On 2019-11-28 10:56:58 +1300, Greg Ewing wrote: > On 27/11/19 10:54 am, Mr. Gentooer wrote: > > why would I be a troll? I have never used usenet. I am honestly and > > genuinely curious. > > The reason people are asking is that wanting a manual on how to > search the Web is a bit like wanting a manual on how to walk.
He asked about Usenet, not the web.
Specifically, about the usenet groups comp.lang.python and
gmane.comp.python.general.
(I suspect he was called a troll because he was mixed up with
"Pycode" ("Mr. Gentooer" and "Pycode" may or may not be the same person,
the Elize-lika posting style is certainly similar, but in the absence of
evidence I will assume that they are not).)
Usenet used to be very popular in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Even
then you did get instructions on how to install and configure a Usenet
client and get access to a Usenet server, it wasn't assumed that you
would pick that up by osmosis. These days such information is probably
harder to come by (especially since Usenet seems to have splintered into
a text-only discussion Usenet and a file-sharing Usenet, so simply
asking your favourite search engine might get you lots of information
about the wrong Usenet).
For general Usenet access I would recommend using a client like
Thunderbird or Pan (unless you like text-only interfaces like slrn
(which I use)) and getting an account with a reputable free provider
like albasani.net. Don't use google groups, don't use aeiou.
That said, I wouldn't recommend comp.lang.python in particular. Not only
is it infested with spammers (those can be dealt with a few killfile
rules), but the gateway to the mailing-list is broken: It rewrites
message-ids which makes it very hard to follow threads. And of course
most of the messages come from the mailinglist, so you get all the
diversity that implies. In short, you get the disadvantages of a
newsgroup, but not the advantages. (At least that was the situation when
I gave up on comp.lang.python and subscribed the mailinglist instead.)
Gmane isn't part of usenet proper. It's more like a mailinglist to nntp
gateway. I'm not sure how functional it currently is. It has been down
and up again over the last few years. The website is currently down,
which doesn't bode well.
hp
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| | | h...@hjp.at | -- Charles Stross, "Creative writing
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