Background Ancient History on Usenet Search URLs...
< HISTORY >
<https://news.admin.peering.narkive.com/>
<https://tinyurl.com/news-admin-peering>
<https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/news.admin.peering>
<https://groups.google.com/g/news.admin.peering> No longer updated 22Feb24
<https://www.novabbs.com/computers/thread.php?group=news.admin.peering>
< / HISTORY >

1. Having been on Usenet forever, I search before I post
(and more importantly, I link to search references within my posts).
2. Today, I needed to link to this article on Android Debug Bridge.
<https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=50818&group=comp.mobile.android#50818>
3. I wish(ed) there was an easier to remember way to obtain that link.

I'm NOT complaining. I'm ecstatic that someone took on the role
of replacing the now no-longer-updating Google Usenet search engine.

But... I went to great lengths prior to ask Google to make their
link humanly rememberable from what it was prior to that change.
<https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/news.admin.peering>

Which, for years, I had accessed using this simple-to-remember URL.
https://tinyurl.com/news-admin-peering
Until Google made the suggested change to easily rememberable URLs.

Now I have the same request to ask of the wonderful NovaBBS folks.
a. Might you consider making the search link easier to remember?
b. Might you consider adding a "link" to each article?

Background Recent History on a Specific Usenet Search URL...

Here's how I eventually found my own post so that I could reference it.
1. I typed in the link to the NovaBBS search for the Android newsgroup.
<https://www.novabbs.com/computers/thread.php?group=comp.mobile.android>
2. I clicked the search within newsgroup link provided
<https://www.novabbs.com/computers/search.php?group=comp.mobile.android>
3. I typed "adb" and pressed the "Search" button
4. I was surprised at the result order because the recent thread wasn't
listed first so I looked for a reverse sort button of some sort.
5. Failing at that, I assumed the results are in some kind of order
that is prioritized by some kind of algorithm I don't understand yet.
6. So I added another search term of "cache" to adb and was pleasantly
surprised I could hit the NovaBBS-provided backarrow to get back to
the search (which is a nice feature, very clever - I like it)
7. That found the thread I was looking for and it put it at the top.
8. Actually, it found the ARTICLE I was looking for & put it at the top.
<https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=50818&group=comp.mobile.android#50818>

Now I have the link.
This is a unique and valuable replacement for future Usenet searches.
But could it have been even easier.

Another way to do it... since I knew the thread was recent, and
since I knew the Message-ID was what I tried before that.
1. I went to the canonical site for NovaBBS Usenet searches:
<https://www.novabbs.com/computers/thread.php?group=comp.mobile.android>
2. I wished that was easier to remember but it still is great where
I could see the thread that I knew was recent & which had the article.
"Clear the cache of an android Cellphone (Moto G Pure)"
3. I found the threads in a logical sort order so I clicked that thread.
<https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=50805&group=comp.mobile.android#50805>
4. I scrolled down to my article (which was the 7th in the listing)
(where I was ecstatic to see the threading flowchart at top!)
5. At that 7th article (which starts with "Yes. But the answer has nuance")
I looked to the right at all that lonely lovely blue empty space at top.
What was I looking for? A "link here" or a "permalink" or something of
the sort which gave me a way to easily link to that specific article.

Try as I might, *I couldn't FIND the link* to that specific article! :(

Failing at that, I went to the message-ID search at the top of the page,
to obtain the link to the article (where I was happy to see the "copy mid"
in the top left (which Google's Usenet search engine no longer provided).
Message-ID = <ut9v35$lob$1@nnrp.usenet.blueworldhosting.com>

From that Message-ID, I was able to find the link to the desired article.
<https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=50818&group=comp.mobile.android#50818>

In summary,
A. *THANK GOD for NovaBBS!*
B. However, they must know that... *No good deed goes unpunished*...
C. Hence, I ask, might NovaBBS consider 2 possible enhancement requests?
a. Might they consider making the search link easier to remember?
b. Might they consider adding a "perma link" to each article?

If they don't add this, I'm still very thankful to NovaBBS because
people who search Usenet before posting can now still do that.

And, people who link to articles for referencing to others can
easily provide that link to others (where, usually those recipients are
technically clueless so the most they can handle is a link).
--
Many thanks to Blueworld also!

Andrew wrote:

> Background Ancient History on Usenet Search URLs...
> < HISTORY >
> <https://news.admin.peering.narkive.com/>
> <https://tinyurl.com/news-admin-peering>
> <https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/news.admin.peering>
> <https://groups.google.com/g/news.admin.peering> No longer updated 22Feb24
> <https://www.novabbs.com/computers/thread.php?group=news.admin.peering>
> < / HISTORY >

> 1. Having been on Usenet forever, I search before I post
> (and more importantly, I link to search references within my posts).
> 2. Today, I needed to link to this article on Android Debug Bridge.
> <https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=50818&group=comp.mobile.android#50818>
> 3. I wish(ed) there was an easier to remember way to obtain that link.

> I'm NOT complaining. I'm ecstatic that someone took on the role
> of replacing the now no-longer-updating Google Usenet search engine.

