This directory contains lotsa good stuff common to both
the news server, support, and client programs. The short of it is:
conf.h Configuration information for NNTP server,
support, and client programs.
response_codes.h These are the #define's of the numeric response
codes in NNTP. This shouldn't change.
clientlib.c This file is a collection of routines which clients
can use to talk to the NNTP server. The code is
well documented, but briefly, the functions are
server_init Open connection to server
getsocket Get a stream socket
get_server Get line from server
put_server Send line to server
close_server Close connection
It is worth noting that these routines use
buffered I/O, and leave the external variables
"ser_rd_fp" and "ser_wr_fp" (server read/write
file pointers, respectively) floating around
for use by programs which need them.
In any event, you shouldn't need to screw with
these routines.
conf.h
======
Unfortunately, you will need to screw with this to get both
the server, support, and client programs running. More unfortunately,
"rrn" has its own ideas of where to look for config information,
so there is some duplication of effort here. With luck, it won't
be too great.
This is sort of a walk through conf.h, and what parameters
need to be changed. The #defines's default value is listed in
parenthesis after it's name. Manual entries mentioned here are
in the "doc" directory of the NNTP distribution.
First are some compile-time type options, for compiling in
certain code. The options should be "#undef"ed if you don't want
them, and "#defined" if you do.
ALONE (undefined)
Defines whether we're a stand alone version of the server, or
whether we're running under inetd. I suggest you run under inetd.
FASTFORK (undefined)
If we're ALONE, then this option tells us not to read the
active file when we fork, but rather for the parent daemon to re-read
it every READINTVL (below) seconds. This should make forking off children
a little bit faster.
LOG (undefined)
When LOG is defined, we log copious amounts of information via
syslog to a special file. One a busy system like ucbvax, this produces
about 100K of log information per day. Look in ../src/SYSLOG to
get an idea of what will be logged. You can use the scripts
provided in ../support to produce statistics on your NNTP server if
you run with LOG.
BSD_42 (undefined)
If you have a 4.2 BSD system (as opposed to a 4.3 BSD system),
this needs to be defined. Really it does only two things: changes
the log level to be compatible with 4.2, and automatically defines
DBM (below). If, somehow, you already have ndbm, then you should
kill the lines which auto-define it.
DBM (undefined)
If you don't have the ndbm routines in your standard library (i.e.,
if you're not running 4.3 BSD), you'll have to define this; all it
does is replace the ndbm calls with the earlier, unwieldy dbm calls.
DOMAIN (undefined)
If domain is defined, it specifies that whatever it is defined
as will be appended to host names; this is for posting news when
your hostname() doesn't return your fully-qualified domain name.
If your hostname system call does return a fully-qualified name,
simply undef DOMAIN.
SERVER_HOST ("foo") <- you better change this!
... is the machine which various programs (mini-inews, rrn,
getactive, etc.) should connect to for news; that is, it is the machine
which will be running the news server.
POSTER ("nobody")
If your nntpd is run as root, nntpd will attempt to setuid()
and setgid() to the uid and gid of whoever POSTER is defined as.
If your nntpd isn't running as root (i.e., it might run as "usenet"),
either undefine this, or define it to be a user which exists but
is not used -- the setuid will fail in any event.
LOG_FACILITY (LOG_DAEMON)
This is of concern only if you have 4.3 syslog. If you do,
and you have LOG defined above (which produces huge amounts of
log info), you may want to define this to be something which can
be redirected in /etc/syslog.conf to a special file -- LOG_LOCAL7
is what we use on ucbvax.
BUGS_TO ("Phil Lapsley (phil@berkeley.edu, ...!ucbvax!phil)")
This person is mentioned in the output of the HELP command.
It should probably be left to me, unless you hack on the server.
Next, we have some common files:
ACTIVE_FILE ("/usr/spool/news/lib/active")
Specifies the location of the "active" file.
ACCESS_FILE ("/usr/spool/news/lib/nntp_access")
Specifies the location of the remote access file.
See the manual entry, nntpd.8c, for a better explanation.
A sample access file is in ../support/access_file.
HISTORY_FILE ("/usr/spool/news/lib/history")
Specifies the location of the "history" file.
This is used with NEWNEWS and ARTICLE/HEAD/BODY/STAT when
given an message-id argument.
SPOOLDIR ("/usr/spool/news/")
This is the directory where news is stored. Note that
the trailing / is important.
INEWS ("/usr/spool/news/lib/inews")
Specifies the location of inews, for posting. Note that this
is not the same as the pseudo-inews in the inews directory
supplied with the NNTP distribution. Your inews may be
in a different place, such as /usr/bin/inews.
RNEWS ("/usr/bin/rnews")
Specifies the location of the rnews program which is used
for dealing with news received from other systems via the
IHAVE command; it is often a link to inews.
STAT_FILE ("/usr/spool/news/lib/mgdstats")
When the support program "mkgrdates" is run, it keep stats
in a file to tell whether or not to rebuild its database
the next time it is run; this is the file the stats are kept
in. Needless to say, it must be writable by whatever user-id
runs "mkgrdates". See the manual entry "mkgrdates.8c" for
more info.
NGDATE_FILE ("/usr/spool/news/lib/groupdates")
Specifies the location of the newsgroup creation date file.
See the manual entry for both nntpd.8c and mkgrdates.8c for
more info.
READINTVL (600 seconds)
If the server is compiled with FASTFORK and ALONE, then this number
tells how often to check if the active file has changed (and to
read it in if it has changed since the last time). See README
in the "server" directory of the NNTP distribution. If you are
not compiled with FASTFORK and ALONE (hint: you're not going to),
don't worry about this.