I've started to go through some of the checkgroups emails that my innd
server has been sending me and notice that for recommended newgroups,
there's no separation between the group name and the description:

# You can add them by executing the command(s):

/news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.announceAnnouncements y
/news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.commitsCommit y
/news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.configgreenend.* y
/news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.miscUnpleasant y
/news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.relativity.private.rsvpParty y
/news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.systemcron y
/news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.testTests y
/news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.vpnPrivate y

I receive the email in Outlook and copy it over to my linux box and
paste into a script that I execute as a shell command, just so I can
make sure the format is right. hexdump confirms there is a tab between
the newsgroup and the description.

00000090 65 72 61 74 65 64 29 0a 63 6f 6d 70 2e 61 69 2e |erated).comp.ai.|
000000a0 61 6c 69 66 65 09 52 65 73 65 61 72 63 68 20 61 |alife.Research a|
^^ ^

Anyone else having similar difficulties? It's not so bad with just a
few but a long list would be a pain.

Thanks,
Nigel

--
End Of The Line BBS - Plano, TX
telnet endofthelinebbs.com 23

Nigel Reed <sysop@endofthelinebbs.com> writes:
> I've started to go through some of the checkgroups emails that my innd
> server has been sending me and notice that for recommended newgroups,
> there's no separation between the group name and the description:
>
> # You can add them by executing the command(s):
>
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.announceAnnouncements y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.commitsCommit y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.configgreenend.* y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.miscUnpleasant y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.relativity.private.rsvpParty y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.systemcron y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.testTests y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.vpnPrivate y

That one’s a private hierarchy, there’s no point in adding the groups
locally.

--
https://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/

On Fri, 01 Apr 2022 08:54:10 +0100
Richard Kettlewell <invalid@invalid.invalid> wrote:

> Nigel Reed <sysop@endofthelinebbs.com> writes:
> > I've started to go through some of the checkgroups emails that my
> > innd server has been sending me and notice that for recommended
> > newgroups, there's no separation between the group name and the
> > description:
> >
> > # You can add them by executing the command(s):
> >
> > /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.announceAnnouncements y
> > /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.commitsCommit y
> > /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.configgreenend.* y
> > /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.miscUnpleasant y
> > /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
> > greenend.relativity.private.rsvpParty y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
> > greenend.systemcron y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.testTests
> > y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.vpnPrivate y
>
> That one’s a private hierarchy, there’s no point in adding the groups
> locally.

That wasn't the point of the post though.

--
End Of The Line BBS - Plano, TX
telnet endofthelinebbs.com 23

Hi Nigel,

> I've started to go through some of the checkgroups emails that my innd
> server has been sending me and notice that for recommended newgroups,
> there's no separation between the group name and the description:
>
> # You can add them by executing the command(s):
>
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.announceAnnouncements y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.commitsCommit y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.configgreenend.* y

This is not what the script handling checkgroups control messages is supposed to send. Descriptions should not be in these commands for ctlinnd.
What OS and shell are you using exactly?
You'll find the shell in the shellbang at the beginning of bin/docheckgroups. For instance:
#! /bin/bash

The contents of the mail normally looks like:

# You can add them by executing the command(s):

/home/news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.announce y
/home/news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.commits y
/home/news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.config y

# The following newsgroups descriptions are missing and should be added:
# # greenend.announce Announcements potentially of interest to readers of greenend.*
# greenend.commits Commit messages automatically generated from version control system history.
# greenend.config Discussion regarding the structure and infrastructure of greenend.*

# You can add them by editing /home/news/db/newsgroups
# or by using the -u flag with docheckgroups.

exit # so you can feed this message into the shell (as well as mod-active).

--
Julien ÉLIE

« L'éternité, c'est long, surtout vers la fin. » (Woody Allen)

On Sat, 2 Apr 2022 13:43:00 +0200
Julien ÉLIE <iulius@nom-de-mon-site.com.invalid> wrote:

> This is not what the script handling checkgroups control messages is
> supposed to send. Descriptions should not be in these commands for
> ctlinnd. What OS and shell are you using exactly? You'll find the
> shell in the shellbang at the beginning of bin/docheckgroups. For
> instance: #! /bin/bash

No, I figured so which is why I brought it up. What OS exactly? I'm
copying the output from Outlook 2019 and pasting into a Putty window on
Ubuntu 20.04.4 LTS.

I pasted to a file then used sh to run it. I should use bash to run it
but I expect it'll do the same thing. I'll have to try.

When I just pasted I ended up with a bunch of bogus groups I then had
to go and remove.

Very odd.

--
End Of The Line BBS - Plano, TX
telnet endofthelinebbs.com 23

Hi Nigel,

>> This is not what the script handling checkgroups control messages is
>> supposed to send.
>
> No, I figured so which is why I brought it up. What OS exactly? I'm
> copying the output from Outlook 2019 and pasting into a Putty window on
> Ubuntu 20.04.4 LTS.

