changelog

This file will acquaint you with the user-visible changes in trn 4.x.

If you're upgrading from trn 2.x see the discussion of the -a option,
the 't' command (newsgroup selection level), and the 'T' command
(article level & in kill files) for slight incompatibilities between
trn 2.5 and later versions of trn.

Changes from trn 3.6 to trn 4.0:

   o	Added a newsgroup selector to make choosing news groups easier
	(use the ++ option to turn it off).
   o	In the selector '\' now is used to execute a command, so if
	you had 'c' in your SELECTCHARS, you could still catch-up a
	group via \c.  It also lets you enter the normal newsgroup
	commands from the newsgroup selector, such as unsubscribe
	(\u) and goto group (\g).  If the command letter is both a
	selector command and a newsgroup command, use '\\' to get
	the newsgroup command (such as \\O or \\h).  Use ':' to apply
	a (limited set) of commands to more than one group, such as
	":u" (unsubscribe) or ":c" (catchup).
   o	Use "\v" from any selector to see the current trn version.
   o	Use the backtick (`) command to switch back and forth between
	the newsgroup selector and the rn-style newsgroup browser.
	You can also type backtick from inside a newsgroup to exit
	back to the newsgroup selection level.
   o	Use the '=' command in the newsgroup selector to refresh the
	article counts (possibly refetching the active file).
   o	Use the Ctrl-G command in the selector to go to a letter
	without affecting it (e.g. "Ctrl-G b" would go to letter 'b').
   o	Added an addgroup selector to ease the arrival of new groups.
   o	Strn's article scan/scoring is now present in trn.
   o	** Describe the universal selector once it settles down **
   o	Enabled trn to use both nntp and local news sources, either
	separately or at the same time.  Create a .trn/access file to
	customize this (start with a copy of <trnlib>/access.def).
   o	Changed the format of trn's option files.  Trn will create a
	.trn/trnrc file for you using your old trn options as soon as
	you edit and save them using the on-line option editor.  Once
	this happens, the old TRNINIT variable is ignored.
   o	When you specify a news source in the active file, you can
	tell trn to keep a local copy of the server's active and
	newsgroups files, and either re-grab them at regular intervals
	(however often you like), update them with new information
	we glean while running, or leave them alone (which is useful
	for an NFS mounted active file).
   o	Added a newsrc selector to choose among the news sources and
	newsrc options in your .trn/access file.
   o	Alternately, use Ctrl-N and Ctrl-P in the newsgroup selector
	or newsgroup browser to change from news source to news source.
   o	Added an on-line option editor (type '&' <RETURN>).  Use the
	search command (/erase) to find the option you're looking for.
   o	Much improved xterm mouse handling now lets you define a
	"mouse bar" of buttons to press, as well as allowing you to
	click on the tree nodes in the article tree display.  Use
	the option selector to turn it on and customize it.  See
	the <trnlib>/INIT file for an example of how to make the
	mouse code conditional on your terminal type.  You can
	even double-click in the selector to start reading and
	select a range with click-drag-release.
   o	Enhanced the mime code so that trn now knows how to handle
	basic mime types, and farm out the ones it doesn't understand.
	!!Not finished yet!!
   o	Use the 'a' (attachments) command to view an article's
	attachments, including a uuencoded picture in a picture
	group.  Even works with multi-part pieces if you use 'a'
	on all the parts (in any order).  Use ":a" to view a
	group of selected articles (handy from the selector).  Of
	course, "::a" affects all unselected articles.
   o	The header hiding code now hides more headers by default,
	and can un-hide any header (prior trns could only hide
	known header names plus all unknown headers in a group).
   o	You can now specify a custom IP port for an NNTP connection
	in your .trn/access file or the NNTPSERVER variable.
   o	A bargraph (for percent done) pops up on slow tasks (such
	as fetching the active file over a slow link).
   o	Changed the default "auto arrows" (-A) to be more web-
	browser-like in the selectors.  Set option "Auto Arrow
	Macros" to "old-style" if you like the old style better.
   o	A client ("mini") inews is now included with trn that is
	compatible with other news readers and a bit more functional.
   o	Macro writers: each selector has a different mode letter (see
	the %m discussion in the man page for a list), but there's
	now an easy way to write a macro that affects all selectors
	test the "general mode": %g=s.  See the man page for the other
	general modes.
   o	Fixed the type-ahead eating to never eat just part of a macro
	sequence (such as a keypad key or a mouse click).
   o	Trn now use X-Newsgroups instead of Newsgroups in mailed replies.
	It also uses X-Also-Posted-To when Cc'ing people while posting.
   o	In-Reply-To lines are now used for threading as well as
	References lines, which makes reading gatewayed mailing lists a
	lot easier.

