How to download old NG articles?
- From: "JoeU2004" <joeu2004@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 30 Jul 2009 13:21:01 -0700
How can I download old newgroups articles using OE6?
Currently, my server is msnews.microsoft.com.
I set "Get headers at a time" to 1000 (the max, apparently), then I repeatably press the Headers icon. (Is there a more direct way?)
For the microsoft.public.excel.misc NG, that gets me back as far as only 1 May 2009. The DBX file size is 9291 KB, and it does not change size when I press Headers subsequently.
Yet with the MS Discussion Groups web interface, I can see articles as long ago as 9 June 2004.
I ass-u-me that MSDG relies on the msnews server rather than maintain its own archive.
(Hmm, perhaps that assumption is wrong. See below.)
Initially, I thought perhaps there are some OE or file system size limitations. But I cannot find any that explain this behavior.
According to the Maintenance Clean Up menu, the cache size is 12.8 MB with 954 KB wasted. After compaction, those numbered were reduced to 12.0 MB and 21.1 KB. (The DBX file size was reduced to 9194 KB.) The maintenance folder size is 19.4 MB with 23 files and 0 folders. Another unrelated folder of mine has 1.40 GB with 794 files and 19 folders. I have 72 GB of free space on my disk. Clearly, I am not running up against any file system limits.
Well, looking at network traces, perhaps the limitation is indeed on the msnews server.
When I press Headers, I see the GROUP request go out and the 211 response come back specifying a total of 18981 articles numbered 841950 through 861046.
When I press Headers again after several minutes, the 211 response specifies a total of 19003 articles numbered 841955 through 861049. And then OE does send an XOVER request for messages 861047 through 861049, the server responds, and I do see those new articles added to my list displayed in OE.
FYI, notice that the lowest message number at the server increased(!). That might be evidence of trimming on the server :(.
Moreover, paging through the list of m.p.e.misc articles in OE, I estimate that I do indeed have about 19,000 articles locally. It is only an "estimate" because I do not have the patience to page down potentially 760 times. I did manage to page down about 160 pages, and that appears to be 1/5 to 1/4 down the list, based on the slider position.
I page down to count because the number next to the NG name in Folder pane seems to be the total number of articles on the server, not the number of articles in my cache. Odd! It seems to be off by 4, at least for one NG. That is, the number in the Folder pane is 4 less the number in the GROUP 211 response. That was observed pressing Reset in the Maintenance Clean Up menu. Oh well....
So it seems that the msnews server retains only about the last 19,000 articles in m.p.e.misc, which apparently date back through only May 2009. In contrast, Google Groups has 242,366 articles in m.p.e.misc that date back at least through Jan 2004. (I did not search back further.)
So, as far as seeing older NG articles using OE, am I SOL?
My ISP stopped maintaining its own news server some time ago. I don't know of any other (free) public news servers that I can access using OE. Does anyone?
I don't seem to have any alternatives, either. Neither MSDG search nor Google Groups Advanced Search seem to work completely right.
(FYI, I am searching for an article circa 2008 or earlier 2009 that I know exists. I wrote it!)
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