So if I understand well, your news server is running on Ubuntu. This
distribution should have modern and working tools (like GNU awk or
sed...) so the docheckgroups shell script should work fine. I don't
know why you're facing this weird behaviour.

> I pasted to a file then used sh to run it. I should use bash to run it
> but I expect it'll do the same thing. I'll have to try.

I was not meaning the shell that runs the output you received by mail,
but the shell that ran the script (docheckgroups) which generated that
broken output.

--
Julien ÉLIE

« L'éternité, c'est long, surtout vers la fin. » (Woody Allen)

Op 1-4-2022 om 2:47 schreef Nigel Reed:
> I've started to go through some of the checkgroups emails that my innd
> server has been sending me and notice that for recommended newgroups,
> there's no separation between the group name and the description:
>
> # You can add them by executing the command(s):
>
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.announceAnnouncements y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.commitsCommit y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.configgreenend.* y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.miscUnpleasant y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.relativity.private.rsvpParty y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.systemcron y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.testTests y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.vpnPrivate y

The names of the newsgroups are wrong.
They are too long and have the first word(s) of the description in it.
They should be:

greenend.announce
greenend.commits
greenend.config
greenend.misc
greenend.relativity.private.rsvp
greenend.system
greenend.test
greenend.vpn

But I can tell you:
all newsgroups are empty, except for the test group
in which I posted the question what greenend is all about.
Nobody gave me a good answer to that question.

> I receive the email in Outlook and copy it over to my linux box and
> paste into a script that I execute as a shell command, just so I can
> make sure the format is right. hexdump confirms there is a tab between
> the newsgroup and the description.
>
> 00000090 65 72 61 74 65 64 29 0a 63 6f 6d 70 2e 61 69 2e |erated).comp.ai.|
> 000000a0 61 6c 69 66 65 09 52 65 73 65 61 72 63 68 20 61 |alife.Research a|
> ^^ ^
>
> Anyone else having similar difficulties? It's not so bad with just a
> few but a long list would be a pain.
>
> Thanks,
> Nigel

Hi,

> all newsgroups are empty, except for the test group
> in which I posted the question what greenend is all about.
> Nobody gave me a good answer to that question.

http://www.greenend.org.uk/news/

On Tue, 5 Apr 2022 13:57:46 +0200
Rink <rink.hof.haalditmaarweg@planet.nl> wrote:

> Op 1-4-2022 om 2:47 schreef Nigel Reed:
> > I've started to go through some of the checkgroups emails that my
> > innd server has been sending me and notice that for recommended
> > newgroups, there's no separation between the group name and the
> > description:
> >
> > # You can add them by executing the command(s):
> >
> > /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.announceAnnouncements y
> > /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.commitsCommit y
> > /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.configgreenend.* y
> > /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.miscUnpleasant y
> > /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
> > greenend.relativity.private.rsvpParty y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
> > greenend.systemcron y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.testTests
> > y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.vpnPrivate y
>
>
> The names of the newsgroups are wrong.
> They are too long and have the first word(s) of the description in it.
> They should be:
>
> greenend.announce
> greenend.commits
> greenend.config
> greenend.misc
> greenend.relativity.private.rsvp
> greenend.system
> greenend.test
> greenend.vpn
>
> But I can tell you:
> all newsgroups are empty, except for the test group
> in which I posted the question what greenend is all about.
> Nobody gave me a good answer to that question.

Yet again, you're reading what you want to read and not reading what I
stated about the problem. I know what the group named should be. So why
not tell my the script is appending the description to the group name
instead?

--
End Of The Line BBS - Plano, TX
telnet endofthelinebbs.com 23

On Tue, 5 Apr 2022 14:29:26 -0000 (UTC)
"Nixd0rf" <qwerty@poiuy.asdfg> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> > all newsgroups are empty, except for the test group
> > in which I posted the question what greenend is all about.
> > Nobody gave me a good answer to that question.
>
> http://www.greenend.org.uk/news/

You know, I'm sorry I bothered asking. Only Julien even bothered to try
and address my problem, meanwhile everyone else wants to tell me stuff
I didn't ask about.

It's been 20 years since I used usenet, and now I'm figuring out why I
didn't miss it.

