Re: [leafnode-list] groups always listed as new

[Nick Drage <nick-drage@xxxxxx>]

( apologies for any dodgy formatting, finished this email by editing it
 in the mailq )
On Sun, 2 Jan 2000, Cornelius Krasel wrote:
> Nick Drage wrote:
> > On Sun, 2 Jan 2000, Cornelius Krasel wrote:
> > > Nick Drage <nick-drage@xxxxxx> wrote:
<< Problem is all groups always reported as new >>
> > > a) The clock in your computer is going wrong (no kidding).
> > Ah.  I've checked this, my BIOS thinks it's 1994 on boot up, but I always
> > change the clock to the current time and date straight after I first log
> > in ( used to have to do this anyway last millennium, dead battery ).
> 
> If you manually set the time as root with "date", you should be fine, IMNSHO.
> Leafnode does not query the hardware clock but uses time() to get the
> time of day. There have been no changes in this routine since I don't know
> when.

The BIOS now successfully believes it's 2000, it just had a problem with
the 1999 -> 2000 transition.  And anyway, like you say, Leafnode gets the
time from the OS :)  So unfortunately it isn't a Y2K problem there.

> There may be another possibility which I didn't think of: your libc may
> contain a Y2K bug. In that case, it would be interesting to see the
> output of the following little program
<< snip little program >>
> This should give you the current date and time.

It does so correctly, so it's not that either - is that good news or bad
news :)

> > hostname:/var/spool/news/leaf.node# head groupinfo
> > 3dfx.d3d.drivers 0 1 0 -x-
<< snip identical entry for next nine groups >>
> > So this is OK?
> 
> This looks good, yes.
> 
> It may also be interesting to get a debuglog of a newsreader invocation;
> maybe your newsreader is not working properly. (The debuglog will show
> how the newsreader invokes the "NEWGROUPS" command.)

OK, how does this look? ( "delete" rather confusingly, is my current
hostname )
Jan  2 23:54:11 delete leafnode[174]: config: debugmode is 1
Jan  2 23:54:12 delete leafnode[174]: rereading
/var/spool/news/leaf.node/groupinfo
Jan  2 23:54:15 delete leafnode[174]: <MODE READER
Jan  2 23:54:15 delete leafnode[174]: >200 Leafnode 1.9.7, pleased to meet 
you!
Jan  2 23:54:17 delete leafnode[174]: <XOVER
Jan  2 23:54:17 delete leafnode[174]: >412 Use the GROUP command first
Jan  2 23:54:17 delete leafnode[174]: <LIST overview.fmt
Jan  2 23:54:17 delete leafnode[174]: >215 information follows
Jan  2 23:54:17 delete leafnode[174]: <LIST
Jan  2 23:54:17 delete leafnode[174]: >215 Newsgroups in form "group high
low flags".
Jan  2 23:54:33 delete leafnode[174]: <NEWGROUPS 1000102 184044
Jan  2 23:54:34 delete leafnode[174]: >231 List of new newsgroups follows
Jan  2 23:57:12 delete leafnode[174]: <LISTGROUP alt.perl
Jan  2 23:57:13 delete leafnode[174]: >211 Article list for alt.perl

Ah, according to this, after receiving the NEWGROUPS command no newgroups are
listed.  However if I actually telnet localhost 119 and manually enter the
"NEWGROUPS 1000102 184044" command I get back a list of all groups, for
example:

zippo.addgroup.propose 1 1 y
zippo.announce 1 1 y
zippo.backbone.notices 1 1 y
zippo.editorial 1 1 y
zippo.general 1 1 y
zippo.groups.added 1 1 y
zippo.spamhippo.top100 1 1 y
zyxel.ger 1 1 y