Changes from trn 3.5 to trn 3.6:

   o	Added support for slow network connections by: (1) making use
	of the LIST ACTIVE <group.name> extension (if available),
	(2) beginning to display the received article as it is received
	from nntp, and (3) making the Pnews (posting) script query the
	group info more efficiently.
   o	Changed nntplist's command-line syntax slightly so that it is
	more orthoganal and so that it can pass an argument to LIST
	ACTIVE or LIST NEWSGROUPS.  ** If you use nntplist in your own
	scripts you'll need to switch them over to using the -o (output)
	option. **
   o	Added :p command to post from the selector.
   o	Added the Ctrl-E command to display the end of the current article.
   o	Enhanced the ':' command to operate on non-selected thread/articles
	(use ::cmd) or to operate on just the current thread (use :.cmd or
	::.cmd).
   o	Added a 't' modifier for the search command to start the search
	at the top of the group.  E.g.:  /subject string/t:+
	The default for searches in the selector has always been the top
	of the group, so this only affects the command while reading
	articles.
   o	Improved the catchup command to allow you to specify an article
	count to leave unread in the group.
   o	Added a new sort order for the article selector -- by 'n'umber.
   o	Enhanced the %( arg = regex ? : ) syntax to allow a % expansion
	in the regex portion of the comparison.
   o	Enhanced xref code to not go sub-optimal on C news's single-group
	xref lines.
   o	Added support for generic authentification (available in the
	reference NNTP 1.5.12 and INN 1.5).
   o	Fixed an elusive crash bug that would not let some people run
	trn from cron.
   o	Other misc. bug fixes.

Changes from trn 3.4.1 to trn 3.5:

   o	Enhanced the -p option to allow you to select how you'd like
	your postings to be selected.  The default (which works the same
	as before) is -p (select your posting and its replies).  Also
	available is -p+ (select all postings in the thread) and -pp
	(select the *parent* article and its replies).
   o	Added the forward (^F) command to forward an article via mail.
   o	Improved the tab command (skip cited text) to skip empty lines
	and choose the quotation character more intelligently.
   o	You can now junk an article in just the current group via
	a search command using 'x'.  E.g.  /subject/:x
   o	Included some code from Olaf Titz <uknf@rz.uni-karlsruhe.de>
	that allows you to tell trn to transform high-bit characters
	into their 7-bit ascii equivilents.  See the _C command and
	the -Q option.
   o	Added the back-scroll command: 'B'.
   o	Added the -J<n> option to allow you to join truncated subjects
	into a common thread.  The default for -J is 30 chars, not counting
	the Re: portion.  I have the lines "&-J27" and "X&+J" in my Babylon
	5 kill file to join all the Genie posts that get truncated into the
	proper thread.
   o	Added the -K option to keep a group static (no new articles) while
	you read it.  Useful for people who have a really slow kill file
	for a group -- use "&-K" and "X&+K" in such a kill file to make
	only that group stop growing until you exit the group and re-enter.
   o	Added optional mouse support in an xterm window.
   o	Added a new intrp (%q) to get the value of the last quoted input
	(%").  Useful for using elm for forwarding articles as it needs
	the answer to the question "To?" on the command line:
		-EFORWARDPOSTER="elm -i %h -s '%'[subject]' %q"
	(though you may wish to redefine the FORWARDHEADER variable too).
   o	Fixed bugs in the handling of thread kills in partially-threaded
	groups (Tj now works even if the -a option wasn't specified) and
	and in the handling of the subject-kill command (Aj).
   o	New files, HINTS.TRN is like HINTS but in a better format.
	(I renamed it to avoid conflicts with the directory "hints").
   o	Portability enhancements to Configure and the support scripts.
   o	Some fairly major and minor bugs fixed.

