NAME
trn - threaded read news program
SYNOPSIS
trn [options] [newsgroups]
DESCRIPTION
Trn is a threaded version of rn, which is a replacement for the
readnews(1) program. Being "threaded" means that the articles are
interconnected in reply order. Each discussion thread is a tree of
articles where all the reply (child) articles branch off from their
respective originating (parent) articles. A representation of this
tree (or a portion of it) is displayed in the article header as you are
reading news. This gives you a better feel for how all the articles
are related, and even lets you see at a glance when an article has
replies -- a good thing to check before posting. In addition, trn has
a thread selector that allows you to quickly browse through a list of
subjects and choose the ones you find interesting. This thread
selector sorts articles according to various criteria and can be
switched into various display modes that allows you to pick all the
subjects separately (threads can have multiple subjects) or even pick
individual articles. Any items you don’t select can be saved for
reading later or marked as read with a single keystroke.
If you are already familiar with trn you may just want to read the
WHATS NEW section. People upgrading from rn will probably want to pay
attention to the sections on The Selector, The Tree Display, and the
aforementioned WHATS NEW. If you’re impatient, just dive in and get
started. All the regular commands will be familiar to an rn or trn
user, and the on-line help will give you a quick run-down of what
commands are available (just type ’h’ from any prompt). I’d also
suggest using the command:
trn -x -X
to make sure some of the best features are turned on.
Starting Trn
If no newsgroups are specified, all the newsgroups which have unread
news will be presented to the user in the order in which they occur in
the .newsrc file. At the prompt for each group you can choose to read
it, skip it, move it, etc. If a list of newsgroups is provided on the
command line, trn will start up in "add" mode, using the list as a set
of patterns to add new newsgroups and restrict which newsgroups are
displayed (see also the discussion of the ’a’ command on the newsgroup-
selection level).
Trn operates on four levels: the newsgroup-selection level, the thread
selector, the article-reading level, and the paging level. Each level
has its own set of commands, and its own help menu. At the paging
level (the bottom level) trn behaves much like the more(1) program. At
the article-reading level articles are presented to you in the order of
their replies, with the subjects being ordered by the date of the
oldest unread article (though there are commands for changing the
default display order). In the thread selector you are presented with
the subjects and (usually) authors associated with each discussion
thread, and given a chance to choose which ones you wish to read now,
save for later, or manipulate in some way. At the newsgroup-selection
level (the top level), you may specify which newsgroup you want next,
or read them in the default order, which is the order that the
newsgroups occur in your .newsrc file. (You will therefore want to
rearrange your .newsrc file to put the most interesting newsgroups
first. This can be done with the ’m’ command on the Newsgroup
Selection level. WARNING: invoking readnews/vnews (the old user
interface) in any way (including as a news checker in your login
sequence!) will cause your .newsrc to be disarranged again.)
On any level, at ANY prompt, help is available by typing an ’h’. This
gives you a summary of available commands and what they do. Remember
this command, you’ll need it.
Typing space to any question means to do the normal thing. You will
know what that is because every prompt has a list of several plausible
commands enclosed in square brackets. The first command in the list is
the one which will be done if you type a space. (All input is done in
cbreak mode, so carriage returns should not be typed to terminate
anything except certain multi-character commands. Those commands will
be obvious in the discussion below because they take an argument.)
Upon startup, trn will do several things:
1. It will look for your .newsrc file, which is your list of
subscribed-to newsgroups. If trn doesn’t find a .newsrc, it will
create one. If it does find one, it will back it up under the name
".oldnewsrc".
2. It will input your .newsrc file, listing out the first several
newsgroups with unread news.
3. It will perform certain consistency checks on your .newsrc. If
your .newsrc is out of date in any of several ways, trn will warn
you and patch it up for you, but you may have to wait a little
longer for it to start up.
4. Trn will next check to see if any new newsgroups have been created,
and give you the opportunity to add them to your .newsrc.
5. Trn goes into the top prompt level -- the newsgroup-selection
level.
Newsgroup Selection Level
In this section the words "next" and "previous" refer to the ordering
of the newsgroups in your .newsrc file. On the newsgroup-selection
level, the prompt looks like this:
====== 17 unread articles in talk.blurfl -- read now? [ynq]
unless the group is set for unthreaded reading, in which case the first
six characters are "******". The following commands may be given at
this level:
+ Enter this newsgroup through the selector.
y Begin reading this newsgroup now.
SP Enter the newsgroup by executing the default command listed in
[]’s.
.command
Do this newsgroup now, but execute command before displaying
anything. The command will be interpreted as if typed on the
article selection level.
= Start this newsgroup, but list subjects before displaying
articles.
U Enter this newsgroup through the unkill-articles prompt.
t Toggle the newsgroup between threaded and unthreaded reading.
The default is threaded, and the current setting is stored in
your .newsrc.
n Go to the next newsgroup with unread news.
N Go to the next newsgroup.
p Go to the previous newsgroup with unread news. If there is
none, stay at the current newsgroup.
P Go to the previous newsgroup.
- Go to the previously displayed newsgroup (regardless of whether
it is before or after the current one in the list).
1 Go to the first newsgroup.
^ Go to the first newsgroup with unread news.
$ Go to the end of the newsgroups list.
g newsgroup
Go to newsgroup, which can be the group’s name or a zero-
relative number of the groups in your .newsrc (see the ’L’
command to list your .newsrc). If it isn’t currently
subscribed to, you will be asked if you want to subscribe.
/pattern
Scan forward for a newsgroup matching pattern. Patterns do
globbing like filenames, i.e., use * to match any sequence of
characters, and [] to specify a list of characters to match.
Use . to match a single character. Unlike normal filename
globbing, newsgroup-searching is not anchored to the front and
back of the filename, i.e. "/ski" will find rec.skiing. You
may use ^ or $ to anchor the front or back of the search:
"/^test$" will find newsgroup test and nothing else If you want
to include newsgroups with 0 unread articles, append /r. If
the newsgroup is not found between the current newsgroup and
the last newsgroup, the search will wrap around to the
beginning.
?pattern
Same as /, but search backwards.
u Unsubscribe from the current newsgroup.
l string
List newsgroups not subscribed to which contain the string
specified.
L Lists the current state of the .newsrc, along with status
information.