> But... I went to great lengths prior to ask Google to make their
> link humanly rememberable from what it was prior to that change.
> <https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/news.admin.peering>

> Which, for years, I had accessed using this simple-to-remember URL.
> https://tinyurl.com/news-admin-peering

You should be able to create your own shortlink to any page on the site.

> Until Google made the suggested change to easily rememberable URLs.

Please make an example of an easily rememberable url. That's not a challenge, just a request :)

> Now I have the same request to ask of the wonderful NovaBBS folks.
> a. Might you consider making the search link easier to remember?

Do you mean the link to:
https://news.novabbs.org/computers/search.php ?

> b. Might you consider adding a "link" to each article?

I have already planned to do that. I just have not taken the time yet. It will eventually happen.

It will be like the 'copy mid' link, just 'copy_link' instead.

Also, as you already noticed, there is a link to search for a message by Message-ID at the top of the page.

--
Retro Guy

Retro Guy wrote on Tue, 19 Mar 2024 23:24:31 +0000 :

>> Which, for years, I had accessed using this simple-to-remember URL.
>> https://tinyurl.com/news-admin-peering
>
> You should be able to create your own shortlink to any page on the site.

Thanks for responding as I'm well aware of two things:
1. You are the only ones with a decent Usenet search now
(David Cavion's narkive notwithstanding)
2. No good deed goes unpunished. :)

:)

Yes. Of course anyone can create any short link. Nobody said otherwise.

The problem is the most easily remembered short link is already taken
(by me) for the Google search (which I did long ago for newsgroups).

Yet I can call it "retro-news.admin.peering" or something like that.

But that's not the request - it was simply the historical way of shortening
the horrid Google Usenet search link before we got Google to shorten it.

>> Until Google made the suggested change to easily rememberable URLs.
>
> Please make an example of an easily rememberable url.
> That's not a challenge, just a request :)

Well, the Google rememberable link was:
https:// FQDN + g + newsgroup
For example: https://groups.google.com/g/news.admin.peering

So the equivalent RetroBBS could be similar.
https:// FQDN + g + newsgroup
For example: https://news.novabbs.org/g/news.admin.peering

But maybe even better to use "ng" instead of "g" as it's a common abbrev.
For example: https://news.novabbs.org/ng/news.admin.peering

I fully realize that the easy part is coming up with a URL.
The hard part is implementing and supporting it (I know).

>> Now I have the same request to ask of the wonderful NovaBBS folks.
>> a. Might you consider making the search link easier to remember?
>
> Do you mean the link to:
> https://news.novabbs.org/computers/search.php ?

No, I didn't mean that. I meant the same link above since I never search
more than one newsgroup at a time, so the link I was referring to was this:
<https://news.novabbs.org/computers/thread.php?group=news.admin.peering>

That's just not an intuitively easily remembered URL for most people.
This would be an intuitively easily remembered URL for most people:
<https://news.novabbs.org/ng/news.admin.peering>

Or maybe, since you're already using the question mark syntax,
it might be easier on you to continue using that question mark syntax.
<https://news.novabbs.org/?ng=news.admin.peering>

>> b. Might you consider adding a "link" to each article?
>
> I have already planned to do that.
> I just have not taken the time yet.
> It will eventually happen.

Ah. Thanks. Thanks for understanding. I agree it will create thousands of
permalinks that you might need to maintain, so I understand that the way I
did it with the Message-ID search to get a link to the article is possible.

It works for me, and it works for all intelligent people who can figure
something that simple out - but you know as well as I do that most people
are incredibly stupid - so it won't work for them - that's all.

I was just asking for the link to make it foolproof for those other people.

> It will be like the 'copy mid' link, just 'copy_link' instead.

Makes sense.

> Also, as you already noticed, there is a link to search for a
> message by Message-ID at the top of the page.

Yes. At first I looked for a "permalink" at the top right of
each article, but then I realized there was a "mid" link to copy the
message id which I combined with a message-id search on your site
to then get the link to the article from that message-id search.

As I said though, anyone on this newsgroup is intelligent enough
to figure that out, but the vast majority of the folks on that
Android newsgroup couldn't figure that out if you paid them to.

So I was only asking for the permalink feature for the dummies.
Thanks for understanding.

At this point in time, other than the narkive (which, bless David
Caveon's heart, just isn't there yet), you're our only salvation!

Andrew <andrew@spam.net> wrote:

This sounds like Arlen.