Changes from trn 3.3 to trn 3.4.1:

   o	Made the kill-file handling more consistent in how it
	deals with the THRU line.  It now only ignores the THRU
	line for all selection commands.  You can turn off this
	exception (and thus make all commands obey the THRU line)
	by turning off the -k option (using +k).  You can also
	specify the 'I' modifier or the 'N' modifier to killfile
	searches to have them either ignore or not-ignore the
	THRU line, respectively.
   o	Changed the %'s interp to not supply the leading and
	trailing single quotes to make it more useful.
   o	The NNTP trn attempts to reconnect to the news server
	after it times out.  If it is successful, trn continues.
   o	The command /subj/M no longer assumes you meant /subj/r:M.
   o	Automatically-generated killfile commands (e.g. the 'K'
	command) now escape a '/' that occurs in the subject string.
   o	The _+ command (select whole thread) now starts reading
	the thread from the first unread article.
   o	The -p self-matching code was improved to match a user's
	name more exactly so that people with short login names
	don't get improper matches.
   o	Pnews was enhanced to deal with Followup-To: poster better
	when you choose to post anyway -- it now puts the user's
	address into the Cc: header and automatically corrects the
	Newsgroups: line.
   o	Pnews returns to the prompt after an inews error instead of
	aborting.  You can still choose to 'a'bort, if you like.
   o	Speller now passes the ispell_options from Configure to
	spell, and Configure has been enhanced to prompt you for
	the options if either ispell or (new!) vspell can't be
	found.
   o	Added the file Policy.sh.SH that puts your policy choices
	from the config.sh file into hints/Policy.sh.  This allows
	you to use the Policy.sh file to prime the Configure choices
	on multiple machines or in the mthreads package without
	machine-specific selections getting in the way.
   o	Upgraded Configure to the latest metaconfig release.
   o	Fixed some MIME bugs and made the handling a little smarter.
   o	Nested comment warnings removed from various include files.
   o	Fixed several crash bugs and several nusiance bugs, including:
	   *	the problem with the NNTP trn mangling the date of
		new news groups (which caused either groups to get missed
		or groups to be re-offered).
	   *	the problem with the NNTP trn that caused it to think
		certain lines that begin with a '.' are the end of the
		list marker and quit when it got confused.
	   *	and lots more...

Changes from trn 3.2 to trn 3.3:

   o	Newsetup now looks for NEWSLIB/subscriptions for a default list
	of groups to subscribe the user to.  If the file doesn't exist
	the NNTP version will attempt to grab it via the LIST SUBSCRIPTIONS
	command (available in INN and some nntp patches).
	[HINT:  if you want your subscription file to default to all
	groups in the active file, link your subscription file to your
	active file -- trn will strip the info past the first space
	when it processes the .newsrc.]
   o	The file newsnews will now default to a simple version update
	message instead of a welcome-to trn message (which is now provided
	by the newsetup file when creating a new .newsrc for a user).
	I still encourage you to install your own custom newsnews
	when trn is updated (and trn still doesn't install newsnews
	automatically -- you have to make this decision for your self).
   o	Redirected and disabled groups (marked by '=' or 'x' in the active
	file) are now handled better, allowing you to read any remaining
	articles after a group gets redirected or disabled and warning you
	to either start using the new group name or that the group will
	not be receiving any new news.
   o	Mime support is now prompted for in Configure and your system's
	display/store commands are remembered.  We also handle a continued
	Content-Type header correctly now.
   o	The tick (') interp modifier will generate a tick-quoted string
	with all ticks inside the string quoted.  For example, %'s might
	generate (INCLUDING the "'"s)  'Ticks aren\'t a problem.'
   o	If the environment variable FAST_PNEWS == y Pnews skips the "Are
	you sure?" question and the "include file" prompt.  You can put
	-EFAST_PNEWS=y in the global INIT file, if you so desire.
   o	Various bug fixes.

