NNTPFS(4) NNTPFS(4)
NAME
nntpfs - network news transport protocol (NNTP) file system
SYNOPSIS
nntpfs [ -a ] [ -s service ] [ -m mountpoint ] [ system ]
DESCRIPTION
Nntpfs dials the TCP network news transport protocol (NNTP)
port, 119, on system (default '$nntp') and presents at
mountpoint (default /mnt/news) a file system corresponding
to the news articles stored on system.
If the -s option is given, the file system is posted as
/srv/service. If the -a option is given, nntpfs authenti-
cates to the system with a user name and password obtained
from factotum(4). The key specifier is
proto=pass service=nntp server=server user? !password?
The file system contains a directory per newsgroup, with
dots turned into slashes, e.g., comp/os/plan9 for
comp.os.plan9. Each newsgroup directory contains one num-
bered directory per article. The directories follow the
numbering used by the server. Each article directory con-
tains three files: article, header, and body. The article
file contains the full text of the article, while header and
body contain only the header or body.
Each newsgroup directory contains a write-only post file
that may be used to post news articles. RFC1036-compliant
articles should be written to it. The post file will only
exist in a given newsgroup directory if articles are allowed
to be posted to it. Other than that, the post file is not
tied to its directory's newsgroup. The groups to which
articles are eventually posted are determined by the
newsgroups: header lines in the posted article, not by the
location of the post file in the file system.
The qid version of a newsgroup directory is the largest num-
bered article directory it contains (~0, if there are no
articles).
The modification time on a newsgroup directory is the last
time a new article was recorded during this nntpfs session.
To force a check for new articles, stat(2) the newsgroup
directory.
To force a check for new newsgroups, stat(2) the root direc-
tory. Note that this causes the entire list of groups,
which can be about a megabyte, to be transferred.
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NNTPFS(4) NNTPFS(4)
To terminate the connection, unmount the mount point.
Nntpfs makes no effort to send ``keepalives'' so that
servers do not hang up on it. Instead, it redials as neces-
sary when hangups are detected.
EXAMPLE
Authenticate to a private news server:
% echo key proto=pass service=nntp server=nose.mit.edu \
user=rsc !password=secret >/mnt/factotum/ctl
% nntpfs -a nose.mit.edu
SOURCE
/sys/src/cmd/nntpfs.c
BUGS
Directories are presented for deleted articles; the files in
them cannot be opened.
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