> Retro Guy wrote on Tue, 19 Mar 2024 23:24:31 +0000 :
>
> >> Which, for years, I had accessed using this simple-to-remember URL.
> >> https://tinyurl.com/news-admin-peering
> >
> > You should be able to create your own shortlink to any page on the site.
>
> Thanks for responding as I'm well aware of two things:
> 1. You are the only ones with a decent Usenet search now
> (David Cavion's narkive notwithstanding)
> 2. No good deed goes unpunished. :)
>
> :)
>
> Yes. Of course anyone can create any short link. Nobody said otherwise.
>
> The problem is the most easily remembered short link is already taken
> (by me) for the Google search (which I did long ago for newsgroups).
>
> Yet I can call it "retro-news.admin.peering" or something like that.
>
> But that's not the request - it was simply the historical way of shortening
> the horrid Google Usenet search link before we got Google to shorten it.
>
> >> Until Google made the suggested change to easily rememberable URLs.
> >
> > Please make an example of an easily rememberable url.
> > That's not a challenge, just a request :)
>
> Well, the Google rememberable link was:
> https:// FQDN + g + newsgroup
> For example: https://groups.google.com/g/news.admin.peering
>
> So the equivalent RetroBBS could be similar.
> https:// FQDN + g + newsgroup
> For example: https://news.novabbs.org/g/news.admin.peering
>
> But maybe even better to use "ng" instead of "g" as it's a common abbrev.
> For example: https://news.novabbs.org/ng/news.admin.peering
>
> I fully realize that the easy part is coming up with a URL.
> The hard part is implementing and supporting it (I know).
>
> >> Now I have the same request to ask of the wonderful NovaBBS folks.
> >> a. Might you consider making the search link easier to remember?
> >
> > Do you mean the link to:
> > https://news.novabbs.org/computers/search.php ?
>
> No, I didn't mean that. I meant the same link above since I never search
> more than one newsgroup at a time, so the link I was referring to was this:
> <https://news.novabbs.org/computers/thread.php?group=news.admin.peering>
>
> That's just not an intuitively easily remembered URL for most people.
> This would be an intuitively easily remembered URL for most people:
> <https://news.novabbs.org/ng/news.admin.peering>
>
> Or maybe, since you're already using the question mark syntax,
> it might be easier on you to continue using that question mark syntax.
> <https://news.novabbs.org/?ng=news.admin.peering>
>
> >> b. Might you consider adding a "link" to each article?
> >
> > I have already planned to do that.
> > I just have not taken the time yet.
> > It will eventually happen.
>
> Ah. Thanks. Thanks for understanding. I agree it will create thousands of
> permalinks that you might need to maintain, so I understand that the way I
> did it with the Message-ID search to get a link to the article is possible.
>
> It works for me, and it works for all intelligent people who can figure
> something that simple out - but you know as well as I do that most people
> are incredibly stupid - so it won't work for them - that's all.
>
> I was just asking for the link to make it foolproof for those other people.
>
> > It will be like the 'copy mid' link, just 'copy_link' instead.
>
> Makes sense.
>
> > Also, as you already noticed, there is a link to search for a
> > message by Message-ID at the top of the page.
>
> Yes. At first I looked for a "permalink" at the top right of
> each article, but then I realized there was a "mid" link to copy the
> message id which I combined with a message-id search on your site
> to then get the link to the article from that message-id search.
>
> As I said though, anyone on this newsgroup is intelligent enough
> to figure that out, but the vast majority of the folks on that
> Android newsgroup couldn't figure that out if you paid them to.
>
> So I was only asking for the permalink feature for the dummies.
> Thanks for understanding.
>
> At this point in time, other than the narkive (which, bless David
> Caveon's heart, just isn't there yet), you're our only salvation!
>

Arlen, is this you?

--
^Ï^. Sn!pe, PA, FIBS - Professional Crastinator

My pet rock Gordon just is.

On 3/19/24 19:02, Andrew wrote:
> I fully realize that the easy part is coming up with a URL.
> The hard part is implementing and supporting it (I know).

This is a perfect example for something like mod_rewrite in Apache.
Have Apache recognize something like:

https://groups.novabbs.com/news.admin.peering

As a short cut for:

https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?group=news.admin.peering

Make the computer do the work for you with little effort on your part.

> No, I didn't mean that. I meant the same link above since I never search
> more than one newsgroup at a time, so the link I was referring to was this:
> <https://news.novabbs.org/computers/thread.php?group=news.admin.peering>
>
> That's just not an intuitively easily remembered URL for most people.
> This would be an intuitively easily remembered URL for most people:
> <https://news.novabbs.org/ng/news.admin.peering>
>
> Or maybe, since you're already using the question mark syntax,
> it might be easier on you to continue using that question mark syntax.
> <https://news.novabbs.org/?ng=news.admin.peering>

Optionally, configure a search shortcut in your client where you type
something like the following:

novabbs news.admin.peering

And have it translate that to:

https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?group=news.admin.peering

> Ah. Thanks. Thanks for understanding. I agree it will create thousands of
> permalinks that you might need to maintain, so I understand that the way I
> did it with the Message-ID search to get a link to the article is possible.

Don't create thousands of permalinks. That's a recipe for failure. If
you don't do something dynamic like mod_rewrite above, at least do
something that's a database lookup. There are plenty of ways to do this
in many web servers.

> I was just asking for the link to make it foolproof for those other people.

The universe is winning, the mice will always be smarter than the best
mouse trap. #HellIsExothermic

> So I was only asking for the permalink feature for the dummies.
> Thanks for understanding.

:-|

> At this point in time, other than the narkive (which, bless David
> Caveon's heart, just isn't there yet), you're our only salvation!