Status Meaning
<number> Count of unread articles in newsgroup.
READ No unread articles in newsgroup.
UNSUB Unsubscribed newsgroup.
BOGUS Bogus newsgroup.
JUNK Ignored line in .newsrc
(e.g. readnews "options" line).
(A bogus newsgroup is one that is not in the list of active
newsgroups in the active file, which on most systems is
/usr/lib/news/active unless you use NNTP.)
m {name}
Move the named newsgroup somewhere else in the .newsrc. If no
name is given, the current newsgroup is moved. There are a
number of ways to specify where you want the newsgroup -- type
h for help when it asks where you want to put it.
c Catch up -- mark all unread articles in this newsgroup as read.
A Abandon the changes made to the current newsgroup since trn was
started. Useful when you accidentally mark a group as read.
o {pattern}
O {pattern}
Only display those newsgroups whose name matches pattern.
Patterns are the same as for the ’/’ command. Multiple
patterns may be separated by spaces, just as on the command
line. The restriction will remain in effect either until there
are no articles left in the restricted set of newsgroups, or
another restriction command is given. Since pattern is
optional, ’o’ by itself will remove the restriction. Using ’O’
will omit empty groups from the cycle.
a pattern
Add unsubscribed newsgroups matching pattern. If any matching
newsgroups are found, you will be asked for each one whether
you would like to add it. If you want to add all the
newsgroups, you can type ’Y’ and they will be added the the end
of the .newsrc file. If you don’t want to subscribe, all the
remaining groups can be ignored by typing ’N’. After any new
newsgroups have been added, the ’a’ command also restricts the
current set of newsgroups just like the ’O’ command does.
& Print out the current status of command-line switches and any
newsgroup restrictions.
&switch {switch}
Set additional command-line switches.
&& Print out the current macro definitions.
&&keys commands
Define additional macros.
!command
Escape to a subshell. One exclamation mark (!) leaves you in
your own news directory. A double exclamation mark (!!) leaves
you in the spool directory for news, which is usually
/usr/spool/news unless you’re using NNTP to read news. The
environment variable SHELL will be used if defined. If command
is null, an interactive shell is started.
v Print the current version number and information on where to
send bug reports.
q Quit.
x Quit, restoring .newsrc to its state at startup of trn. The
.newsrc you would have had if you had exited with ’q’ will be
called .newnewsrc, in case you didn’t really want to type ’x’.
^K Edit the global list of memorized commands (in the global KILL
file) that you wish to be performed in every newsgroup as it is
started up (that is, when it is selected at the newsgroup-
selection level). This file contains commands (one per line)
such as /subject/:j or /author/f:+ to kill or select articles
based on the indicated search criteria. There is also a local
list of commands for each newsgroup that can contain
kill/selection commands tailored for each specific group.
Because of the overhead involved in searching for articles to
kill, it is better if possible to use a local list rather than
the global one. Local memorized commands are usually
maintained by using the ’A’ or ’T’ commands from the
article/pager level or in the selector. There is also a K
search modifier that appends any search command you desire to
add. It is also possible to manually edit the file with the
’^K’ command from anywhere inside a newsgroup. If either of
the environment variables VISUAL or EDITOR is set, the
specified editor will be invoked; otherwise a default editor is
invoked on the KILL file.
The Selector
Most people who don’t have all day to read news will want to enter a
newsgroup by way of the selector. This is accomplished by using the
’+’ command at the newsgroup-selection or article/pager levels. In
fact, this may be the default command for entering a newsgroup,
depending on how your version of trn was configured and your use of the
-X option.
The selector displays a list of articles by their subjects and
(usually) authors. The articles are grouped into threads by default
(which may list multiple subjects per selectable item if the subject
has changed during the discussion) and ordered by the date of their
oldest unread article. Thread or subject groups are also shown with a
count of the number of articles in each group. Each selectable item is
preceded by a letter or number that can be typed to toggle its
selection. Items that are selected are flagged with a ’+’ after their
letter. Groups that have only some of their articles selected are
flagged with a ’*’. You can change the selector’s mode (to pick each
subject separately or pick individual articles), order the list by a
variety of sort criteria, and switch the author display between its
long, medium and short styles using the commands detailed below.
The following commands are available in the selector:
a-z,0-9,A-Z
Select/deselect the indicated item by its letter or number.
There are quite a few letters omitted from the alpha characters
to be typed as commands -- see below. Also, the variable
SELECTCHARS is available to customize which characters you want
to be used as selection letters, overriding their command
function.
SP Perform the default command. This is usually > for most pages,
and Z on the last page (although D and X are also quite
popular).
CR Begin reading. If no articles are selected, the current item
is selected (unless you’ve marked it as killed).
Z,TAB Begin reading. If no articles are selected, read all unread
articles.
’.’ Toggle the current item’s selection (the one under the cursor).
* Same as ’.’ except that it affects all articles with the same
subject (useful in the article selector).
# Make an overriding selection that reads the current item only,
temporarily ignoring all other selections.
k, ’,’ Mark the current item as killed.
m, \ Unmark the current item.
- Set a range, as in a - k. Repeats the last marking action:
selection, deselection, killing, or unmarking.
@ Toggle all visible selections.
M Mark the current item’s article(s) to return on newsgroup exit
and kill the item.
Y Yank back and select the marked-to-return articles, clearing
their to-return status.
E Exclude all unselected items from the selection list (narrow
the display). Press it again to pick from all available items.
n, ] Move down to the next item (try the down-arrow keypad key
also).
p, [ Move up to the previous item (try the up-arrow keypad key
also).
< Go to previous page (try the left-arrow keypad key also).
> Go to next page (try the right-arrow keypad key also).
^ Go to the first page.
$ Go to the last page.
S Set the items the selector displays: threads, subjects or
articles. If the group is unthreaded setting this to threads
will thread the group.
= Switch between the article selector and the subject/thread
selector.
O Pick the order for the items: date, subject, author, item count
(for thread/subject groups), and a subject-date grouping of
individual articles. Typing the selection in lower-case will
sort the articles in the default direction, while using upper-
case will reverse the sort. There is a separate default sort
order for the subject/thread selector and the article selector.
See the -O option to set your favorite selector mode and sort
order as the default.
R Reverse the current sort order.
