NNTP Gateway for Usenet ( Newsgroups ), Mailing Lists

The latest version: V2.3.2 (31 Oct 2004)

What is it?

This hack provides a gateway from vBulletin forums to the USENET. It allows forum members to read newsgroup messages as well as to send posts to the newsgroups. In a nutshell, it turns vBulletin forums into a basic function news reader.

For an added bonus, this package also supports mailing list archive and forum to mailing list gateway. The software retrieves messages from a pop3 account and import them into the forums threaded. It also allows a forums user to send messages to the mailing list by the forum posting interface.

Why?

The gateway will be appreciated by forum members who do not know how to set up a news reader, or people who do not have port 119 open in their network. A forum interface to read and post news are often considered to be better than a news reader.

The gateway adds more contents to your forums and allows the members to interact with wider audience. It is common to see new users signing up to use this feature.

History

This hack is basically a hacked vB2 NNTP gateway written by Gilby to work with vB3. The original hack can be found here:

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...7&page=1&pp=15


Features

Some of the features and improvement include:

• Handles both newsgroup posts and mailing lists.
• Handles MIME encoded messages and attachment.
• Handles UUEncoded messages.
• Two Admin Control Panels for all settings.
• Automated installation.
• Correct thread implementation. All imported messages and posts sent to newsgroups will be threaded correctly according to References and Message-ID headers.
• Optional setting to thread by subject for mailing lists that strip references header.
• Supports TABLE_PREFIX.
• Imported messages will be searchable just like normal forum posts.
• Similar threads are built when the messages are imported if the system setting is on.
• Multiple attachments importing.
• Save attachment to database or file according to vB setting.
• Thumbnail created while importing image files.
• Multiple attachment post to newsgroup is also supported.
• Selectable X-No-Archive header honouring system.
• Light on system resources.
• Global Killfile to filter out unwanted messages. Killfiles can have OR and AND effectiveness.
• Strip footer by setting for incoming messages. Strips out repeated message footers.
• Built options to disable signatures and footers for out going messages.

Future development

• AdminCP interfaces. (completed)
• Installation/upgrade script. (completed, coded into AdminCP)
• Traditional "> " lead posting interface.

What do you need and do not need?

You do not need to edit vB php files if you use two bookmarks
You need to edit one vB php file to insert two lines of code if you want direct click links within AdminCP.
No need to run SQL.

Installation

Basically the AdminCP interfaces take care of installation as well as upgrade in the background. Back up your database first. The scripts can modify your database without alerting you!

Please follow the instructions in the readme.txt file for more details.

Support

Please post your support questions to this thread. Please check the FAQ in the third post within this thread first.

================== UPDATES ======================
Jul 31 2004 (release version 2.2.0)

• Provided option of not importing attachments
• Provided option of pause between messages
• Provided option of not sending messages to USENET
• Provided mechanism to skip importing a message if it was crashed on it
• Provided "Default Footer" option
• Provided strip_footer function for mailing lists
  (written originally by KevinM)
• Provided Killfile functions with Header/Body/AND/OR settings
• Provided ability to thread messages by subject for mailing lists
• Provided ability to use a single POP3 account for different mailing lists
  (use prefix)
• Merged KevinM's attachment routine, save thumbnail to hard drive
  as vB3.0.3
• Official support to have the script run by Scheduled Tasks
• Many bug fixes

Please note, when you manually run the script, you must turn on the debug mode. Otherwise nothing will be displayed on the screen.

To run as debug mode: http://forums.yourdomain.com/gateway.php?debug=1

25 Oct 2004

• Provided the option of sending posts using the real email address
• Provided the option of sending posts using a fixed email address for
  each group.
• Posts are now held back if they are in the moderating queue
• Scheduled task log is now working
• Provided the option of sending the debug messages to the vB3 cron log
• Bug fixes

31 Oct 2004

Fixed bugs running the gateway by the vB3 Scheduled Tasks

1 March 2004

Uploaded the new zip file. It contains one or two bug fixes.

[SEO Report]

Hi!

What a great mod, thanks for sharing this!

I have two questions :

1. # of imported posts are different from those given by Outlook Express. Is there a way to search for duplicates ? (not that I trust OE, but...)
2. I'm wondering if it's legal to import msg from, say, MS newsgroups ? I mean it's not usenet

Thanks,
AG.

[Stephan Whelan]

Hi everyone.

We still getting the same issue as listed here: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=677 posts going outbound get re-imported in the next run.

