[mythtv-users] Mooting architecture for a DataDirect replacement

[Rod Smith]

On Monday 25 June 2007 11:57, Jay R. Ashworth wrote:
> On Mon, Jun 25, 2007 at 10:48:24AM -0400, Rod Smith wrote:
>
> > It could be easier to just maintain a separate server (HTTP, FTP, NNTP,
> > or whatever) that's open to all but intended only for retrieving missing
> > posts.
>
> Well, I think that's inherent in commercial NNTP service, no?  There's
> a fixed event horizon: people only schedule out 2 or 3 weeks, and
> postings hard-expire 6 hours after airtime, or less.  I don't think the
> traffic load would be too painful for supernews.

Yes, but this particular sub-issue is about missing posts. If John Doe's ISP's 
NNTP server is missing the post that holds Tuesday's data for his local NBC 
station, he'll need somewhere to get it. John could of course subscribe to 
SuperNews as his primary NNTP server, but to protect against the occasional 
lost post, another solution is necessary, or at least desirable.

OTOH, I just Googled on "free Usenet servers" and got quite a few hits -- it 
seems there are still quite a few free Usenet servers out there. If the 
community took steps to ensure that a couple of them have reliable postings, 
the reliability problem would go away; these servers could automatically be 
polled in case a missing post is discovered, and people without NNTP provided 
by their ISPs could use such a server as a primary.

It might also be possible to contract with SuperNews (or similar big news 
server operators) to provide public access to just the desired newsgroup 
hierarchy for a reasonable fee.

-- 
Rod Smith
http://www.rodsbooks.com