                                Leafnode FAQ
   
   Last update 29 Aug 2000
   
   
   This document contains answers to some commonly encountered problems.
   The questions discussed are:
    1. Leafnode does not compile on my system.
    2. I want to change my upstream server.
    3. I cannot connect to my newsserver.
    4. My news reader complains about repeated frequent timeouts of the
       NNTP server.
    5. Does Leafnode support local newsgroups?
    6. tin complains about a missing file "/var/lib/news/active".
    7. When searching news with Netscape, I only get back "unknown
       command".
    8. When running leafnode in "delaybody" mode, I can only view the
       headers with Netscape/Outlook Express.
    9. fetchnews does not fetch any articles.
   10. fetchnews is slow. Can I speed it up?
   11. fetchnews has problems retrieving new newsgroups.
   12. When fetching articles, the connection is interrupted by the pppd.
   13. fetchnews crashes with a segmentation fault.
   14. I want to invoke fetchnews as normal user.
   15. I have unsubscribed a newsgroup, but fetchnews still retrieves
       articles from it.
   16. leafnode generates incorrect/incomplete message IDs.
   17. texpire does not expire articles.
   18. I want to switch off the automatic expiring of newsgroups.
   19. Why is Leafnode not licensed under the GPL?
     _________________________________________________________________
   
   A good way to approach communication problems with leafnode is to
   switch on the debugmode. This is done by putting "debugmode = 1" into
   the leafnode configuration file and then turning on the logging of the
   "debug" priority for the facility "news" in /etc/syslogd.conf. To turn
   on logging, do the following:
    1. Put into /etc/syslogd.conf a line which looks like the one below:
           news.=debug     /var/log/news.debug
       It is mandatory that the two fields be separated by a tab, not
       spaces.
    2. Become root and restart the syslog daemon:
           kill -HUP `cat /var/run/syslog.pid`
       or
           kill -HUP `cat /var/run/syslogd.pid`
       (depends on your distribution).
       
   Be warned that the leafnode programs write a lot of information to
   this channel.
   
   Comments or additions should be sent to Cornelius Krasel
   <krasel@wpxx02.toxi.uni-wuerzburg.de>.
     _________________________________________________________________
   
1. Leafnode does not compile on my system.

   This most frequently seems to happen on Linux. The reason is that
   Leafnode depends on some system-specific information which is usually
   included in the sources of the kernel. Unfortunately, nowadays many
   Linux distribution do not install kernel sources by default;
   therefore, compilation of Leafnode (and most other programs as well)
   will fail. The obvious solution is to install the kernel sources. If
   compilation still does not work afterwards, complain to your
   distributor. On Linux, if the kernel sources are installed in
   /usr/src/linux-a.b.cc (with a.b.cc being the version number of your
   kernel), create a symlink to /usr/src/linux.
   
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2. I want to change my upstream server.

   I have never done this myself, but leafnode should have no problems
   with it. Assuming that your new server is called "new.upstream.server"
   and your old server "old.upstream.server", I recommend following the
   procedure outlined below:
    1. Add the following lines to your config file:
           server = new.upstream.server
           maxfetch = 100
       If you have already another maxfetch defined, reduce it
       temporarily.
    2. Run fetchnews.
    3. Remove
           server = old.upstream.server
       and delete the "maxfetch" line that was introduced in step 1).
       That's it.
       
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3. I cannot connect to my newsserver.

   Most likely your setup is incorrect. This can have several reasons.
    1. inetd is not running. Check with
           ps axu | grep inetd
       inetd should be running once.
       
    2. inetd is running, but the entry in /etc/inetd.conf is incorrect.
       
         1. The nntp entry is not recognized.
            Run "inetd -d" as root (finish with Ctrl-C). You should get
            exactly one line starting like this:
                ADD : nntp proto=tcp, ...
            If this is not the case, the syntax of your entry in
            /etc/inetd.conf is incorrect. Compare it with some other
            entries. Most notably, it should not contain any leading
            spaces.
            