Please don't attack people, especially people that aren't in the
conversation to defend themselves.

It's relatively easy to ask others to change what they are doing. It's
quite a bit more difficult to do it yourself.

So ... why don't you show us what you are doing on your server to make
things easily accessible for others.

--
Grant. . . .

On Tue, 19 Mar 2024 21:07:59 -0500, Grant Taylor wrote:

> On 3/19/24 19:02, Andrew wrote:
>> I fully realize that the easy part is coming up with a URL.
>> The hard part is implementing and supporting it (I know).
>
> This is a perfect example for something like mod_rewrite in Apache.
> Have Apache recognize something like:
>
> https://groups.novabbs.com/news.admin.peering
>
> As a short cut for:
>
> https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?group=news.admin.peering
>
> Make the computer do the work for you with little effort on your part.

Yes, it's pretty simple to do with the web server, but if I were to do this
I will be writing changes into the website code. That's how I'm doing other
tasks (rewriting url when groups are moved by admin to another section,
accessing an article by mid, etc.) I prefer the software can handle this
stuff on it's own.
>> No, I didn't mean that. I meant the same link above since I never search
>> more than one newsgroup at a time, so the link I was referring to was this:
>> <https://news.novabbs.org/computers/thread.php?group=news.admin.peering>
>>
>> That's just not an intuitively easily remembered URL for most people.
>> This would be an intuitively easily remembered URL for most people:
>> <https://news.novabbs.org/ng/news.admin.peering>
>>
>> Or maybe, since you're already using the question mark syntax,
>> it might be easier on you to continue using that question mark syntax.
>> <https://news.novabbs.org/?ng=news.admin.peering>
>
> Optionally, configure a search shortcut in your client where you type
> something like the following:
>
> novabbs news.admin.peering
>
> And have it translate that to:
>
> https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?group=news.admin.peering

Good idea.

>> Ah. Thanks. Thanks for understanding. I agree it will create thousands of
>> permalinks that you might need to maintain, so I understand that the way I
>> did it with the Message-ID search to get a link to the article is possible.
>
> Don't create thousands of permalinks. That's a recipe for failure. If
> you don't do something dynamic like mod_rewrite above, at least do
> something that's a database lookup. There are plenty of ways to do this
> in many web servers.

No need for permalinks, I would just create a link to the article as one
already exists. I would just make that link easy to copy to the clipboard
as I do with mid.

Retro Guy wrote on Tue, 19 Mar 2024 20:34:21 -0700 :

>> Have Apache recognize something like:
>> https://groups.novabbs.com/news.admin.peering
>> As a short cut for:
>> https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?group=news.admin.peering
>> Make the computer do the work for you with little effort on your part.
>
> Yes, it's pretty simple to do with the web server, but if I were to do this
> I will be writing changes into the website code. That's how I'm doing other
> tasks (rewriting url when groups are moved by admin to another section,
> accessing an article by mid, etc.) I prefer the software can handle this
> stuff on it's own.

What I like about Grant's suggestion above is his link is the simplest:
<https://groups.novabbs.com/news.admin.peering>

Which is very similar to the Google Usenet search URL, which was:
<https://groups.google.com/g/news.admin.peering>

So maybe another suggestion (to copy the Google syntax) could be:
<https://groups.novabbs.com/g/news.admin.peering>

>> Optionally, configure a search shortcut in your client where you type
>> something like the following:
>> novabbs news.admin.peering
>> And have it translate that to:
>> https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?group=news.admin.peering
>
> Good idea.

No big deal but I do not understand Grant's suggestion above.
What's a "search shortcut" and which "client" is Grant talking about?

>> Don't create thousands of permalinks. That's a recipe for failure. If
>> you don't do something dynamic like mod_rewrite above, at least do
>> something that's a database lookup. There are plenty of ways to do this
>> in many web servers.
>
> No need for permalinks, I would just create a link to the article as one
> already exists. I would just make that link easy to copy to the clipboard
> as I do with mid.

Whew. Good. I wouldn't want you to have to maintain an additional set of
permalinks, so it's nice that you already have the link. It just takes
intelligence to find that link because the only way today to get to it is
via the message-id search option.

Thanks for understanding that the goal is to make it foolproof for dummies.

Grant Taylor wrote on Tue, 19 Mar 2024 21:07:59 -0500 :

>> At this point in time, other than the narkive (which, bless David
>> Caveon's heart, just isn't there yet), you're our only salvation!
>
> Please don't attack people, especially people that aren't in the
> conversation to defend themselves.

Sorry. You misinterpreted that. I truly was saying bless his heart.

He's a good guy. Trying to do the right thing. Just like you are.
And just like I am. And just like Retro Guy is trying to do too.

He just doesn't have the time to work on his archive, that's all.

As for all your other suggestions, I think Retro Guy understood them all.
I like your proposed URL better than the suggestions I gave to Retro Guy.
<https://groups.novabbs.com/g/news.admin.peering>

It matches perfectly the Google Usenet search (which isn't updated).
<https://groups.google.com/g/news.admin.peering>

I wasn't sure what you had meant by adding a shortcut to the client though.
Is the client you speak of a newsreader? Or a web browser?