--
End Of The Line BBS - Plano, TX
telnet endofthelinebbs.com 23

Ignore the Trolls, and welcome back <3

On 2022-04-06, Nigel Reed <sysop@endofthelinebbs.com> wrote:
> On Tue, 5 Apr 2022 14:29:26 -0000 (UTC)
> "Nixd0rf" <qwerty@poiuy.asdfg> wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> > all newsgroups are empty, except for the test group
>> > in which I posted the question what greenend is all about.
>> > Nobody gave me a good answer to that question.
>>
>> http://www.greenend.org.uk/news/
>
>
> You know, I'm sorry I bothered asking. Only Julien even bothered to try
> and address my problem, meanwhile everyone else wants to tell me stuff
> I didn't ask about.
>
> It's been 20 years since I used usenet, and now I'm figuring out why I
> didn't miss it.
>
>

--
gemini://hispagatos.org
gemini://rek2.hispagatos.org
https://hispagatos.org
https://hispagatos.space/@rek2

On 4/5/22 11:10 PM, Nigel Reed wrote:
> On Tue, 5 Apr 2022 13:57:46 +0200
> Rink <rink.hof.haalditmaarweg@planet.nl> wrote:
>
>> Op 1-4-2022 om 2:47 schreef Nigel Reed:
>>> I've started to go through some of the checkgroups emails that my
>>> innd server has been sending me and notice that for recommended
>>> newgroups, there's no separation between the group name and the
>>> description:
>>>
>>> # You can add them by executing the command(s):
>>>
>>> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.announceAnnouncements y
>>> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.commitsCommit y
>>> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.configgreenend.* y
>>> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.miscUnpleasant y
>>> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
>>> greenend.relativity.private.rsvpParty y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
>>> greenend.systemcron y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.testTests
>>> y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.vpnPrivate y

Nigel,

Are you pasting from the e-mail directly into your terminal/shell? I
have issues pasting tab characters in modern terminal clients and
looking at the original output you gave reminds me of struggles I've had
with that. Most terminal software have configuration settings you can
alter relating to pasting tab characters.

Cheers,

Jesse

Hi Nigel,

> I've started to go through some of the checkgroups emails that my innd
> server has been sending me and notice that for recommended newgroups,
> there's no separation between the group name and the description

Could you please try these 2 commands:

% echo "testing.checkgroups\tJust a test." > test
% docheckgroups < test

What is the resulting output in your Ubuntu?

And which shell is mentioned at the first line of the script named
"docheckgroups"? (run "innconfval pathbin" to know where it is)

Normally, the output should be something like:

# The following newsgroups are missing and should be added:
# # testing.checkgroups
# # You can add them by executing the command(s):

/home/news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup testing.checkgroups y

# The following newsgroups descriptions are missing and should be added:
# # testing.checkgroups Just a test.
# # You can add them by editing /home/news/db/newsgroups
# or by using the -u flag with docheckgroups.

exit # so you can feed this message into the shell (as well as mod-active).

--
Julien ÉLIE

« Roma tibi subito motibus ibit amor. »

On Wed, 6 Apr 2022 05:26:33 -0000 (UTC)
rek2 hispagatos <rek2@hispagatos.org.invalid> wrote:

> Ignore the Trolls, and welcome back <3

Thank you.

--
End Of The Line BBS - Plano, TX
telnet endofthelinebbs.com 23

On Wed, 6 Apr 2022 07:38:26 -0500
Jesse Rehmer <jesse.rehmer@blueworldhosting.com> wrote:

> On 4/5/22 11:10 PM, Nigel Reed wrote:
> > On Tue, 5 Apr 2022 13:57:46 +0200
> > Rink <rink.hof.haalditmaarweg@planet.nl> wrote:
> >
> >> Op 1-4-2022 om 2:47 schreef Nigel Reed:
> >>> I've started to go through some of the checkgroups emails that my
> >>> innd server has been sending me and notice that for recommended
> >>> newgroups, there's no separation between the group name and the
> >>> description:
> >>>
> >>> # You can add them by executing the command(s):
> >>>
> >>> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
> >>> greenend.announceAnnouncements y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
> >>> greenend.commitsCommit y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
> >>> greenend.configgreenend.* y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
> >>> greenend.miscUnpleasant y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
> >>> greenend.relativity.private.rsvpParty y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
> >>> greenend.systemcron y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
> >>> greenend.testTests y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
> >>> greenend.vpnPrivate y
>
> Nigel,
>
> Are you pasting from the e-mail directly into your terminal/shell? I
> have issues pasting tab characters in modern terminal clients and
> looking at the original output you gave reminds me of struggles I've
> had with that. Most terminal software have configuration settings
> you can alter relating to pasting tab characters.

Yes, you could be right. I might see if I can change the script to use
spaces instead of tabs which would work better. Thanks for the
suggestion.

--
End Of The Line BBS - Plano, TX
telnet endofthelinebbs.com 23

Nigel Reed <sysop@endofthelinebbs.com> writes:

> I've started to go through some of the checkgroups emails that my innd
> server has been sending me and notice that for recommended newgroups,
> there's no separation between the group name and the description:

> # You can add them by executing the command(s):

> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.announceAnnouncements y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.commitsCommit y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.configgreenend.* y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.miscUnpleasant y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.relativity.private.rsvpParty y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.systemcron y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.testTests y
> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.vpnPrivate y

Just wanted to confirm that this is definitely broken (the above output is
nonsensical and means the checkgroups message isn't being parsed
properly), but I'm not sure why and I haven't seen the same behavior.