         2. The nntp entry is recognized, but leafnode is not found or
            has wrong permissions.
            inetd will log attempts to invoke leafnode in some logfile,
            usually /var/log/syslog or /var/log/messages (the exact name
            depends on the setup of your /etc/syslog.conf). If an error
            occurs when invoking leafnode, you can find out there what
            exactly happened.
       
    3. inetd is running and the entry in /etc/inetd.conf is correct, but
       the tcpd denies access to the server (in /var/log/messages you
       will find something like "leafnode: connection refused from ...").
       Check the entries in /etc/hosts.allow and /etc/hosts.deny. An
       example for a correct entry is given in the INSTALL file.
       
    4. Leafnode cannot read its configuration file (usually
       /etc/leafnode/config). This is usually a problem of incorrect
       permissions: the user "news" must be able to read the file.
       (Warning: some editors, e.g. kedit, change the ownership of an
       edited file.)
       
    5. Another badly configured news server is already running on your
       machine. Switch it off.
       
   You can test your setup by opening a telnet connection to your
   newsserver. This is done by doing "telnet localhost 119". You should
   get back something like
   
     200 Leafnode NNTP Daemon, version xx running at yy
     
   where xx is the version number and yy your hostname. Type "quit" after
   seeing this message. If you don't get any connection at all or
   something different, check through points 1-4 above.
   
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4. My news reader complains about repeated frequent timeouts of the NNTP
server.

   This is most likely the result of a corrupt groupinfo file. Rebuild it
   by starting fetchnews with the -f parameter.
   
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5. Does leafnode support local newsgroups?

   The 1.x versions do not support local newsgroups. The 2.x versions
   will do that.
   
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6. tin complains about a missing file "/var/lib/news/active".

   Either you have started the wrong version of tin (the one which tries
   to read news directly from the spool) or your groupinfo file is
   corrupt.
   
   In the first case, simply invoke tin with the -r flag: "tin -r". If
   this does not help, try to rebuild the groupinfo file by starting
   fetchnews with the -f flag.
   
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7. When searching news with Netscape, I only get back "unknown command".

   To search news, older versions of Netscape needed a news server which
   supports the XPAT command. Leafnode does not. If you want to use
   Netscape, you have to upgrade to version 4.5 and press the "options"
   button which appears in the "search messages" window. In the box which
   appears you have to select "on your local system".
   
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8. When running leafnode in "delaybody" mode, I can only view the headers
with Netscape/Outlook Express.

   This is a problem of Netscape and Outlook Express, not of Leafnode.
   These programs store read articles in the cache and (for some odd
   reason) refuse to reload an article that has been already read. To
   force Netscape to reload articles, clear the cache (Options/Network
   Preferences in version 3.0x). Better, get a sensible newsreader. (If
   somebody has a solution for OE, please email me.)
   
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9. fetchnews does not fetch any articles.

   Here are the two most common occurences which cause this error:
    1. Your groupinfo file is corrupt. Restart fetchnews with the -f
       parameter.
    2. /var/spool/news may have the wrong permissions. /var/spool/news
       and all its subdirectories should be drwxrwsr-x and owned by user
       and group news.
       
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10. Fetchnews is slow. Can I speed it up?

   In the 1.9.x versions of fetchnews, each command is handled at a time.
   Since headers and bodies are fetched separately, fetchnews is quite
   slow when compared to other news transport programs. There is
   currently no remedy for that problem other than to wait for 2.x.
   
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11. fetchnews has problems retrieving new newsgroups.

   Maybe your upstream server supports neither the "XGTITLE
   news.group.name" nor the "LIST NEWSGROUPS news.group.name" command. In
   this case, add "nodesc" to your server entry as described in
   leafnode(8) and the config.example file.
   
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12. When fetching articles, the connection is interrupted by the pppd.