L Switch the selector’s display between the long, medium and
short display styles. See the -x option to set your favorite
style as the default.
U Switch between selecting unread/read articles.
X Mark all unselected articles as read and start reading.
D Mark unselected articles on the current page as read and begin
reading if articles are selected, otherwise go to the next
page.
J Mark all selected articles as read (useful after performing
some action on them with the ’:’ command).
c Catch up -- marks ALL articles as read without affecting their
cross-posted counterparts.
A Add a subject-search command to the memorized list (a.k.a. a
KILL file) for this group. You are prompted to choose
selection (+), junking (j), selection including all replies (.)
or junking including all replies (,). If the thread has more
than one subject the first subject is the one chosen for the
memorized command.
T Add a thread-oriented command to the memorized list for this
group. You are prompted to choose selecting the thread (+),
junking the thread (j), or clearing the auto-selection/junking
for the thread (c). (Note: there are three other options (’.’,
’,’, and ’C’) on the article-reading level -- look there for an
explanation of their use.)
^K Edit the local list of memorized commands (a.k.a. a KILL file)
for this newsgroup. A detailed description of memorized
commands is found in the Article Selection section.
:command
Apply a command to all the selected threads or their selected
articles. You can also use ":E" to end a binary extraction or
":p" to post a new article. Use "::command" to apply it to all
non-selected threads/articles.
Applicable commands include ’+’/’-’ (select/deselect an
article), "++"/"--" (select/deselect a thread), "T+" (auto-
select the entire thread), "TJ" (auto-junk the entire thread),
’t’ (display article tree), "s dest" (save article to a
destination), "e dir" (extract to directory), ’E’ (end partial
uudecode), as well as: S, │, w, W, m, M, j, = and ’,’.
:.command
Apply a command to the current thread or the selected articles
in the current thread. Use "::.command" to apply a command to
the unselected articles in the current thread.
/pattern
Scan all articles for a subject containing pattern and select
it.
/pattern/modifiers:command{:command}
Apply the commands listed to articles matching the search
command (possibly with h, a, b, r, or K modifiers). The
default action, if no command is specified, is to select the
article’s item in the selector (e.g. the entire thread ("++")
in the thread selector). See the section on Regular
Expressions and the description of pattern searching in the
Article Selection section.
One example: to scan all the unread articles looking for
"topic" anywhere in the article and then select its group and
save the articles to the files topic.1, topic.2, etc. use
"/topic/a:++:s topic.%#".
N Go to the next newsgroup with unread news.
P Go to the previous newsgroup with unread news.
& Display or set the current status of command-line switches.
&& Display or set the current macro definitions.
!command
Escape to a subshell.
q Quit this group.
ESC,+ Quit the selector to the article level. Note: ESC won’t work
if trn has mapped your arrow keys with default macros and the
first character that your arrow keys send is an ESC.
Q Quit the current newsgroup and return to the newsgroup-
selection prompt for this group.
Article-Reading Level
On the article-reading level, trn displays unread articles in thread
sequence (reading each article and its replies before going on to
another topic) unless threads are disabled for a particular group, in
which case the default order is the order they arrived at your site
(numeric sequence). In either case if you use the subject-search
command (^N) you will switch to reading the articles in date order
within each matching subject. (Making selections in the subject
selector or using the -S switch will automatically turn subject search
mode on in an unthreaded group.)
On the article-reading level you are not asked whether you want to read
an article before the article is displayed; rather, trn simply displays
the first page (or portion of a page, at low baud rates) of an article
and asks if you want to continue. The normal article-reading prompt
comes at the END of an article (although article-reading commands can
also be given from within the middle of an article in addition to the
pager level commands). The prompt at the end of an article looks like
this:
End of article 248 (of 257) -- what next? [npq]
The following are the options at this point:
n,SP Scan forward for next unread article. (Note: the ’n’ (next)
command when typed at the end of an article does not mark the
article as read, since an article is automatically marked as
read after the last line of it is printed. It is therefore
possible to type a sequence such as ’mn’ and leave the article
marked as unread. The fact that an article is marked as read
by typing n, N, ^N, F, R, e, s, S, │, w, or W within the MIDDLE
of the article is in fact a special case.)
N Go to the next article.
^N Find the next article with the same subject in date order.
This also makes subject search mode (^N) the default command at
the end of an article.
p Scan backward for previous unread article. If there is none,
stay at the current article.
P Go to the previous article.
- Go to the previously displayed article (regardless of whether
that article is before or after this article in the normal
sequence).
^P Find the previous article with the same subject in date order.
Makes subject search mode (^N) the default.
_N Go to the next article in numeric sequence.
_P Go to the previous article in numeric sequence.
<, > Browse the previous/next selected thread/subject. If no
selections have been made, all the threads that had unread news
when you entered the newsgroup (or last left the selector) are
treated as selected. Entering an empty newsgroup makes all the
already-read threads available for browsing.
[, ] Proceed to the left/right in the article tree. Visits already-
read articles as well as empty nodes. Try using the
left-/right-arrow keys also.
{, } Go to the root/leaf of the article tree, even if the node is
already read or empty. Proceeds to the very first/last node if
you’re already at a root/leaf in a multi-root thread.
(, ) Go to the previous/next sibling in the thread, including
"cousin" siblings. Try using the up-/down-arrow keys also.
t Display the entire article tree and all its associated
subjects. If the group is not currently threaded, it will
become threaded to process this command.
^R Restart the current article.
v Restart the current article verbosely, displaying the entire
header.
^L Refresh the screen.
^X Restart the current article, and decrypt as a rot13 message.
X Refresh the screen, and decrypt as a rot13 message.
b Back up one page.
^E Display the last page of the article.
q Quit this newsgroup and go back to the newsgroup-selection
level.
^ Go to the first unread article.
$ Go to the last article (actually, one past the last article).
number Go to the numbered article.
_C Switch to next available charset conversion.
range{,range}:command{:command}
Apply a set of commands to a set of articles. A range consists
of either <article number> or
<article number>-<article number>. A dot ’.’ represents the
current article, and a dollar sign ’$’ represents the last
article.