Changes from trn 3.1 to trn 3.2:

   o	Configure and the include file structure has been improved to
	install easier on more systems.
   o	Fixed some non-portable test statements in Pnews.
   o	Added the -Z option to allow you to turn on/off support for the
	two different database formats (-Zt, -Zo, -Zot, or +Z).
   o	Configure now allows you set the default database support to
	thread files, overview files, both or none.
   o	Trn and its support scripts handle ~/dirs in the newslib or
	rnlib better.
   o	Various bug fixes.

Changes from trn 3.0 to trn 3.1:

   o	Added a new header-searching syntax:  /string/Hheader:cmd.
	This allows you to match a string on any header that trn
	knows about and is faster on the NNTP side than full-header
	matching.  Example:  /: .../Hlines:j  would junk all postings
	longer than 99 lines.
   o	Two new commands can be put into a group's kill file: *j
	(kill all articles from THRU to the end of the group) and *X
	(kill all unselected articles from THRU to the end of the group).
   o	Pnews (using artcheck) now checks the active file as well as
	the newsgroups file for each group on the Newsgroups line.  This
	lets you know whenever you specify a group that doesn't exist.
	Also, the NNTP version has been fixed to provide full checking.
   o	Pnews/Rnmail have been modified to allow you to type either upper
	or lower case for the response letters, and use "sp*ell" in addition
	to "c*heck" for the spelling checker ("s*end" is unchanged).
   o	Pnews/Rnmail each have a pre-edit signature appending option.
	If you use the file DOTDIR/.news_sig INSTEAD of .signature Pnews
	will append your signature before you edit the file.  Rnmail uses
	the file DOTDIR/.mail_sig.  Note also that the names may be
	customized with the environment variables NEWSSIGNATURE and
	MAILSIGNATURE, if desired (allowing a per-group signature).
   o	Added the modifiers '>' and ')' to interpreted strings.  For
	example:  %>f gives you the address only on the From line,
	while %)f gives you the real name portion.
   o	Added the 'O' command (newsgroup level) that works just like 'o'
	except that it does not visit empty groups.
   o	The killfile is fully saved before manual editing with Ctrl-K
	(message-id commands used to be saved only on exit from the group).
   o	The screen is now refreshed when the window size changes.
   o	Trn now makes use of stdlib.h, unistd.h (if available) and does a
	more intelligent inclusion of time.h & sys/time.h (as needed).
   o	Trn doesn't loop through the current thread if unread articles
	still exist in it.  Also fixed various problems with '>' & 'P'.
   o	The 'D' command in the selector no longer jumps back to the top.
   o	The NNTP version has a different new-article aquisition strategy.
	Your nntp server must send up-to-date information in response to
	the GROUP command (INN's nnrpd does) for a group to expand while
	you're in it.  Also, you can now set the minimum time for trn to
	wait (see -z) before it refetches the active file at the end of
	the newsgroups.  The default is 5 minutes.
   o	Optional metamail support pauses between the headers and the
	metamail-interpreted article.  Also, the 'v' command displays the
	raw article without metamail processing.
   o	Numerous portability changes and bug fixes.