You can see and example here: http://forums.deeperblue.net/showpos...42&postcount=6 (original post in the forums) and http://forums.deeperblue.net/showpos...46&postcount=7 (reimported post).

Any ideas?

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by Stephan Whelan

Hi everyone.

We still getting the same issue as listed here: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=677 posts going outbound get re-imported in the next run.

You can see and example here: http://forums.deeperblue.net/showpos...42&postcount=6 (original post in the forums) and http://forums.deeperblue.net/showpos...46&postcount=7 (reimported post).

Any ideas?

I have answered this question many, many times. You need to at least go through once all the NNTP settings in the control panel.

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by SEO Report

Hi!

What a great mod, thanks for sharing this!

I have two questions :

1. # of imported posts are different from those given by Outlook Express. Is there a way to search for duplicates ? (not that I trust OE, but...)
2. I'm wondering if it's legal to import msg from, say, MS newsgroups ? I mean it's not usenet

Thanks,
AG.

1. Need more details, does the gateway rereive more messages than OE? or the other way around. Do you have any kill files on one of these?

2. I think they wouldn't worry about archiving their newsgroups. Google does that anyway. MS newsgroups are Usenet. I am not a lawyer, so take care.

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by trackpads

Lierduh, totally forgot to request this. Is there a way to block messages by their usenet username? For example it would be an extra way to block annoying messages by usenet denizens who like to OT to death certain forums under the same name.

When I try to prune in vb by using that name it never finds them either in the by name or by subject field.

Thanks again!

-Jason

The kill file matches all header fields including the sender name.

May be they use some sort of ASCII charactors to fool.

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by pgrote

Is there a way to import emails into a specific thread?

I can import into specific forums or subforums, but that is all I have as an option from the drop-down box in the Admin CP when specifying NNTP Newsgroups. I see no place where I can enter in a specific URL or already established thread...Is this possible?

You just need to forward the email with the same subject, by an automated way naturally, then it will be imported into the same thread.

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by journey

I have the script up and running on a new vB3.03 install. It seems as though when I d/l posts/threads (from usenet) that my overall post/thread count statistics increment at a 2:1 ratio (the main forums view stats to the right of the individual forums seem normal though). ie, if I were to have downloaded 10k posts my overall post stats would read 20k. Why would posts / threads be double counted in the overall stats (but not on the individual stats)?

This happened both when I initially downloaded threads as well as everytime I d/l additonal posts when the cron job runs.

oh yeah, and non-usenet forums that are strictly local do correctly update the overall and forum specific post/thread count at a 1:1 ratio.

irate:

The total counts are calculated based on each forum's counts when the main page loads. So it is impossible the total counts are wrong while the individual forum's stats are right.

I will check this when I get a chance to play on an empty forum.

[SEO Report]

Originally Posted by lierduh

1. Need more details, does the gateway rereive more messages than OE? or the other way around.

The gateway retreive more messages than OE. I tested GW with microsoft.public.windowsxp.help_and_support, I ended with 25,261 threads and 75,698 posts, while OE retrieved 19,520 (OE showed something like 500K msg, then quickly went down to 19K)

Originally Posted by lierduh

Do you have any kill files on one of these?

I don't know, I'm not even sure what is a kill file

Originally Posted by lierduh

2. I think they wouldn't worry about archiving their newsgroups. Google does that anyway. MS newsgroups are Usenet. I am not a lawyer, so take care.

Thanks, lierduh! much appreciated!

[kkiely]

Anyone know what this error is and how to fix it? I just got it 1 day after switching to a new data feed - I dont think that would cause it though

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Database error in vBulletin 3.0.0:

Invalid SQL:
SHOW COLUMNS FROM nntp_groups
LIKE 'newsgroupid'

mysql error: Can't find file: 'nntp_groups.MYI' (errno: 2)

mysql error number: 1017

Date: Wednesday 12th of January 2005 07:15:57 PM
Script: http://www.homepokergames.com/vbforu...ntp_groups.php
Referer: http://www.homepokergames.com/vbforu...dex.php?do=nav
Username: ***
IP Address: *********

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by kkiely

Invalid SQL:
SHOW COLUMNS FROM nntp_groups
LIKE 'newsgroupid'

mysql error: Can't find file: 'nntp_groups.MYI' (errno: 2)

Table nntp_groups could be corrupted, as the database can not find the nntp_groups.MYI (the index file). You can try to rebuild the table, or just delete it altogher and let the script to create a new empty table.