Applicable commands include ’m’ (mark as unread), ’M’ (mark as
read-until-exit), ’j’ (mark as read), "s dest" (save to a
destination), "e dir" (extract to directory), "!command" (shell
escape), "=" (print the subject), ’+’/’-’ (select/deselect the
article), ’T+’ (auto-select the entire thread), ’TJ’ (auto-junk
the entire thread), "++"/"--" (select/deselect the associated
thread), ’C’ (cancel), as well as S, │, w, W, and t.
:command
Apply a command to all the selected threads or their selected
articles. Use "::command" to apply it to all non-selected
threads/articles. For applicable commands, see the discussion
above for the range command.
:.command
Apply a command to the current thread or the selected articles
in the current thread. Use "::.command" to apply a command to
the unselected articles in the current thread.
j Junk the current article (i.e. mark it as read). If this
command is used from within an article, you are left at the end
of the article, unlike ’n’, which looks for the next article.
m Mark the current article as still unread. (If you don’t want
to see this article for a while you’re probably better off
using M instead of m, otherwise this article might get picked
again as the first available article sooner than you’d like.)
M Mark the current article to return on newsgroup exit. Until
then, the current article will be marked as read. This is
useful for returning to an article in another session.
Y Yank back the marked-to-return articles, clearing their to-
return status. If you are reading selected articles, the
yanked articles come back selected.
/pattern
Scan forward for article containing pattern in the subject.
See the Regular Expressions section. Together with the escape
substitution facility described later, it becomes easy to
search for various attributes of the current article, such as
subject, article ID, author name, etc. The previous pattern
can be recalled with ESC. If pattern is omitted, the previous
pattern is assumed.
/pattern/f
Scan forward for article containing pattern in the from line.
If you are using thread files the article data you are matching
against MAY contain only the real name of the user. If you
want to always match the full from line, see the following
header-matching option that will read in the full from-line
data if it is not already available.
/pattern/Hheader
Scan forward for article containing pattern in the indicated
header. Because we scan the entire string up to the end of the
modifiers, this modifier must be the last one. For example,
"/jsmoe@somesite.com/rHfrom:m+" will mark all articles from
"jsmoe@somesite.com" as unread and select them. Note that if
the header line isn’t one that trn recognizes in its header
parser, you’ll have to use the following full-header matching.
/pattern/h
Scan forward for an article containing pattern in the header.
/pattern/a
Scan forward for an article containing pattern anywhere in the
article.
/pattern/b
Scan forward for an article containing pattern in the body of
the article, but not the signature. (The signature must be
properly delimited to be ignored, however.)
/pattern/B
Scan forward for an article containing pattern anywhere in the
body of the article.
/pattern/r
Scan read articles also.
/pattern/c
Make search case sensitive. Ordinarily upper- and lower-case
are considered the same.
/pattern/t
Force the search to start at the top of the group (useful while
reading the group, since the default is to start at the current
article).
/pattern/I
Force the search to ignore the THRU line when executed as a
memorized command. If the command portion is a selection
command (i.e. it starts with a ’+’ or a ’.’) this is the
default behavior.
/pattern/N
Force the search to NOT ignore the THRU line when executed as a
memorized command (useful on selection commands -- see also
-k).
/pattern/modifiers:command{:command}
Apply the commands listed to articles matching the search
command (possibly with h, a, b, or r modifiers). Applicable
commands include ’m’ (mark as UNread), ’M’ (mark as read-until-
exit), ’j’ (junk -- mark as read in all groups), ’x’ (mark as
read in this group), "s dest" (save to a dest), "e dir"
(extract to dir), "!command" (shell escape), "=" (print the
subject), ’+’ (select the article), ’-’ deselect the article,
’T+’ (auto-select the entire thread), ’TJ’ (auto-junk the
entire thread), "++" (select the associated thread), "--"
deselect the associated thread), and ’C’ (cancel). If the
first command is ’m’ or ’M’, modifier r is assumed. A K may be
included in the modifiers (not the commands) to cause the
entire command (sans K) to be saved to the local KILL file,
where it will be applied to every article that shows up in the
newsgroup.
For example, to save all articles in a given newsgroup to the
line printer and mark them read, use "/^/│lpr:j". If you type
"/^/K│lpr:j", this will happen every time you enter the
newsgroup.
?pattern
Scan backward for article containing pattern in the subject.
May be modified as the forward search is:
?pattern?modifiers[:commands]. It is likely that you will want
an r modifier when scanning backward.
k Mark as read all articles with the same subject as the current
article. (Note: there is no single character command to
temporarily mark as read (M command) articles matching the
current subject. That can be done with "/<ESC>s/M", however.)
Mark the current article and all its replies as read.
J Junk all the articles in the current thread, even if it
contains multiple subjects.
A Add a subject-search command to the memorized list for this
group (in the KILL file). You are prompted to choose selection
(+), junking (j), selection including all replies (.) or
junking including all replies (,).
K This is a synonym for the command "Aj" which adds a command to
junk the current subject to the memorized commands for the
group. See also the K modifier on searches above.
T Add a thread-oriented command to the memorized list for this
group. You are prompted to choose selection of entire thread
(+), junking of entire thread (j), selection of an article and
its replies (.), junking of an article and its replies (,),
clearing the auto-selection/junking for this thread (c), or
clearing the auto-selection/junking for an article and its
replies (C).
^K Edit the local list of memorized commands (a.k.a. a KILL file)
for this newsgroup. Each line of the KILL file is either a
subject-affecting command of the form /pattern/x or a thread-
affecting command of the form <message-id> Tx. The first line
in the KILL file has the form "THRU <number>", which tells trn
the maximum article number that the KILL file has been applied
to. The THRU value is usually only used to keep header or
article searches from happening multiple times. Subject and
from-line searches are quite fast if the group has cached data
around (e.g. a .thread or .overview file). If it doesn’t, the
THRU line is used to set a lower boundary on the search to keep
the startup time as short as possible. If trn skipped some
selections (or you’re not sure), wait for the group to finish
being cached (e.g. visiting the selector forces the caching of
all unread articles), quit the group, and re-enter.
To see only newgroup articles in the control newsgroup, for
instance, you might include the line
/newgroup/:+
which selects all subjects containing "newgroup". You can add
lines automatically via the A and T commands as well as the K
search modifier, but editing is the only way to remove subject
commands (thread commands die automatically as the thread
dies). If either of the environment variables VISUAL or EDITOR
is set, the specified editor will be invoked; otherwise a
default editor (normally vi) is invoked on the KILL file.
