.TH noffle.conf 5
.\" $Id: noffle.conf.5 155 2000-06-24 20:28:01Z bears $

.SH NAME
noffle.conf \- Configuration file for NOFFLE news server

.SH DESCRIPTION

The
.B NOFFLE
news server - see
.BR noffle (1)
- takes its configuration from a configuration file.
By default this file is \fI/etc/noffle.conf\fP.

.PP
.B noffle.conf
is a normal text file containing
.B NOFFLE
settings, one per line.

.PP
Leading whitespace on a line is ignored, as is any comment
text. Comment text begins with a '#' character and continues to the
end of the line. Blank lines are permitted.

.SH SETTINGS

.TP
.B server <hostname>[:<port>] [<user> <pass>]
Name of the remote server. If no port given, port 119 is used.
Username and password for servers that need authentication
(Original AUTHINFO). The password may not contain white-spaces.
If there are multiple server entries in the config file, all of them are
used for getting groups. In this case the first server should be
the one of your main provider. Note that you must always
run 'noffle --query groups'
after making changes to the server entries.

.TP
.B getgroups <group pattern> [, <group pattern> ...]
Only retrieve from the most recently specified server newsgroups that match
the specified patterns. The patterns can contain \fIwildcards\fP, and
there can be multiple
.B getgroups
lines. For further details on
.B getgroups
processing in tandem with \fBomitgroups\fP, see the section on
.B omitgroups
following.
.br
Default: All groups

.TP
.B omitgroups <group pattern> [, <group pattern> ...]
Don't retrieve from the most recently specified server newsgroups that match
the specified patterns. The patterns can contain \fIwildcards\fP, and
there can be multiple
.B omitgroups
lines. When processing a new newsgroup name, it is checked first to see
if it appears on the
.B getgroups
list (if any). If not, the group is rejected.
Then the group is checked to see if it appears on the
.B omitgroups
list. If it does not, the group is accepted as a group
.B NOFFLE
will list and collect as required.
.br
Default: No groups

.TP
.B max-fetch <n>
Never get more than <n> articles. If there are more, the oldest ones
are discarded.
.br
Default: 300

.TP
.B mail-to <address>
Receiver of failed postings. If empty then failed postings are returned
to the sender (taking the address from the article's Sender, X-Sender or
From field, in this order).
.br
Default: <empty string>

.TP
.B auto-unsubscribe yes|no
Automatically remove groups from fetch list if they have not been
accessed for a number days.
.br
Default: no

.TP
.B auto-unsubscribe-days <n>
Number of days used for auto-unsubscribe option.
.br
Default: 30

.TP
.B thread-follow-time <n>
Automatically mark articles for download in thread mode, if they
are referencing an article that has been opened by a reader within the last
<n> days.
.br
Default: 7

.TP
.B connect-timeout <n>
Timeout for connecting to remote server in seconds.
.br
Default: 30

.TP
.B auto-subscribe yes|no
Automatically put groups on fetch list if someone reads them.
<mode> can be full, over, thread (depending on the fetch mode) or
off (do not subscribe automatically). Condition for putting a group
on the list is that an article is opened. For this reason there is
always a pseudo article visible in groups that are not on the fetch list.
.br
Default: no

.TP
.B auto-subscribe-mode <group pattern> full|thread|over
Mode for auto-subscribe option for groups that match the given
pattern. 
.br
Default: none

.TP
.B default-auto-subscribe-mode full|thread|over
Default mode for auto-subscribe option. Used for all groups that do
not match a pattern specified with
.B auto-subscribe-mode
entries (if any).
.br
Default: over

.TP
.B info-always-unread yes|no
An information article is presented for all unsubscribed
newsgroups. If auto-subscribe mode is off, there is a possibility of
someone reading the article but forgetting the instructions therein
and not knowing how to return to a read article. This option causes
the information article always to be present as an unread article in a
group when auto-subscribe if off. It does this by incrementing the
article number of the information article every time it is read.
.br
Default: yes

.TP
.B post-locally yes|no
Place articles posted to external servers in the local aticle database
immediately. Some servers may rewrite Message-IDs, which will cause
duplicate postings of this option is enabled. Also, if for some reason
the post to the remote server fails, the article still exist in the local
database, which may be a source of some confusion.
.br
Default: no

.TP
.B replace-messageid yes|no
Replace Message-ID of posted articles by a Message-ID generated by
NOFFLE. Some news readers generate Message-IDs that are not accepted by
some servers. For generating Message-IDs, the domain name of your system should
be a valid domain name. If you are in a local domain, set it to your
provider's domain name.
.br
Default: yes

.TP
.B path-header <path header content>
Articles posted without a Path: header have one added by NOFFLE.
When
.B path-header
has its default value (empty) the header content
is "<hostname>!not-for-mail".
Use the
.B default-path
setting to provide alternate content for the Path: header.
This will very rarely be necessary.
.br
Default: <empty string>

.TP
.B default-expire <n>
The default expiry period, in days. An expiry period of 0 means "never".
.br
Default: 14

.TP
.B expire <group pattern> <n>
The expiry period for a newsgroup or set of newsgroups, in days. The
expiry pattern can contain \fIwildcards\fP, and there can be multiple
.B expire
lines. When checking the expiry period for a group, the expiry
patterns are checked in the order in which they appear in
.I /etc/noffle.conf
until the first match occurs. If no pattern matches the group name, the
.B default expiry period
is used. An expiry period of 0 means "never".
.br
Default: no

.SH "GROUP NAME WILDCARDS"

.B NOFFLE
uses a wildcard format that closely matches filename-style wildcards.
\fIalt.binaries.*\fP, for example, matches all newsgroups under the
.I alt.binaries
hierarchy. A full description of the fomat (known as
.B wildmat
patterns) is as follows.

.TP
.BI \e x
Turns off the special meaning of
.I x
and matches it directly; this is used mostly before a question mark or
asterisk, and is not special inside square brackets.
.TP
.B ?
Matches any single character.
.TP
.B *
Matches any sequence of zero or more characters.
.TP
.BI [ x...y ]
Matches any single character specified by the set
.IR x...y .
A minus sign may be used to indicate a range of characters.
That is,
.I [0\-5abc]
is a shorthand for
.IR [012345abc] .
More than one range may appear inside a character set;
.I [0-9a-zA-Z._]
matches almost all of the legal characters for a host name.
The close bracket,
.IR ] ,
may be used if it is the first character in the set.
The minus sign,
.IR \- ,
may be used if it is either the first or last character in the set.
.TP
.BI [^ x...y ]
This matches any character
.I not
in the set
.IR x...y ,
which is interpreted as described above.
For example,
.I [^]\-]
matches any character other than a close bracket or minus sign.


.SH SEE ALSO

.BR noffle (1)

.SH AUTHORS

Markus Enzenberger <markus.enzenberger@t-online.de>
.br
Volker Wysk <volker.wysk@student.uni-tuebingen.de>
.br
Jim Hague <jim.hague@acm.org>
.br
Uwe Hermann <uh1763@bingo-ev.de>

1998-2000.