Changes from trn 2.5 to trn 3.0:

   o	Trn is now capable of reading more news database formats.  It
	currently supports news overview (.overview files), mthreads
	(.thread files), and direct threading of the articles.  The
	NNTP version supports the XTHREAD and XOVER NNTP extensions.
	If you compile trn with support for both formats it will figure
	out which groups (or which server) has which type of data and
	act accordingly.
   o	Mthreads is now a separate package from trn since not everyone
	will need to use it.  Look for it in the same place you found
	trn.
   o	Trn attempts to build some useful default macros for your
	terminal's arrow keys.  On the article level they move around
	in the thread; in the selector they change pages (left/right)
	and switch selections (up/down); on the newsgroup level they
	move by group (up/down) and enter a group (right).  If you
	don't like this, turn it off with the +A option.
   o	There's a new search scope -- the from line.  For example:
	use /author/f+ to search for and select 'author's articles.
   o	The thread selector has been extended to be a subject and
	article selector.  Use the 'S'et selector command to change
	modes or use '=' to toggle between the article selector and
	the subject/thread selector (whichever was last in use).
   o	The selector can now be sorted in a variety of ways:  by date,
	subject, author, article count (in the subject/thread selector),
	or a combination of subject and date (in the article selector).
	The default is date order of the oldest unread article in a thread.
	Use the 'O'rder command to pick a new one or use 'R' to reverse
	the sort.  See also the "-O<mode><order>" option to set your
	favorite mode and order.  You can even put a "&-Oas" command (for
	example) into a group's kill file to set a per-group default.
   o	The selector allows you to exclude all the non-selected articles
	from the display (i.e. narrow it) -- use 'E' to toggle this mode.
   o	The selector has two new selection commands:  '*' is used to select
	(or deselect) the current item and all other items with the same
	subject (useful in the article selector); '#' is used to make an
	overriding selection that immediately reads the current item
	ignoring all other selections.
   o	You can now type 'M' in the selector to mark the current item's
	articles as read-but-returning and press 'Y' to yank back and
	select these articles before exiting the group.
   o	Selections via searches are article-oriented (/subj/+) or
	thread-/subject-oriented (/subj/++).  The article selector's
	default command is "+", while the thread/subject selector's is
	"++".  In other words doing a "/subj" search with no specified
	command selects whatever type of object you're looking at in the
	selector.
   o	If you specify the "-p" option, your postings and any replies to
	them are auto-selected whenever trn encounters them.
   o	The '+' command in a non-threaded group visits the subject selector.
	You can also use "_a", "_s", "_t" or "_T" to force the article,
	subject, thread, or thread-but-I'll-settle-for-subject selector.
   o	The selector displays subjects/threads that are partially-selected
	with a '*'.  Fully-selected items are marked with a '+', as before.
	Use the article selector (possibly with 'E'xclusive set) to see
	which articles are selected in a partially-selected group (or just
	read them).
   o	The selector remembers which subjects you selected (and didn't kill)
	and marks any newly-arriving articles in these subjects as selected
	until you exit the group.
   o	The medium display mode of the thread selector has been improved
	to make it more readable.
   o	The selector will leave out the middle portion of a subject that is
	too long to display the last two words of the subject.  If you don't
	like this, use the -u option to leave them unbroken.
   o	'T'hread KILL commands now use message-ids to either junk
	or select articles.  The 'T' command has been extended to be
	more flexible on the article level and has been added to the
	selector.
   o	Another new command 'A'dds selection or kill commands to the KILL
	file, and works from both the article level and the selector.
   o	The tree display has been updated to display unread-but-not-
	selected articles as <x>.  Other unread articles are still [x],
	while read articles still display as (x).
   o	Trn can enter a group without thread information available and
	thread it in the background while you read.  Articles that have
	references that may or may not exist show up as "(?)".  If you
	visit an article like this and wait there, the screen will update
	when we know for sure one way or the other (after processing more
	of the group).
   o	The -a option is used to tell trn to thread all of the
	articles on entry to the group.  If you don't specify this
	option a group may have a few (or many) articles that get
	threaded in the background and won't show up on the tree
	display until trn processes them.
   o	Pressing "_+" on the article level will select the entire thread