The KILL file may also contain switch-setting lines beginning
with ’&’ (see the section on "Options") and special commands
beginning with ’*’. There are two such commands at the moment:
"*j" (junk all articles from THRU to the end of the group) and
"*X" (junk all unselected articles from THRU to the end of the
group). Additionally, any line beginning with ’X’ is executed
on exit from the newsgroup rather than on entrance. This can
be used to set switches back to a default value. One use for
this capability is to set your save directory to a custom value
upon entry to a newsgroup and set it back on exit using the
-ESAVEDIR option. See also the -/ option for another solution
to multiple save directories without using KILL files.
r Reply through net mail. The environment variables MAILPOSTER
and MAILHEADER may be used to modify the mailing behavior of
trn (see the environment section). If the current article does
not exist (such as the "End of newsgroup" pseudo-article you
can get to with a ’$’ command), invokes the mailer to nobody in
particular.
R Reply, including the current article in the header file
generated. (See ’F’ command below). The YOUSAID environment
variable controls the format of the attribution line.
^F Forward the current article.
f Submit a follow-up article. If the current article does not
exist (such as the "End of newsgroup" pseudo-article you can
get to with a ’$’ command), posts an original (root) article.
F Submit a follow-up article, and include the old article, with
lines prefixed either by ">" or by the argument to the -F
switch. Trn will attempt to provide an attribution line in
front of the quoted article, generated from the From: line of
the article. Unfortunately, the From: line doesn’t always
contain the right name; you should double check it against the
signature and change it if necessary, or you may have to
apologize for quoting the wrong person. The environment
variables NEWSPOSTER, NEWSHEADER and ATTRIBUTION may be used to
modify the posting behavior of trn (see environment section).
C Cancel the current article, but only if you are the contributor
or superuser.
z Supersede the current article, but only if you are the
contributor.
Z Same as the ’z’ command, but you start with a copy of the
original article to work with.
c Catch up in this newsgroup; i.e., mark all articles as read.
U Unkill articles. You can choose to unkill the current thread,
sub-thread (the current article and its replies), all the
articles, or start up the selector to choose specific articles
to unkill.
u Unsubscribe from this newsgroup.
s destination
Save to a filename or pipe using sh. If the first character of
the destination is a vertical bar, the rest of the command is
considered a shell command to which the article is passed
through standard input. The command is subject to filename
expansion. (See also the environment variable PIPESAVER.) If
the destination does not begin with a vertical bar, the rest of
the command is assumed to be a filename of some sort. An
initial tilde ’~’ will be translated to the name of the home
directory, and an initial environment variable substitution is
also allowed. If only a directory name is specified, the
environment variable SAVENAME is used to generate the actual
name. If a non-absolute filename is specified, the environment
variable SAVEDIR will be used to generate the actual directory.
If nothing is specified, then obviously both variables will be
used. Since the current directory for trn while doing a save
command is your private news directory, typing "s ./filename"
will force the file to your news directory. Save commands are
also run through % interpretation, so that you can enter "s
%O/filename" to save to the directory you were in when you ran
trn, and "s %t" to save to a filename consisting of the
Internet address of the sender.
After generating the full pathname of the file to save to, trn
determines if the file exists already, and if so, appends to
it. trn will attempt to determine if an existing file is a
mailbox or a normal file, and save the article in the same
format. If the output file does not yet exist, trn will by
default ask you which format you want, or you can make it skip
the question with either the -M or -N switch. If the article
is to be saved in mailbox format, the command to do so is
generated from the environment variable MBOXSAVER. Otherwise,
NORMSAVER is used.
S destination
Save to a filename or pipe using a preferred shell, such as
csh. Which shell is used depends first on what you have the
environment variable SHELL set to, and in the absence of that,
on what your news administrator set for the preferred shell
when he or she installed trn.
│ command
Shorthand for "s │ command".
w destination
The same as "s destination", but saves without the header.
W destination
The same as "S destination", but saves without the header.
e directory
Extract a shell archive or uuencoded binary to the designated
directory. The article is first scanned to try discover what
type of data is encapsulated. If a "cut here" line is found,
the first non-blank line after it must be either the start of a
shar header, or the "begin" or "table" line of a uuencoded
binary. The default for extracting shars is to send the data
portion of the file to /bin/sh, but that can be overridden with
the UNSHAR variable (see the ENVIRONMENT section). Uudecoding
is done internally by a decoder that can handle the data being
split up over multiple articles, and extracted one piece at a
time. To decode a multi-article file, either execute the ’e’
command in each article in sequence, use an article range to
execute the command, or use the ":e" command to repeat the
command for each of the currently selected articles. When the
’e’ command is not followed by any arguments, it will repeat
the arguments from the last extraction. All directory
specifications are relative to the value of SAVEDIR, so you can
use the command "e ." to force an extraction to SAVEDIR itself.
If a uudecoding is in progress (i.e. the last piece wasn’t
extracted yet) and you exit the group, the partial file will be
removed. This also occurs if you start to extract a new
uuencoded file before the previous one was finished. See also
the ’E’ command for ending a multi-part uudecoding manually.
There is one special case that is handled differently: if the
first file in a recognizable shar file is a uuencoded binary
that was packed with lines starting with an ’X’, we will not
unshar the file but instead uudecode it. If this causes
problems, you can override the default extraction method by
following the directory with an explicit command to execute, as
described below.
e directory│command
This form of the ’e’ command allows you to extract other data
formats than shar or uuencoded files or to override the
decisions made by the automatic extraction selection described
above. In normal operation, all data following what we
recognize as a "cut here" line will be sent to the specified
command. Additionally, the distinctive beginning of a shell
archive is also recognized without a preceding cut line. When
the command is run, the default directory will be set to the
specified directory, or the value of SAVEDIR if unspecified.
Entering the ’e’ command without arguments will repeat your
previous extract command. You can use the command "e dir│" to
extract to a new directory using the previously-specified
command.
E This command ends any multi-part uuencoded file extraction that
you began, but are unable (or unwilling) to complete. The
partially extracted file is removed.
& Print out the current status of command-line switches.
&switch {switch}
Set additional command-line switches.
&& Print out current macro definitions.
&&keys commands
Define an additional macro.
