how to: (use Usenet)
This guide will explain how to use Outlook Express 5 to access Usenet on a Windows computer. Usenet is divided into newsgroups with various subjects (ex. alt.dss.hack, rec.sports.childbeating, etc.). It is one of the "old-school" components of the Internet along with email and IRC and people are always talking about how Usenet is dying or already dead. However, there are tons of very active newsgroups around.
Installation and
configuration
The first thing you need is the client. If you use Win98SE or
higher you will have Internet Explorer 5 which comes with Outlook
Express as part of it. Most of this will work for Outlook Express 4
but I haven't use that crap in a couple years. Start Outlook Express
and go to Tool --> Accounts. Click the Add button, then News.
Display name: is the name that'll be attached to any messages you
post on newsgroups. Click Next to get to your E-mail
address. You can put a fake one in here but it is considered bad
etiquette. Plus if you have a question and someone emails you instead of
posting a reply in the newsgroup, you don't get your stupid answer.
Just use that crappy Hotmail
account you send all your junk mail to. Click Next to go to the News
(NNTP) server: field and put in the value provided by your ISP (check
their website if you don't have it written down). @home users can
just put in news as the server. Click Next and then Finish.
After you close the Accounts dialog box, you'll be asked if you
want to download a list of available newsgroups. Just says Yes
and wait while it downloads the names of the 30000+ newsgroups.
Most of the groups are dead/stupid/crap. If you're looking for *cool*
stuff start with the alt.binaries hierarchy. TV aficionados
will want to check out alt.dss.hack. Once you've found the name of
a group you like, click the Subscribe button. After you've
scanned/subscribed the groups, close the dialog box.
Connecting to
newsgroups
The list of groups you subscribed
to will be listed in the Folders pane of Outlook Express below
your email account(s).
When you click on the newsgroup name, all the available headers
(subjects) of the posted messages will be downloaded. Note that the actual
messages are not downloaded until you click on the header (subject).
This is to save time by not downloading crap you have no interest in. If
you read a message and want to send a reply just right click the header
and pick Reply to Group. To post a new message click the New
Message icon on the toolbar 
. There is an etiquette to be
followed in newsgroups. Basically do not post a question without checking
to see if it has already been asked or answered. This will piss people off
and the majority of responses you'll get to your question will be flames.
To search the headers of the group you are currently in, go to Edit
--> Find --> Message in this Folder. To search an archive of Usenet go to Google's
Group search (formerly Deja). Keep the search values to
a minimum of words and you'll almost always find the answer. When people
ask me questions I don't know the answer to, this is the first
place I go. The next section explains how to get attachments.
Attachments (ie cool
stuff)
Attachments in Usenet are
the same as attachments in email. People can send pictures, sounds,
other files, etc. You'll usually see multiple messages with the same header
with something like (1/1) or (25/43) as the only difference. If there is
just one part to the message (as denoted by 1/1) you can just click the
message to download the attachment. If there are multiple parts to the
message the easiest way to get the file(s) is by sorting the messages by Subject.
To do this, click "Subject" in the toolbar of the header
window.
Once the messages are sorted alphabetically you can select all the
parts (ie files) of a message by clicking once on the first part,
then hold down the SHIFT key and click once on the last part
of the message. This will tag the first and last message and anything in
between. *Note: You have to download ALL the parts in order
to get the file. Sometimes parts will be missing so you may have to wait
until your news server (maybe) catches up or try to find them somewhere else*.
Once all the parts are highlighted, right-click once on the
last message and choose Combine and Decode. When the parts have
finished downloading a new window will open up with the filenames of the
crap you just downloaded. Right-click once in a blank part of the window
where the filenames are listed and pick Save All to save the crap
to a folder on your hard drive.
Why your download won't open
Sometimes you might end up downloading corrupt files or you may be missing some. There are 2 common checking or repairing tools. A .SFV
file that sometimes accompanies the attachments can be used to check for corruption. You need an external program like QuickSFV
to process these files. If QuickSFV
tells you that there are missing files or have corrupt files you'll need to make sure that all the parts of the message you downloaded were
available on your news server (see *Note* a few sentences back). A better way of checking and repairing corrupt or missing files is with PAR files (i.e. .PAR,
.P01, .P02, etc). These files can be used to recover missing files from a post. For example, if someone has split a large binary post into 10 sections
and only 8 came through complete to your news server, you could download any 2 PAR files (assuming the poster has provided them) to recreate the
parts you are missing. All you would have to do is get any 2 complete PAR files (i.e. filename.P01 and filename.P07) along
with the main index file (the one ending in .PAR). Then you would use a program like FSRaid (just associate it with .PAR's during it's install) by double clicking the .PAR
and it would check the integrity of the files (like SFV's) and repair or re-create any missing volumes by using the PAR's. No need to waste
time waiting for or requesting a repost. After you've saved the files and, optionally verified them, you
will sometimes need to use WinZip
or WinRAR
or WinAce
to extract the files. Zip files end in a .zip extension. RAR
files usually end in .RAR, or .001. Ace files have a .ACE
or .C01 extension.
There's a lot of useful information in Usenet (along with even more crap). Just don't post unnecessary (redundant) messages and everything will be OK.