> On Jan 14, 3:18 am, Gordon Sande worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>

>>On 2008-01-12 17:51:14 -0400, Terence cantv.net> said:
>>
>>
>>
>>

>>>Update.

>>

>>>I checked over and over what happens when I select another google
>>>group URL from all the groups i usually consult or post on.

>>

>>>Only this one and alt.lanng.asm have the double-screen initial
>>>display.

>>

>>>After which the screens are stable for that Forum.

>>

>>>I am still trying to understand what the above posters mean about
>>>direct access to User Groups without going through a Google interface.
>>>How?
>>>I use Opera by choice over the MS applications and Netscape, all of
>>>which I have the latest versions. I need to be able to selectively
>>>clear refeence and history out.

>>
>>Lets backup a few steps.
>>
>>Newsgroups use something called NNTP which is Network Newsgroup
>>Transport Protocol, or something close to that name. There are
>>specialized programs, that look a lot like email programs to users and
>>they often are often bundled to add to the confusion, that deal with a
>>NNTP source. The NNTP source is typically part of the service offered by
>>an ISP. It used to be mentioned early in their ads but now it is often
>>hard to find. It will be called news.city.isp.net if you subscribe to
>>isp.net and they choose to localize traffic in city, or whatever arcane
>>sequence of symbols the isp guru chose to dream up. The isp will be
>>running a news server that both receives news postings from other news
>>operators and sends them posting. The route from you to me is typically
>>fragmented in the internet style which leads to all the technical
>>difficulties of dealing with messages that may be duplicated and out of
>>order etc. That is why the posting can be out of order and can have
>>"echos" if one of the servers botchs the labelling so duplication is no
>>longer detected. A side confusion is the NNTP uses different TCP/IP
>>ports than other services like the web or email. The purpose of all
>>this is that one copy of the posting arrives at the isp and can be read
>>by many newsgroup readers. A mailing list would have to send separate
>>copies to each reader at greater communication cost.
>>
>>As a service to those who do not bother to get a NNTP reader many isps
>>offer a web interface to the newsgroups. If they can offer a web
>>interface to email then it is a small step to do the same for
>>newsgroups. That used to be the AOL way and was often noted for the many
>>totally clueless newgroup users who arrived via AOL. Google has its web
>>interface so you do not even need to use your local isp.
>>
>>Many sites offer forums for technical support or discussing the state of
>>the world. They have seaparate users postings but that is about the
>>limit of the similarity to newsgroups. Forum posting stay there and are
>>not exchanged. Compare this newsgroup to the Intel support forums as a
>>concrete example. Web interfaces to newsgroups and forums will have
>>similar visual appearances so it is easy to be confused.
>>
>>A news reader can be online in which it requests the content of a
>>posting as you select it from the titles which have been downloading
>>when you selected the newsgroup. This can lead to delays when you hit
>>return for that posting if the server is busy. A news reader can also be
>>offline in which it will download all the posting for the newsgroups
>>that you have selected in advance. It will spool the contents to your
>>local disk with whatever dealys are required. It allows you to read the
>>postings from your disk with no delays. When 9600 baud was a fast modem
>>the offline style was common. In the days of 1.5mbs cable feeds the
>>online style is the most common.
>>
>>If you read newsgroups regularly it is a very good bet that the use
>>of a specialized newsreader will make things easier in the long run.
>>The initial cost of choosing a newsreader, which is as subjective as
>>choosing an editor, will save itself in the ease of use over a web
>>interface. When you go an vacation and really need to keep up then
>>the web interface can be tolerated.
>>
>>Google will be several layers away from the real NNTP service so all
>>sorts of funny things can be going on. Get a nice NNTP reader and
>>use the NNTP service of you local isp and things will look a lot
>>cleaner. There are several open source newsreaders (ask Google!)
>>although I use a commercal one on MacOsX. It is an online reader
>>as I have a cable modem. I still like the offline reader that I had
>>on MacOs back when the bleeding edge was 38k dialups. I have also
>>had times when I used PCs and found that I preferred the commercial
>>newsreaders there. I tend to prefer a well choosen set of useful
>>features out of the box rather than an uncountablely large collection
>>of arcane fetures with an awkward set of defaults which is all too
>>typical of various open software offerings. Some open software follows
>>the usability style so my tar brush is not universal. Gnome vrs KDE
>>is a good example of this issue. Or Ubuntu comapred to other Linux
>>offerings. "It just works" sounds real good to me so I can spend my
>>time on other persuits.
>>
>>So much for ramblings on isps and newsgroups.

>
>
> This was a very informative posting Gordon, but it implies that one
> has a constant drip-feed of data through an always-on broadband
> connection.

> Now, I've just got beyond dial-up, (which has its benefits), but my 1
> Mbyte/s broadband (which delivers cable TV too) is only data-active
> when I say so. A news feed also implies I must store the data I want,
> whereas with Google groups I select and browse THEIR data base.
>
> The point that still escapes me is that I suspected there was ANOTHER
> url where I could go to see, with my browser, just "Comp.Lang.Fortran"
> for example, without the Google framework and anonimity.