!command
Escape to a subshell. One exclamation mark (!) leaves you in
your own news directory. A double exclamation mark (!!) leaves
you in the spool directory of the current newsgroup. The
environment variable SHELL will be used if defined. If command
is null, an interactive shell is started.
You can use escape key substitutions described later to get to
many run-time values. The command is also run through %
interpretation, in case it is being called from a range or
search command.
+ Start the selector in the last-used mode. If the newsgroup is
unthreaded and the default selector mode is threads, we
temporarily switch to subject selection unless manually
overridden.
_a Start the selector in article mode.
_s Start the selector in subject mode.
_t Start the selector in thread mode.
_T Start the selector in thread mode unless the group isn’t
threaded, in which case we settle for the subject selector.
= List subjects of unread articles.
# Print last article number.
_+ Select the entire thread associated with the current article.
_- Deselect the entire thread associated with the current article.
Pager Level
At the pager level (within an article), the prompt looks like this:
--MORE--(17%)
and a number of commands may be given:
SP Display next page.
x Display next page and decrypt as a rot13 message.
d Display half a page more.
CR Display one more line.
q Go to the end of the current article (don’t mark it either read
or unread). Leaves you at the "What next?" prompt.
j Junk the current article. Mark it read and go to the end of
the article.
^L Refresh the screen.
X Refresh the screen and decrypt as a rot13 message.
b Back up one page.
^E Display the last page of the article.
_C Switch to next available charset conversion.
t Display the entire article tree, including its associated
subjects, and continue reading. If the group is not currently
threaded, it will be threaded first.
gpattern
Goto (search forward for) pattern within current article. Note
that there is no space between the command and the pattern. If
the pattern is found, the page containing the pattern will be
displayed. Where on the page the line matching the pattern
goes depends on the value of the -g switch. By default the
matched line goes at the top of the screen.
G Search for g pattern again.
^G This is a special version of the ’g’ command that is for
skipping articles in a digest. It is equivalent to setting
"-g4" and then executing the command "g^Subject:".
TAB This is another special version of the ’g’ command that is for
skipping inclusions of older articles. It is equivalent to
setting "-g4" and then executing the command "g^[^c]", where c
is the first character of the last line on the screen. It
searches for the first line that doesn’t begin with the same
character as the last line on the screen.
!command
Escape to a subshell.
The following commands skip the rest of the current article, then
behave just as if typed to the "What next?" prompt at the end of the
article. See the documentation at the article selection level for
these commands.
# $ & / = ? A c C f F k K T ^K J , m M r R ^R u U v Y ^
p P ^P - < > [ ] { } number
range{,range} command{:command}
The following commands also skip to the end of the article, but have
the additional effect of marking the current article as read:
n N ^N e s S │ w W
Miscellaneous facts about commands
An ’n’ typed at either the "Last newsgroup" prompt or a "Last article"
prompt will cycle back to the top of the newsgroup or article list,
whereas a ’q’ will quit the level. (Note that ’n’ does not mean "no",
but rather "next".) A space will of course do whatever is shown as the
default, which will vary depending on whether trn thinks you have more
articles or newsgroups to read.
The ’b’ (backup page) command may be repeated until the beginning of
the article is reached. If trn is suspended (via a ^Z), then when the
job is resumed, a refresh (^L) will automatically be done (Berkeley-
type systems only). If you type a command such as ’!’ or ’s’ which
takes you from the middle of the article to the end, you can always get
back into the middle by typing ’^L’.
In multi-character commands such as ’!’, ’s’, ’/’, etc, you can
interpolate various run-time values by typing escape and a character.
To find out what you can interpolate, type escape and ’h’, or check out
the single character % substitutions for environment variables in the
Interpretation and Interpolation section, which are the same.
Additionally, typing a double escape will cause any % substitutions in
the string already typed in to be expanded.
The Tree Display
When reading a threaded newsgroup, trn displays a character
representation of the article tree in the upper right corner of the
header. For example, consider the following display:
(1)+-(1)--(2)--[2]
│-(1)+-<3>
│ \-[1]
\-(1)+-[1]--[1]
\-[1]
This tree represents an initial article that has three direct replies
(the second column with three (1)’s). Each reply has further replies
branching off from them. In two cases the subject line was altered in
the reply, as indicated by the increasing numbers.
The third subject is not selected for reading, as indicated by the
<>’s. Note you can always forcefully visit an unselected article with
’N’ and ’P’ as well as the thread-navagation commands (which are
typically macro’ed to the arrow keys on your keypad).
When there is only one subject associated with a thread, all the nodes
are marked with the number 1. When the first subject change arrives,
it is marked with the number 2, and so on. If you were to look at this
thread in the thread selector, the three subjects associated with it
would be listed in the same order as the ascending digits. In those
rare cases where more than 9 subjects are associated with each thread,
the nodes are marked with the letters A-Z, and then by a-z.
The articles that have already been read are enclosed in ()’s, Unread
articles are displayed in []’s, and unread-but-unselected articles are
displayed in <>’s. The currently displayed article has its entire node
highlighted in the display. The previously displayed article has only
its number highlighted. If the group has not been completely threaded
yet, some articles will appear as (?) until trn can determine if the
referenced article truly exists or not. If you visit such an article
and wait for trn to finish threading the group, the screen will refresh
as soon as the presence or absence of the article is determined.
Options
Trn has a nice set of options to allow you to tailor the interaction to
your liking. (You might like to know that the author swears by "-x6ms
+e -mu -S -XX -N -B -p".) These options may be set on the command
line, via the TRNINIT environment variable, via a file pointed to by
the TRNINIT variable, or from within trn via the & command. Options
may generally be unset by typing "+switch". Options include:
-a causes trn to always thread the unread articles on entry to a
group. Without this option trn may enter a group in a partially-
threaded state and process the unthreaded articles in the
background. The down side of this is that the tree display may
not be complete when it is first displayed and you may start out
at an odd position in the first thread’s article tree.
-A tells trn to attempt to create some default macros that will map
your arrow keys to useful trn functions (this is the default).
Use +A to turn this behavior off.
-b will force trn to read each thread in a breadth-first order,
rather than depth-first.
-B will turn on a spinner that twirls when trn is doing background
article-processing. A gizmo for those interested in what’s going
on behind the scenes.
