ok I have my news server that I'm paying for: news.tigerusenet.com
I have a username and password for it.

I setup the forum and the nntp settings
I've uploaded the files but when I run the debug, I get the msg:

Now i thought that this might be because my hosting company is blocking the ports.
I spoke to them and they wanted the ip and port so that they can open it up.

Now I'm guessing that the IP is what news.tigerusenet.com translates to (66.250.146.196). Is this correct?

Then I told them port 119, and they said that they cannot open this up on shared hosting plans...

Can anyone help me get this up and running?

All I'm after is to be able to fill my forum up a little more with posts. So I don't even need forum members to be able to post to usenet.

It's so frustrating.

Please help

Wait... your hosting will or won't open up port 119 for you? If they won't open up port 119 then you'll need to see if your NNTP provider offers feeds on other ports like port 80 (and then you'll need to change the port # hard-coded in the PHP file but one step at a time).

Thanks for your reply.

My host won't open up port 119.

I checked tigerusenet.com (the company I'm using to subscribe to the news server) and it says:

Port(s): 119, 80, 3128, 23, 7000, 8000, 9000

Now it doesn't say if I need to change options or anything there. These numbers are just in the corner so I guess that I can connect on any.

Do you know which is the best port to use there? port 80?

Do I just need to go through each of the php files and change 119 to, say 80?

Thanks for your help...

I just changed the details in the php files from 119 to 80. ran the gateway.php script and got the same error message.


This is really strange.
I feel like this is an amazing hack and I'm so close just can't get it to work and am lost about the reason?!

Is it the files? Is it the news server (tigerusenet)? is it my hosting company? Is it me?

I have no idea...

If all you want to do is fill ya forum with posts, perhaps using the free Microsoft account, no user or pass required, theres a good few groups as well, This is what i have done for now :)

I think the problem is my hosting company blocking port 119.

So even the microsoft news forums wouldn't work at this time. Unless I can get the hack to work on a different port.

Has anyone else had this same problem with their host? Any work around changing the ports in this script. I've kinda tried changin every occurance of 119 with 80 in the php files, but it still doesnt work?

Any advice

It's a double edged sword you're fighting here... on one side you have your hosting company who won't open up port 119 which is the standard NNTP port while on the other hand you have to find a NNTP provider who supports different ports like 80.

Not every NNTP provider supports port 80 so you need to find out from them what other ports, if any, they offer connections on and then you need to take that list to your hosting company to see which ports they have open. You may or may not find any common ports. You just can't blindly change the PHP file to different port numbers because (a) your hosting company may be blocking it but even if they aren't then (b) your NNTP provider may not offer that port as an option.

Take a step back with this...

- Go to your NNTP provider and tell them that your hosting company is blocking port 119 and then ask if they (the NNTP provider) offer connections on port 80 since that port is open for just about every hosting company.

- If your NNTP provider offer connections on port 80 then try to get the software up & running with a test newgroup first.

- If your NNTP provider does not offer connections on port 80 then try to find a free open access NNTP provider that offers connections on port 80. Most likely the newsgroup you want won't be available but at leat you can get the software up & running as a proof of concept and go from. After you have it up & running then you can shop around for a different NNTP provider.

What i meant was try the msnews.microsoft.com server not your hosting server, add that one as a new server and then add microsoft.public.pocketpc as a group and see if that works..

My newshosting account didnt work for me either so i tried the default server and forun a decent group in that server and hey presto it works...

I am referring to the server that you changed to yours when you 1st set it up, itshould be a microsoft one im sure, but anyway, use them details i have given you and it will work, let me know please, if ya dont quite understand what i mean let me know also and i will try to explain better :)

I have exactly the same problem! My host will not allow NNTP ports to be open and block all ports!

As I can get them with a newsreader (outlook or others), could there be away of downloading them all every so often then exporting them somehow into mysql??!!

OR,
Maybe I could run a copy of Vb locally on my pc using WAMP, then copying the relevant database onto the live website??? Need to do this a lot though!

What do you reckon?

Thanks,:)
Dave

Thanks KW802, I appreciate your help and comments... I'm well on my way with this now and think that when I have more time I can get it to work how I want.

Thanks Bashy. I have found another way to get this working at the moment. I'm just not sure that what you suggest would work either though. Basically I'm guessing that this is the problem in easy terms (someone let me know if I'm wrong)... The script is being run from a php file on my website, it requests access to ports on a newsserver (that could be a free one or a pay for account), so long as it gets a connection (and authenticates - if its a pay for newsserver with login) then the messages are posted in the forum.

With my original problem being my web hosting not allowing connection to be opened for outgoing requests on port 119, this would affect the free and pay for newsservers connecting to usenet groups.

Dave, I was trying to figure out a way to do exactly that - download the messages locally, then upload them to my forums. I'm not all that bothered with forum members interacting with usenet - I just want to fill my board with more posts. But I couldn't find a way to do this.

I did solve the problem of getting the connection working on a different port, and have managed to import messages. Only problem is with some of the titles, and also the links on the forumhome to the last message in each forum isn't working.

Anyways, 1 problem at a time. Here's how I got my web hosting company to open ports and connect to my newsserver. (as KW802 suggested):

I'm registered with http://www.tigerusenet.com/ (I think it's $7.50 a month - for 15GB / month)
This newsserver allows access on ports: 119, 80, 3128, 23, 7000, 8000, 9000

I had to then keep pushing my hosting company to open port 7000 (because they wouldn't open port 119 on a shared hosting plan) eventually they did it. It took 24 hours for them to process this change. They needed to know the ip address of the where the open port was connecting to so I did an ip lookup for news.tigerusenet.com

I then went through each of the installation files and replaced all instances of "119" with "7000" (only about 3 files needed changing, but i went through them all to make sure - use the easy edit>find>replace funtions of your text editor)

then after running the script (after putting in the settings) and it sucked the messages to my forum.

I still have some issues with it. (Like I haven't been able to repeat the task of sucking in the messages, but I haven't spent time trying to figure this out yet, plus I guess this has something to do with schedul tasks - just getting error messages) I will read through the posts here again.

But I'm optimistic because I sucked them in.

Give it ago, I'm not too sure how good tigerusenet is, but there is no contract, so if they end up being bad, I will cancel and change.

I know that if I was to allow 2 way posting to usenet, then I would probably have problems with this newsserver (maybe most are the same) - because each post to usenet would be from my account. And each instance of my account spamming usenet over tigernet is gonna get me a fine... so I disabled my forum members post from going on usenet (someone earlier in the thread suggested this).

Give it a go by seeing which ports you can use your newsserver on (eg. 7000?) then go to your webhost and ask to open port 7000 for ip (of your newsserver), then change all instances of 119 with 7000 in the install files (port 119 is the default).

Let me know how you go, good luck!