It should be parsed by checkgroups.pl, which does:

foreach (@body) {
my ($ngname, $ngdesc) = split(/\s+/, $_, 2);

which should split each line on the first whitespace, so I'm not sure what
could cause this. It's acting as if it doesn't think the tab is
whitespace and is instead splitting on the first space in the description,
but I don't know what would cause that behavior in Perl. I don't think
that even a really weird locale would make a tab not be whitespace.

--
Russ Allbery (eagle@eyrie.org) <https://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>

Please post questions rather than mailing me directly.
<https://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/faqs/questions.html> explains why.

Russ Allbery <eagle@eyrie.org> writes:

> Just wanted to confirm that this is definitely broken (the above output is
> nonsensical and means the checkgroups message isn't being parsed
> properly), but I'm not sure why and I haven't seen the same behavior.

> It should be parsed by checkgroups.pl, which does:

> foreach (@body) {
> my ($ngname, $ngdesc) = split(/\s+/, $_, 2);

Oh, wait, no, that delegates the construction of that mail message to
docheckgroups, which looks like it parses the checkgroups yet again.

docheckgroups is kind of a mess of Perl and shell, but it looks like the
core parsing is "my @fields = split()" which should again split the line
on whitespace.

--
Russ Allbery (eagle@eyrie.org) <https://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>

Please post questions rather than mailing me directly.
<https://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/faqs/questions.html> explains why.

On Wed, 06 Apr 2022 11:56:48 -0700
Russ Allbery <eagle@eyrie.org> wrote:

> It should be parsed by checkgroups.pl, which does:
>
> foreach (@body) {
> my ($ngname, $ngdesc) = split(/\s+/, $_, 2);
>
> which should split each line on the first whitespace, so I'm not sure
> what could cause this. It's acting as if it doesn't think the tab is
> whitespace and is instead splitting on the first space in the
> description, but I don't know what would cause that behavior in Perl.
> I don't think that even a really weird locale would make a tab not
> be whitespace.

It could be putty losing the tabs when pasting, which is why I'm going
to change it to just put in spaces when generating the email and see if
that helps.

--
End Of The Line BBS - Plano, TX
telnet endofthelinebbs.com 23

Nigel Reed <sysop@endofthelinebbs.com> writes:

> It could be putty losing the tabs when pasting, which is why I'm going
> to change it to just put in spaces when generating the email and see if
> that helps.

Oh, sigh, I completely misread your original message and thought that INN
was sending you the message directly.

Yes, my guess is also that the tabs are being lost in the process of
cutting and pasting the full checkgroups file into an invocation of
docheckgroups.

--
Russ Allbery (eagle@eyrie.org) <https://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>

Please post questions rather than mailing me directly.
<https://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/faqs/questions.html> explains why.

Op 6-4-2022 om 6:10 schreef Nigel Reed:
> On Tue, 5 Apr 2022 13:57:46 +0200
> Rink <rink.hof.haalditmaarweg@planet.nl> wrote:
>
>> Op 1-4-2022 om 2:47 schreef Nigel Reed:
>>> I've started to go through some of the checkgroups emails that my
>>> innd server has been sending me and notice that for recommended
>>> newgroups, there's no separation between the group name and the
>>> description:
>>>
>>> # You can add them by executing the command(s):
>>>
>>> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.announceAnnouncements y
>>> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.commitsCommit y
>>> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.configgreenend.* y
>>> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.miscUnpleasant y
>>> /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
>>> greenend.relativity.private.rsvpParty y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup
>>> greenend.systemcron y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.testTests
>>> y /news/bin/ctlinnd newgroup greenend.vpnPrivate y
>>
>>
>> The names of the newsgroups are wrong.
>> They are too long and have the first word(s) of the description in it.
>> They should be:
>>
>> greenend.announce
>> greenend.commits
>> greenend.config
>> greenend.misc
>> greenend.relativity.private.rsvp
>> greenend.system
>> greenend.test
>> greenend.vpn
>>
>> But I can tell you:
>> all newsgroups are empty, except for the test group
>> in which I posted the question what greenend is all about.
>> Nobody gave me a good answer to that question.
>
> Yet again, you're reading what you want to read and not reading what I
> stated about the problem. I know what the group named should be. So why
> not tell my the script is appending the description to the group name
> instead?
>

I'm sorry Nigel.
I do not have a newsserver, I do not understand how that works, I do not
understand what your question was, so I cannot (and could not) help you.

I just saw that the newsgroup names were wrong (without reading your
text above).

Now I see that you already mentioned that.
So my mail was not needed.
Sorry.

Rink