Re: NNTP - how to check for removed newsgroups ?

On Fri, 12 Jul 2024 19:34:58 -0000 (UTC), "Auric__" <[email protected]>
wrote:

>R.Wieser wrote:
>
>> Simple question : using the NNTP protocol - How do I check for newsgroups
>> that have been removed ?
>>
>> I don't really want to go thru the list of all newsgroups I currently have
>> stored and check, one by one, if I they are still present on the newsgroup
>> server.
>>
>> Remark: I found the command to find all *new* newsgroups (since a certain
>> date), but have not been able to find its opposite.
>
>There isn't a method defined in any RFC to do so, because there are a number 
>of hurdles that make it infeasible:

Rather than infeasible, it's more likely to be trivial. I don't know of a client
that offers the capability, but that's probably because no one has asked for it.

>- *WHO* decides what groups to include on that list?

The user who sits behind the news client or script that provides the capability.

>- How far back do you want to go/removed since *WHEN*?

Since the last time this user performed this check against this server, using
this client/script.

>- For each user, the server would need to remember the last time that user
>  checked the groups, and what groups have been removed since then. *WHERE*
>  does the server store this information?

The server would store nothing. The client or local script would store
everything. 

>- *WHY* would the server retain information it has already removed?

N/A, since the server would need to store nothing in this regard.

Older versions of Forte Agent, at least up through 2.0 since that's where most
of my experience was, use a newsrc file to keep track of each group carried by
the designated server. Agent 2.0 has a menu command to "Get new groups", and it
has an in-built command to see a list of only the new groups. New, in this case,
simply means groups that have been added since the last time this person checked
for new groups. Behind the scenes, the command probably builds a new newsrc
file, since that already contains a list of all of the groups, then it could
compare the new file to the old file, diff-like, to see what's been added. That
much is trivial, and once it does the diff, I don't see why there couldn't have
been an additional view that shows the groups that have been removed since the
last check.

It seems to me that any client that uses a newsrc file could be used as the
basis for determining which groups are New or Old since the last time the
command was run. Yes, the newsrc file contains additional information,
especially for subscribed groups, but it sounds like all of that can be ignored
if only deleted groups need to be listed.