-c checks for news without reading news. If a list of newsgroups is
given on the command line, only those newsgroups will be checked;
otherwise all subscribed-to newsgroups are checked. Whenever the
-c switch is specified, a non-zero exit status from trn means that
there is unread news in one of the checked newsgroups. The -c
switch does not disable the printing of newsgroups with unread
news; this is controlled by the -s switch. (The -c switch is not
meaningful when given via the & command.)
-C<number>
tells trn how often to checkpoint the .newsrc, in articles read.
Actually, this number says when to start thinking about doing a
checkpoint if the situation is right. If a reasonable check-
pointing situation doesn’t arise within 10 more articles, the
.newsrc is check-pointed willy-nilly.
-d<directory name>
sets your private news directory to something other than ~/News.
The directory name will be globbed (via csh) if necessary (and if
possible). The value of SAVEDIR (where articles are saved) is
initially set to this directory, but is often manipulated via the
-/ option or by manipulating SAVEDIR directly (perhaps via the
memorized commands (the KILL file) for a group. Any KILL files
(see the K command in the Article Selection section) also reside
in this directory and its subdirectories, by default. In
addition, shell escapes leave you in this directory.
-D<flags>
enables debugging output. See common.h for flag values. Warning:
normally trn attempts to restore your .newsrc when an unexpected
signal or internal error occurs. This is disabled when any
debugging flags are set.
-e causes each page within an article to be started at the top of the
screen, not just the first page. (It is similar to the -c switch
of more(1).) You never have to read scrolling text with this
switch. This is helpful especially at certain baud rates because
you can start reading the top of the next page without waiting for
the whole page to be printed. It works nicely in conjunction with
the -m switch, especially if you use half-intensity for your
highlight mode. See also the -L switch.
-E<name>=<val>
sets the environment variable <name> to the value specified.
Within trn, "&-ESAVENAME=%t" is similar to "setenv SAVENAME ’%t’"
in csh, or "SAVENAME=’%t’; export SAVENAME" in sh. Any
environment variables set with -E will be inherited by
subprocesses of trn.
-f will make trn avoid various sleep calls and the prompt after the
processing of the memorized commands that are intended to allow
you time to read a message before the screen clears. This allows
the advanced user to cruise along a little faster at the expense
of readability. The -t (terse) option turns on -f by default, but
you can override this by specifying +f after the -t option.
-F<string>
sets the prefix string for the ’F’ follow-up command to use in
prefixing each line of the quoted article. For example, "-F<tab>"
inserts a tab on the front of each line (which will cause long
lines to wrap around, unfortunately), "-F>>>>" inserts ">>>>" on
every line, and "-F" by itself causes nothing to be inserted, in
case you want to reformat the text, for instance. The initial
default prefix is ">".
-g<line>
tells trn which line of the screen you want searched-for strings
to show up on when you search with the ’g’ command within an
article. The lines are numbered starting with 1. The initial
default is "-g1", meaning the first line of the screen. Setting
the line to less than 1 or more than the number of lines on the
screen will set it to the last line of the screen.
-G selects the "fuzzy" processing on the go command when you don’t
type in a valid group name. With this option on trn will attempt
to find the group you probably meant to type, but it can be a
little slow about it, so it’s not on by default.
-h<string>
hides (disables the printing of) all header lines beginning with
string. For instance, -hx- will disable the printing of all "X-
Foo:" headers. Case is not significant. The default for
unrecognized headers can be set with the -hunrecognized option.
Alternately you could use -h (no string) to disable all headers
except the Subject line and then use +h to select only those lines
you want to see. You may wish to use the baud-rate switch
modifier below to hide more lines at lower baud rates.
-H<string>
works just like -h except that instead of setting the hiding flag
for a header line, it sets the magic flag for that header line.
Certain header lines have magic behavior that can be controlled
this way. At present, the following actions are caused by the
flag for the particular line: the Date line prints the date in
local time if the group is threaded; the From line will only print
the commented portion of the user name; the Newsgroups line will
only print when there are multiple newsgroups; the Subject line
will be underlined and (when threaded) the keyword ’Subject:’ is
replaced by its subject number (e.g. [1]); and the Expires line
will always be suppressed if there is nothing on it. In fact, all
of these actions are the default, and you must use +H to undo
them.
-i=<number>
specifies how long (in lines) to consider the initial page of an
article -- normally this is determined automatically depending on
baud rate. (Note that an entire article header will always be
printed regardless of the specified initial page length. If you
are working at low baud rate and wish to reduce the size of the
headers, you may hide certain header lines with the -h switch.)
-I tells trn to append all new, unsubscribed groups to the end of the
.newsrc.
-j forces trn to leave control characters unmolested in messages.
-J{<number>}
causes trn to join similar subjects into a common thread if they
are the same up to the indicated number of characters (the default
is 30). You can turn this on and off for specific groups by
putting the following lines into your kill file for the group(s):
&-J30
X&+J
-k tells trn to ignore the THRU line when processing selection
searches (i.e. searches with a command portion that starts with a
’+’ or a ’.’) in the memorized commands (aka kill files). This is
turned on by default, so use +k if you want to turn it off.
-K is used to keep a trn from checking for new news while you’re in
the group. Use this when your kill-file processing is so slow
that you don’t want the group to expand while you’re reading. If
you only want specific groups to be affected, put these lines into
your kill file for the group(s):
&-K
X&+K
-l disables the clearing of the screen at the beginning of each
article, in case you have a bizarre terminal.
-L tells trn to leave information on the screen as long as possible
by not blanking the screen between pages, and by using clear to
end-of-line. (The more(1) program does this.) This feature works
only if you have the requisite termcap capabilities. The switch
has no effect unless the -e switch is set.
-m=<mode>
enables the marking of the last line of the previous page printed,
to help the user see where to continue reading. This is most
helpful when less than a full page is going to be displayed. It
may also be used in conjunction with the -e switch, in which case
the page is erased, and the first line (which is the last line of
the previous page) is highlighted. If -m=s is specified, the
standout mode will be used, but if -m=u is specified, underlining
will be used. If neither =s or =u is specified, standout is the
default. Use +m to disable highlighting.
-M forces mailbox format in creating new save files. Ordinarily you
are asked which format you want.
-N forces normal (non-mailbox) format in creating new save files.
Ordinarily you are asked which format you want.
