SongBear said:
I am trying to find a link to this board, All I can find is this post
a question page, not a page where I can view answers or other
questions. Kind of frustrating.
If you want FULL newsgroup features, use a real NNTP (network news
transfer protocol) client program, like Outlook Express, Forte Agent,
Thunderbird, Xnews, or whatever you find to your liking. The
webnews-for-dummies interface will not allow you to watch threads, color
code them, apply rules against them, define and change views, allow you
to read them while offline, etc. There are several freebie NNTP servers
around, like Microsoft's (msnews.microsoft.com) but you might want to
also use an NNTP server provided your your ISP (Internet Service
Provider) or even pay for one, like Giganews.
I don't use the webnews interface (at
http://support.microsoft.com/newsgroups/). You'll have to navigate down
the tree list on every visit to find your newsgroup of interest (i.e.,
you cannot simply subscribe to those you are interested and only see
those in the tree list, as you could do with a real newsreader). Since
you cannot mark a thread to watch it, I suspect you have to go searching
for posts where you used your unique moniker. You did use one, right?
Otherwise, you cannot tell your "anonymous"-named post from anyone else
who didn't bother giving themself a name?
In Outlook Express (as a newsreader), I see your post sent all of 16
minutes earlier
(nntp://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.outlook.general/
[email protected]).
Newsgroups are not prattle, er, chat rooms so don't expect to see your
post show up immediately. It has to get accepted by the NNTP server,
processed, and then submitted to the list to update it. There is
propagation delay to duplicate your message around the world to other
NNTP servers, and there is even propagation delay within the NNTP server
to which you post. For example, posts submitted through Google Groups
(
http://groups.google.com) may not show up at Google Groups until around
4 hours later. Rather than consider newsgroups as a substitute for
interactive prattle rooms, think of them as where you leave a message on
an answering machine and then wait.