   The article which causes the interruption contains three plus signs
   ("+++") which is interpreted by a subset of modems as the beginning of
   a command. You can either change the command introduction sequence or
   switch off the command completely. Consult the instructions of your
   modem to find out how this is done.
   
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13. fetchnews crashes with a segmentation fault.

   This should not happen, especially not with the current version. As a
   workaround, do the following: If fetchnews crashes during posting, it
   helps to post the articles separately (with "fetchnews -P"). If
   fetchnews crashes during reading news, repeatedly calling it will
   often fetch all the articles.
   
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14. I want to invoke fetchnews as normal user.

   Fetchnews can only be started as user root or news. Many people find
   this inconvenient, but it improves security on the system and prevents
   possible damage from berserk processes.
   
   The tool "sudo" allows a normal user to start any other program with
   root or other priorities. "sudo" is available from
   http://www.courtesan.com/sudo/.
   
   If "sudo" is installed on your system, root priviledges for fetchnews
   are invoked as follows:
    1. As user root, invoke the program "visudo". This will edit the file
       /etc/sudoers.
    2. Enter the following line (replace "username" with the name of the
       user who wants to invoke fetchnews and "hostname" with the name of
       your machine or ALL):
           username hostname = (news) NOPASSWD: /path/to/fetchnews
    3. Quit "visudo".
    4. Now the user who has been entered into /etc/sudoers may invoke
       fetchnews with
           sudo -u news /usr/sbin/fetchnews
       
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15. I have unsubscribed a newsgroup, but fetchnews still retrieves articles
from it.

   Your news reader talks to leafnode via the NNTP protocol. This
   protocol provides no means for Leafnode to determine which newsgroups
   you are actually subscribe. Therefore, Leafnode assumes that a
   newsgroup that is not read for a certain time (which can be configured
   with the "timeout_long" parameter) is unsubscribed and will only stop
   retrieving articles in it after this time.
   
   If you are somewhat impatient and want to immediately stop fetchnews
   retrieving articles from a certain group, delete the appropriate file
   in the directory /var/spool/news/interesting.groups/ .
   
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16. leafnode generates incorrect/incomplete message IDs.

   First you should check whether it is indeed Leafnode which generates
   the message ID. Leafnode will not touch any message IDs generated by
   newsreaders (many of which generate message IDs themselves). A message
   ID that is generated by leafnode has the following general appearance:
       <local-part.ln@host-name>
   The local-part is generated by Leafnode and you cannot influence it.
   For host-name, Leafnode tries to figure out the name of your computer
   by calling gethostname(2) and using the return value for a
   gethostbyname(3) call. Therefore, if you set the name of your computer
   correctly (using hostname(1) and domainname(1)) you should also get
   correct message IDs.
   
   If you don't want to change the name of your machine, you can change
   the part of the Message-ID behind the @ sign by putting "hostname =
   correct.hostname" in your config file. For more information, see the
   leafnode(8) man page.
   
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17. texpire does not expire articles.

   Run texpire with the -f parameter. This will expire articles somewhat
   earlier because the time of last access on the files will be ignored.
   If you have an urgent need to free some space in your spool directory,
   reduce the expiry time in the config file and re-run texpire -f.
   
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18. I want to switch off the automatic expiring of newsgroups.

   Run fetchnews with the -n parameter.
   
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19. Why is Leafnode not licensed under the GPL?

   There are several reasons:
    1. Originally, Arnt Gulbrandsen licensed Leafnode under his own
       license:
       
     Use, modification and distribution is allowed without limitation,
     warranty, or liability of any kind.
       This license is very broad. The same spirit is (in my opinion)
       contained in the X11 license, which is used by Leafnode nowadays.
    2. I do not like the philosophy of the FSF. They seem to emphasize
       that every project they conceived is good whereas everything else
       is bad. If they cannot argue the software away this way, they
       claim it to be part of the project, such as calling Linux
       "GNU/Linux".
       
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