ietf-nntp Section 11.5 - NEWNEWS

Charles Lindsey chl at clw.cs.man.ac.uk
Mon Nov 20 06:21:35 PST 2000


In <87lmuifn3e.fsf at erlenstar.demon.co.uk> Andrew Gierth <andrew at erlenstar.demon.co.uk> writes:

>it shouldn't - a sensible client uses DATE to get the server (GMT)
>time, then passes to NEWNEWS the _server's_ time that it recorded the
>last time it did NEWNEWS, possibly even subtracting a fudge factor.

Good thinking. I have just hacked my implementation of nntpxfer to do it
that way.

>However, it is desirable for the server's clock to be accurate enough
>for the other approach to work too.

It is unreasonable to expect servers around the world to be accurate to
better than a few seconds (and it isn't going to happen just because we
say so). With the correct use of DATE, it doesn't matter. In other cases,
people ought to put a fudge factor in. A NOTE to this effect would be
useful.

>But all bets are off if you don't specify the GMT flag to NEWNEWS (or
>NEWGROUPS) - these days, it's dangerous to assume that the server is
>in the same timezone, because it often isn't. (for example, the UK
>provider madasafish.com use corp.supernews.com as their news server,
>which is in the US Pacific timezone.)

Agreed, that should go in the NOTE too.

-- 
Charles H. Lindsey ---------At Home, doing my own thing------------------------
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