If every individual on the planet has to add a shortcut, that doesn't solve
the problem I was trying to solve, which was to set it up for the dummies.

In article <utcd0f$7lu$1@nnrp.usenet.blueworldhosting.com>,
Andrew <andrew@spam.net> wrote:
> Message-ID = <ut9v35$lob$1@nnrp.usenet.blueworldhosting.com>
>
>From that Message-ID, I was able to find the link to the desired article.
> <https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=50818&group=comp.mobile.android#50818>

<URL:https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=ut9v35$lob@nnrp.usenet.blueworldhosting.com>

John
groenveld@acm.org

Retro Guy wrote:

> Andrew wrote:

>> b. Might you consider adding a "link" to each article?

> I have already planned to do that. I just have not taken the time yet. It will eventually happen.

> It will be like the 'copy mid' link, just 'copy_link' instead.

The above task is complete. There is now a 'copy link' to click to copy link to clipboard in each message's header.

Please let me know what I broke while adding this :)

--
Retro Guy

On 20 Mar 2024 10:55:27 GMT, groenveld@acm.org (John D Groenveld) wrote:
>In article <utcd0f$7lu$1@nnrp.usenet.blueworldhosting.com>,
>Andrew <andrew@spam.net> wrote:
>> Message-ID = <ut9v35$lob$1@nnrp.usenet.blueworldhosting.com>
>>From that Message-ID, I was able to find the link to the desired article.
>> <https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=50818&group=comp.mobile.android#50818>
>
><URL:https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=ut9v35$lob@nnrp.usenet.blueworldhosting.com>

that certainly works . . .

https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=l5vtkvFduucU1@mid.individual.net

if message id could work with this put.hk format, then numerous other
servers could share the load . . . experts might know how to do this?

http://put.hk/article/news.i2pn2.org/news.admin.peering/1876.html

for example . . .

(using Tor Browser 13.0.12)
http://put.hk/reader.jsp?server=paganini.bofh.team&btnsubmit=Go
>Server: paganini.bofh.team (48694)
http://put.hk/reader.jsp?server=news.dizum.net&btnsubmit=Go
>Server: news.dizum.net (45726)
http://put.hk/reader.jsp?server=news.blueworldhosting.com&btnsubmit=Go
>Server: news.blueworldhosting.com (45057)
http://put.hk/reader.jsp?server=news.novabbs.org&btnsubmit=Go
>Server: news.novabbs.org (42483)
http://put.hk/reader.jsp?server=news.i2pn2.org&btnsubmit=Go
>Server: news.i2pn2.org (42470)
http://put.hk/reader.jsp?server=news.mixmin.net&btnsubmit=Go
>Server: news.mixmin.net (41842)
http://put.hk/reader.jsp?server=news.alt119.net&btnsubmit=Go
>Server: news.alt119.net (40576)
http://put.hk/reader.jsp?server=gallaxial.com&btnsubmit=Go
>Server: gallaxial.com (31048)
http://put.hk/reader.jsp?server=news.eternal-september.org&btnsubmit=Go
>Server: news.eternal-september.org (12) *requires login, tor disabled

etcetera . . .

see also:
>List of Free Usenet Servers: https://sybershock.com/#usenet

Retro Guy wrote on Wed, 20 Mar 2024 14:57:27 +0000 :

> The above task is complete.
> There is now a 'copy link' to click to copy link to clipboard
> in each message's header.
> Please let me know what I broke while adding this :)

Ah. Perfect. Thank you. For the dummies.
Since "No good deed ever goes unpunished!", here's what I'll try.

< ALMOST RANDOM ANCIENT HISTORY REPLAY >
On the Android newsgroup today is the classic argument (mostly from morons)
that the cellphone caused accident rates in the USA to skyrocket, and yet,
they didn't for two reasons - & the only place you see it being said that
the accident rate skyrocketed, was by 3 major agencies with an ax to grind.

But the reliable government agency (the US Census Bureau) who has been
reliably documenting normalized accident rates for all 50 US states since
the 1920s, shows no effect whatsoever on the accident rate from before,
during or after the meteoric rise in cellphone ownership rates.

Also, no US safety-related law (such as hands-free operation) has had any
statistically valid effect on the accident rate in the USA dating back
decades (according to aggregate studies) - but there was a second-order
effect on length of hospital stay, which the researches hypothesized was
likely due mostly to restraint laws such as the use of seatbelts/airbags.
< /ALMOST RANDOM ANCIENT HISTORY REPLAY >

The reason it's "almost random" is that I needed this link just today!
(But I didn't want to go to the trouble of looking for it, until now.)