	associated with the current article -- useful if you've selected
	individual articles and wish to read the rest of the discussion.
	Use "_-" to deselect the current thread.
   o	The commands _N and _P move to the next and previous article
	in numberical (arrival) order (article level).  Thus, you can
	use the command "._P" on the newsgroup level to start reading
	a group from the very last article to arrive.
   o	The 't' command on the newsgroup level now turns OFF reading a
	group with threads (this setting is stored in the .newsrc file,
	so it is remembered from session to session).  Trn 2.x used this
	to force threading to be turned ON, but it wasn't usually needed
	for normal operation.  To temporarily turn threads on once inside
	a non-threaded group, use the 't' or "_t" commands (article level)
	or the "St" command (selector).
   o	Trn now checks for the environment variable TRNMACRO on startup
	(which defaults to DOTDIR/.trnmac) before checking for the usual
	RNMACRO (DOTDIR/.rnmac) file.  If you're running trn in its rn-
	compatible mode, only RNMACRO is tried.
   o	The threaded and non-threaded data in a group has been unified,
	resulting in more cached information on the non-threaded side
	(such as the from line) and more efficient handling of missing
	articles, just to name two benefits.
   o	The newsgroup information is freed when we enter a new group,
	not when we exit the current group.  This means that if you
	quit out of a group (even accidentally), you can go back in
	and everything is still there except the selections, which
	get cleared on group exit.
   o	KILL file processing will now ignore the THRU line as much as
	possible without slowing down the handling of KILL files.
	If you have really slow searches (header or article searches)
	or you use trn without a database it will use the THRU line
	to only search an article one time (as it would in rn).  This
	means that if you have subject-oriented selection commands you
	don't have to worry about missing articles if you don't read all
	of them the first time you enter a group after they arrive.  This
	also means that you won't have to edit your local kill file to
	remove the THRU line to force a re-scan -- this is now unnecessary.
   o	Header parsing is now done in-memory, making threading and
	caching of articles much faster.  This especially helps out
	NNTP users because trn used to write a tmp file for every
	header parse.
   o	Several new mode letters (accessed by %m in macros) were added.
	The most significant are 'f' for the end (Finis) of the newsgroup
	selection level (instead of 'n') and 'e' for the end of the article
	reading level (instead of 'a').
   o	A new % modifier has been introduced: "%:FMTx".  This allows you
	to apply a printf-style column format to a regular %x expansion.
	For example, %:-50.50s would left-justify the subject into 50
	characters, exactly.
   o	The -f option will make trn go a little faster by getting rid of the
	delay/prompt after kill file processing, printing the "skipping
	article" message, and printing the "Depositing KILL command" message.
	This is the default if -t (terse) is specified, but can be overriden
	by specifying +f after the -t option.
   o	A new option for the gadget-conscious (-B) displays a spinner when
	trn is processing articles in the background.
   o	Added the -G option to make the newsgroup 'g'o command look for
	near matches (for those typing mistakes).
   o	New newsgroups that are left unsubscribed are not appended to the
	.newsrc unless you use the -I option or you're running an NNTP
	version that does not use the NEWGROUPS code.
   o	Support for metamail's mime handling is now built into the code --
	see the METAMAIL define in common.h.
   o	Pnews does more checking of your article before posting, has a
	spelling-check option, and allows the Cc: header to be used to
	send mail while posting the article.

Changes from trn 1.0.3 to trn 2.5:

   o	Added the '(' and ')' commands (article level) to move to an
	article's previous/next sibling, including "cousin" siblings.
   o	The 'A'bandon command (newsgroup level) forgets all changes to the
	current newsgroup since you first started trn.
   o	The thread selector now allows you type type 'c'/'y' to catchup
	the group without chasing cross-references.
   o	Added 'z' and 'Z' commands (article level) supersede the current
	article ('Z' also including the original text).
   o	The g command (newsgroup level) will go to a newsgroup by number
	where the the number corresponds to that shown in the 'L'ist
	command.
   o	Added the "-o" option to use the old method of junking articles in
	the thread commands (they didn't chase cross-references in trn 1.x)
   o	Added the "-b" option to read articles in a breadth-first descent
	of the article tree.  You can specify this command at runtime to
	switch from breadth-first (type "&-b") to depth-first ("&+b).
   o	Added the "-j" option to tell trn to pass control characters through
	the pager unharmed.