262@news.iastate.edu> rod@iastate.edu writes:
+ >What options do I have in INN for archiving local newsgroups?
+
+ See doc/archive.8. You could also put "never:never:never" in your
+ expire.ctl file.
+
+ >Any help would be appreciated. Any cookbook examples would also help.
+
+ A cookbook newsfeeds entry:
+ # Feed all moderated source postings to an archiver
+ source-archive!:!*,*sources*,!*wanted*,!*.d\
+ :Tc,Nm,Wn:/usr/local/bin/archive -f -i /usr/spool/news.archive/INDEX
+
+
+ ------------------------------
+
+ Subject: How do I set up inpaths with INN?
+
+ inpaths should work just fine with INN as it ships. However, you can
+ make it run faster by using the following shell script. Edit it to
+ your tastes. It replaces the long "(cd /var/spool/news ;
+ /usr/local/bin/gfind . -type f -print | /usr/lib/news/local/inpaths sdl
+ | /usr/ucb/mail admin,pathsurvey@decwrl.dec.com )" which people usually
+ use.
+
+ #!/bin/sh
+ . /home/news/innshellvars
+ cd ${SPOOL}
+ awk '(NR > 2){print $3}' < ${HISTORY} | tr . / | sort | \
+ inpaths `innconfval pathhost` | \
+ ${MAILCMD} pathsurvey@decwrl.dec.com
+
+
=====================================================================
BUGS IN 1.4
=====================================================================
! UNOFFICIAL patches for INN 1.4 are available via anonymous FTP at
! ftp://ftp.pop.psu.edu/pub/src/news/inn-patches/
!
! The file ftp://ftp.pop.psu.edu/pub/src/news/inn-patches/README describes
! each of the UNOFFICIAL patches.
!
! The ones that are highly recommended are:
+ 1.4-to-1.4sec -- Fixes the major security hole in INN.
+ 1.4sec-to-1.4sec2 -- Fixes the remaining known security hole in INN.
+
+ select-loop-bug.patch -- Under some circumstances innd can lose track
+ of a file descriptor and end up sitting in a select() loop. If your
+ INN suddenly is using up tons of CPU time and not getting much done,
+ install this UNOFFICIAL patch. Some OSs are more susecptible to this
+ bug.
+
=====================================================================
BUGS IN 1.3
=====================================================================
***************
*** 580,585 ****
--- 839,853 ----
fixed in INN 1.4.
+ ------------------------------
+
+ Subject: NOV (overchan) doesn't work well.
+
+ Correct. The NOV support in 1.3 didn't have all the bugs worked out.
+ Don't use NOV under INN 1.3. Better yet, upgrade to 1.4sec and get all
+ the benefits!
+
+
=====================================================================
BUGS IN 1.2
(Hey, it's 1994! Upgrade already!)
***************
*** 589,595 ****
Subject: Why doesn't nntpget work?
! The nntpget in INN 1.2 doesn't work. Period. Upgrade to the latest version
! of INN.
--- 857,863 ----
Subject: Why doesn't nntpget work?
! The nntpget in INN 1.2 doesn't work. Period. Upgrade to the latest
! version of INN.