1. So, let's go to the Android newsgroup NovaBBS URL
<https://www.novabbs.com/computers/thread.php?group=comp.mobile.android>
2. Tap the convenient "Search" button.
(I had expected the URL to change, but it didn't change.)
3. Take the default of "Body" (but it's nice to see the others).
4. Type in the "Search terms" field (does it take regex perhaps?)
first-order effect
5. Press "Search"
(Again, I had expected the URL to change, but it didn't change from
https://www.novabbs.com/computers/search.php)
6. Drat. I know that's wrong but it said
"0 matching articles found"
Hmmm... I had never intended to test how far back it goes, so let me
first find the article in the normal Google Usenet search to make sure
that what I'm seeking existed (I remember the discussions well).
7. Go to the Google (no longer updated) search engine
https://groups.google.com/g/comp.mobile.android
8. Type "first-order effect" in the search box.
(as expected, the URL changes - which is helpful for future searches)
https://groups.google.com/g/comp.mobile.android/search?q=first-order%20effect
9. That found two threads, one from July 6, 2020 & one from March 16, 2016
<https://groups.google.com/g/comp.mobile.android/c/ygt6XZCvhX8/>
<https://groups.google.com/g/comp.mobile.android/c/Ve_2cgliiGk/>
10. Does the NovaBBS go back that far?

Let me try the message-id first. Drat. Google doesn't provide it anymore.
And they're so far back that it won't be in my news server's archives.

Let's see by searching for the SUBJECT now that we know what it is.
2. Go to
3. Change the NovaBBS search default to "Subject" instead of "Body"
4. Type in the "Search terms" field (does it take regex perhaps?)
They finally found proof texting bans - does it make a difference
5. Press "Search"
6. Drat. "0 matching articles found"

OK. Let's go to today's thread on the subject instead, as this
may simply be that NovaBBS archives don't go back that far
(which is just fine, BTW, as the Google Archives go way back).

1. Start at the top at the given Android newsgroup.
<https://www.novabbs.com/computers/thread.php?group=comp.mobile.android>
2. Click on the recent thread (second in the listing)
"Re: No fault cell phone law"
The display, by the way, is sheer beauty in both simplicity,
and in functionality, presenting the tree at top & articles below.
3. Click on a random article in that recent thread.
Re: No fault cell phone law
<MPG.406228b7abad68fc9902c6@news.individual.net> copy mid
https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=50820&group=comp.mobile.android#50820 copy link
Newsgroups: comp.mobile.android
by: Stan Brown - Mon, 18 Mar 2024 13:32

Voila! You are a Usenet God. There it is.
In addition, I was curious what the open checkbox was for
next to Stan Brown's name, so as I am want to do, I clicked it.

Up showed the entire header (something Google stopped doing!).
Path: i2pn2.org!i2pn.org!usenet.goja.nl.eu.org!3.eu.feeder.erje.net!feeder.erje.net!fu-berlin.de!uni-berlin.de!individual.net!not-for-mail
From: the_stan...@fastmail.fm (Stan Brown)
Newsgroups: comp.mobile.android
Subject: Re: No fault cell phone law
Date: Mon, 18 Mar 2024 11:32:56 -0700
Organization: Oak Road Systems
Lines: 25
Message-ID: <MPG.406228b7abad68fc9902c6@news.individual.net>
References: <ut4s0v$9ei$1@toxic.dizum.net> <ut5bef$353ou$2@dont-email.me> <ut5s9m$3bjd7$2@dont-email.me> <MPG.4060b42225f15ccb9902c4@news.individual.net> <ut793f$3krla$1@dont-email.me>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
X-Trace: individual.net +YzOkPQEFWYt80jw3ALlyQninOU0J2ShImJzuMWWYSrPZsnPyH
Cancel-Lock: sha1:24wMXEiESCaHpC5C3HgfXI/UmBc=sha256:TTU4UYlPqKEFOfdsXHHzg8QH/x6PP0WZgwPVJvBhH7s=
User-Agent: MicroPlanet-Gravity/3.0.11 (GRC)

I didn't even need to click the "copy mid" link as a selection
and then paste is all I've been doing to get all of the above.

But to test how "copy link" shows up in the Windows 10 clipboard,
I clicked it, and to my expectation, put this in my clipboard.
<https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?id=50820&group=comp.mobile.android#50820>

This can be sent to dummies, who don't need to know how to properly
capitalize Usenet in order to just paste that link into their web browser
on any platform, even on the smartphone, to read that article.

In addition, I pressed the "copy mid" link whose results can
be pasted into various MID lookup engines on the net.
<http://al.howardknight.net/>
<http://news.chmurka.net/mid.php>
<http://usenet.ovh/index.php?article=ual>
<https://www.novabbs.com/SEARCH/search_nocem.php>
etc.

1. HowardKnight worked as expected to provide a link to the article.
<http://al.howardknight.net/?STYPE=msgid&MSGI=%3CMPG.406228b7abad68fc9902c6%40news.individual.net%3E>
2. Chmurka repeatedly failed without any display of why it failed.
3. OVH worked to display the article but no link to it was provided.
So OVH failed in effect.
4. NovaBBS said "Message-ID not found in NoCeM messages"
(which is true, but then NovaBBS provided a link to the article)
<https://www.novabbs.com/SEARCH/search_nocem.php?d=%3CMPG.406228b7abad68fc9902c6%40news.individual.net%3E>

I'd say it's almost perfect, the only extremely minor thing is that a dummy
can't tell there are two links (copy mid copy link) which are right next to
each other, since only spaces separate them so maybe a "comma" would help
dummies (e.g., copy mid, copy link) so that they know it's two links.

See! I told you no good deed goes wholly unpunished!

In summary, THANK YOU Retro BBS guy for adding value to the Usenet search
engine capability so that people can now do two things with efficiency.

1. They can search before they post, which allows them to start where
all the others left off to add value to each thread from there...

2. And, they can search Usenet newsgroups for articles to cite so
that they can send that link to even their grandma who only needs
to know how to use the web browser on her platform of choice.

On 3/20/24 02:33, Andrew wrote:
> No big deal but I do not understand Grant's suggestion above.
> What's a "search shortcut" and which "client" is Grant talking about?

Custom search engines (or some nomenclature like that) used to be what
they were called in Firefox.

Now they seem to be bookmarks with keywords.

I have the following bookmark in Firefox:

Name: USPS Tracking
URL: https://tools.usps.com/go/TrackConfirmAction?qtc_tLabels1=%s
Keyword: usps

So any time I type "usps " (trailing space is important) in the address
bar it changes and indicates that it's doing a search and then replaces
the "%s" in the URL (from the bookmark) with whatever I type after the
URL in the address bar.

So you could have something like:

Name: NovaBBS
URL: https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?group=%s
Keyword: nova

So that any time you type "nova news.admin.peering" the web browser goes
to the following URL:

https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?group=news.admin.peering

--
Grant. . . .

Grant Taylor wrote on Wed, 20 Mar 2024 18:13:23 -0500 :

> On 3/20/24 02:33, Andrew wrote:
>> No big deal but I do not understand Grant's suggestion above.
>> What's a "search shortcut" and which "client" is Grant talking about?
>
> Custom search engines (or some nomenclature like that) used to be what
> they were called in Firefox.

Thanks for explaining.

That's what I thought you might have been referring to, where in the olden
days of early web browsing, we had "dict word" to bring up a dictionary to
that word.

The problem is, of course, that every person on the planet has to do that,
whereas RetroGuy could just create a URL that mimics the Google URL....

1. This still works, so why not piggyback off of the syntax:
<https://groups.google.com/g/news.admin.peering> (no longer updated)
2. To piggyback off that syntax, RetroGuy can possible make the URL:
<https://groups.novabbs.com/g/news.admin.peering> (updated after Google)

I like it because of the intuitive simplicity and URL continuity.
> Now they seem to be bookmarks with keywords.
>
> I have the following bookmark in Firefox:
>
> Name: USPS Tracking
> URL: https://tools.usps.com/go/TrackConfirmAction?qtc_tLabels1=%s
> Keyword: usps
>
> So any time I type "usps " (trailing space is important) in the address
> bar it changes and indicates that it's doing a search and then replaces
> the "%s" in the URL (from the bookmark) with whatever I type after the
> URL in the address bar.
>
> So you could have something like:
>
> Name: NovaBBS
> URL: https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?group=%s
> Keyword: nova
>
> So that any time you type "nova news.admin.peering" the web browser goes
> to the following URL:
>
>
> https://www.novabbs.com/computers/article-flat.php?group=news.admin.peering

Thanks. Much appreciated. I think a better solution is something like this:
<https://groups.novabbs.com/g/news.admin.peering>

Which is easy to remember, especially as it's similar to the previous
Google Usenet search URL with only a minor change of the domain name.

That's my vote! :)

On Thu, 21 Mar 2024 00:27:29 -0000 (UTC), Andrew <andrew@spam.net> wrote:
snip
>
>Thanks. Much appreciated. I think a better solution is something like this:
> <https://groups.novabbs.com/g/news.admin.peering>
>Which is easy to remember, especially as it's similar to the previous
>Google Usenet search URL with only a minor change of the domain name.
>That's my vote! :)

big thumbs down . . . this google shill is "wally j" version 2.x

Andrew wrote:

> Retro Guy wrote on Wed, 20 Mar 2024 14:57:27 +0000 :

>> The above task is complete.
>> There is now a 'copy link' to click to copy link to clipboard
>> in each message's header.
>> Please let me know what I broke while adding this :)

> Ah. Perfect. Thank you. For the dummies.
> Since "No good deed ever goes unpunished!", here's what I'll try.

<snip>

> 1. So, let's go to the Android newsgroup NovaBBS URL
> <https://www.novabbs.com/computers/thread.php?group=comp.mobile.android>
> 2. Tap the convenient "Search" button.
> (I had expected the URL to change, but it didn't change.)
> 3. Take the default of "Body" (but it's nice to see the others).
> 4. Type in the "Search terms" field (does it take regex perhaps?)
> first-order effect
> 5. Press "Search"
> (Again, I had expected the URL to change, but it didn't change from
> https://www.novabbs.com/computers/search.php)
> 6. Drat. I know that's wrong but it said
> "0 matching articles found"
> Hmmm... I had never intended to test how far back it goes, so let me

This particular site (www.novabbs.com) goes back 3 years, or 100,000 messages per group, whichever comes first. Users should please remember that www.novabbs.com is not an archive, and is not meant to be. It's also not meant to be a google groups clone.

<snip>

> In addition, I pressed the "copy mid" link whose results can
> be pasted into various MID lookup engines on the net.
> <http://al.howardknight.net/>
> <http://news.chmurka.net/mid.php>
> <http://usenet.ovh/index.php?article=ual>
> <https://www.novabbs.com/SEARCH/search_nocem.php>
> etc.

> 1. HowardKnight worked as expected to provide a link to the article.
> <http://al.howardknight.net/?STYPE=msgid&MSGI=%3CMPG.406228b7abad68fc9902c6%40news.individual.net%3E>
> 2. Chmurka repeatedly failed without any display of why it failed.
> 3. OVH worked to display the article but no link to it was provided.
> So OVH failed in effect.
> 4. NovaBBS said "Message-ID not found in NoCeM messages"
> (which is true, but then NovaBBS provided a link to the article)
> <https://www.novabbs.com/SEARCH/search_nocem.php?d=%3CMPG.406228b7abad68fc9902c6%40news.individual.net%3E>

I've added a 'Just find article' button to that site (www.novabbs.com/SEARCH/search_nocem.php) that simply tries to find the article and display it.

> I'd say it's almost perfect, the only extremely minor thing is that a dummy
> can't tell there are two links (copy mid copy link) which are right next to
> each other, since only spaces separate them so maybe a "comma" would help
> dummies (e.g., copy mid, copy link) so that they know it's two links.

It's ok the way it is. People will figure it out, or not.

--
Retro Guy

Retro Guy wrote on Thu, 21 Mar 2024 15:43:37 +0000 :

> This particular site (www.novabbs.com) goes back 3 years
> or 100,000 messages per group, whichever comes first.

In the words of Grank, "ACK". :)

> It's also not meant to be a google groups clone.

Understood.

> I've added a 'Just find article' button to that site
> (www.novabbs.com/SEARCH/search_nocem.php)
> that simply tries to find the article and display it.

Thanks. As I said, anyone intelligent (such as most people
on this n.a.p newsgroup) will find a way to do what they need,
so it's nice that you added an easier way (as I hd already found
a way but I concluded most people are too stupid to find it).

>
>> I'd say it's almost perfect, the only extremely minor thing is that a dummy
>> can't tell there are two links (copy mid copy link) which are right next to
>> each other, since only spaces separate them so maybe a "comma" would help
>> dummies (e.g., copy mid, copy link) so that they know it's two links.
>
> It's ok the way it is. People will figure it out, or not.

Understood. No complaints. You did what I had asked. Thank you,
on behalf of all the dummies out there, they can do it easily now.

AFAIK offhand, yours is the only reliable method although under certain
circumstances David's "Narkive" will also provide a link to a new article.

The reason it matters is people need a way to search deeper than their
particularly nntp server provides, and then they need a way to reference
the resulting permalink for the myriad clueless people who form the bulk of
the human population.

Thanks, on behalf of them.

Some brainstorm thoughts ...

What about a multi-name approach ... something like ...

https://domain.url/group.name/article-number

https://domain.url/hash/message-id-hash

Some message-ids are ridiculously long with weird chars. Hash it.

One could employ something like sha1 or tiger for the hash name.

Or one may hash with the ubiquitous b2sum and truncate N chars.

Or one may use the size parameter of b2sum:

echo hello | b2sum -l 160
d2f799bb9610968a2efa8f7682d5f2f1d45163d7 -

echo hello | b2sum -l 160 | tr -dc a-f0-9 | xxd -p -r | base32
2L3ZTO4WCCLIULX2R53IFVPS6HKFCY6X

Or one may convert a long b2sum hash to ascii chars:

echo $RANDOM$RANDOM$RANDOM | b2sum | tr -dc a-f0-9 | xxd -p -r \
| base64 | tr -dc a-zA-Z0-9 | head -c 24
xot1cQ6w8mJHbr0l2sWkU4e0

A hash table pointing to articles would be simple to re-build if anything gets corrupted. I'm assuming one is not going to use Rocksolid Light to pull down decades of Usenet history, but rather maybe a few hundred thousand articles max. Otherwise re-building all the hashes for a full Usenet feed could take days on a cheap VPS. On a multi-core high-end server it would be faster but may still take all day.

--

3883@sugar.bug | sybershock.com | sci.crypt

On 3/25/24 01:15, SugarBug wrote:
> Some brainstorm thoughts ...

Likewise.

> https://domain.url/hash/message-id-hash

I would discourage a hash of the Message-Id. I believe the purpose of
this is to make things easy to reference. As in copy and paste or
re-type. So I feel like any hashing (or other processing) is
counterintuitive to this make it simple goal.

> One could employ something like sha1 or tiger for the hash name.
>
> Or one may hash with the ubiquitous b2sum and truncate N chars.
>
> Or one may use the size parameter of b2sum:

The multiple options are examples of why I think doing any processing is
antithetical to the goal of making things simple.

--
Grant. . . .