-o will act like old versions of trn and not junk cross-referenced
articles when using thread commands to junk articles in the
current group (such as the selector’s ’X’ command).
-O<mode>{<order>}
specifies the selector’s mode and (optionally) the sort order.
The modes are ’a’rticle, ’s’ubject, or ’t’hread. The orders are
’d’ate, ’s’ubject, ’a’uthor, article ’c’ount per group, ’n’umeric,
or subject-date ’g’roups. The order can be capitalized to reverse
the indicated order. For example, to choose the article selector
in subject order specify "-Oas".
-p{opt}
tells trn to auto-select your postings and their replies as it
encounters them in the various groups you read. The optional
parameter is either a ’.’, ’p’, or ’+’ (it defaults to ’.’ if
omitted) and affects what command trn should execute when it
encounters your postings. The default is to execute the command
"T." on each of your postings which tells trn to memorize the
auto-selection of this article and all its replies. Using -pp
tells trn to use the same command, but start the selection with
the parent article, so that you see any other replies to the same
article. Using -p+ tells trn to select the whole thread that
contains your reply.
-q bypasses the automatic check for new newsgroups when starting trn.
-Q<set>
defines the set of available charset conversions. This can be
useful to restrict the available conversions to those your
terminal can handle and/or to specify an alternate default. The
first element of this set is taken as default for each article.
-r causes trn to restart in the last newsgroup read during a previous
session with trn. It is equivalent to starting up normally and
then getting to the newsgroup with a g command.
-s with no argument suppresses the initial listing of newsgroups with
unread news, whether -c is specified or not. Thus -c and -s can
be used together to test "silently" the status of news from within
your .login file. If -s is followed by a number, the initial
listing is suppressed after that many lines have been listed.
Presuming that you have your .newsrc sorted into order of
interest, -s5 will tell you the 5 most interesting newsgroups that
have unread news. This is also a nice feature to use in your
.login file, since it not only tells you whether there is unread
news, but also how important the unread news is, without having to
wade through the entire list of unread newsgroups. If no -s
switch is given -s5 is assumed, so just putting "rn -c" into your
.login file is fine.
-S<number>
causes trn to enter subject search mode (^N) automatically
whenever an unthreaded newsgroup is started up with <number>
unread articles or more. Additionally, it causes any ’n’ typed
while in subject search mode to be interpreted as ’^N’ instead.
(To get back out of subject search mode, the best command is
probably ’^’.) If <number> is omitted, 3 is assumed.
-t puts trn into terse mode. This is more cryptic but useful for low
baud rates. (Note that your system administrator may have
compiled trn with either verbose or terse messages only to save
memory.) You may wish to use the baud-rate switch modifier below
to enable terse mode only at lower baud rates.
-T allows you to type ahead of trn. Ordinarily trn will eat
typeahead to prevent your autorepeating space bar from doing a
very frustrating thing when you accidentally hold it down. If you
don’t have a repeating space bar, or you are working at low baud
rate, you can set this switch to prevent this behavior. You may
wish to use the baud-rate switch modifier below to disable
typeahead only at lower baud rates.
-u sets the unbroken-subject-line mode in the selector, which simply
truncates subjects that are too long instead of dumping the middle
portion prior to the last two words of the subject.
-U tells trn to not write the .newsrc file out after visiting each
group. While this is "unsafe" it can be faster if you have a
really huge .newsrc.
-v sets verification mode for commands. When set, the command being
executed is displayed to give some feedback that the key has
actually been typed. Useful when the system is heavily loaded and
you give a command that takes a while to start up.
-V will output trn’s version number and quit.
-x{<number>}{<list>}
Enable the extended (threaded) features of trn beyond the rn
compatibility mode (this may be the default on your system, use +x
if you yearn for the good ol’ days). The <number> is the maximum
number of article-tree lines (from 0 to 11) you want displayed in
your header. Use the <list> to choose which thread selector
styles you like (’s’hort, ’m’edium, or ’l’ong), and in what order
they are selected with the ’L’ command. For example, use -xms to
start with the medium display mode and only switch between it and
the short mode. You can omit either or both of the parameters, in
which case a default of -x6lms is assumed.
-X{<number>}{<commands>}
If you like using the selector, you’ll probably want to use this
option to make the selector command (+) the default when a
newsgroup is started up with at least <number> unread articles.
(Your installer may have chosen to make -X0 the default on your
system.) It is also used to select which commands you want to be
the defaults while using the thread selector. For example, -X2XD
will make the thread selector the default command for entering a
newsgroup with at least 2 unread articles, and set the default
command for the LAST page of the thread selector to be the X
command and the default command for all other pages to be the D
command. Either or both parameters can be omitted, as well as the
second default command (e.g. -XX would change the default
newsgroup entry to use the selector and the default command for
the last page of the selector to be ’X’). The default is -X0Z> if
just -X is specified. To set the default selector commands
without having ’+’ be the default entry into a newsgroup, specify
a high number, like 9999.
-z sets the minimum number of minutes that must elapse before the
active file is refetched to look for new articles. A value of 0
or using +z turns this off.
-Z is used to select what style of database you want trn to access.
Use -Zt for thread files, -Zo for overview files, and +Z for none.
The default is whatever your newsadmin compiled into trn, and can
be -Zot to try to access either one.
-/ sets SAVEDIR to "%p/%c" and SAVENAME to "%a", which means that by
default articles are saved in a subdirectory of your private news
directory corresponding to the name of the the current newsgroup,
with the filename being the article number. +/ sets SAVEDIR to
"%p" and SAVENAME to "%^C", which by default saves articles
directly to your private news directory, with the filename being
the name of the current newsgroup, first letter capitalized.
(Either +/ or -/ may be default on your system, depending on the
feelings of your news administrator when he, she or it installed
trn.) You may, of course, explicitly set SAVEDIR and SAVENAME to
other values -- see discussion in the environment section.
Any switch may be selectively applied according to the current baud-
rate. Simply prefix the switch with +speed to apply the switch at that
speed or greater, and -speed to apply the switch at that speed or less.
Examples: -1200-hposted suppresses the Posted line at 1200 baud or
less; +9600-m enables marking at 9600 baud or more. You can apply the
modifier recursively to itself also: +300-1200-t sets terse mode from
300 to 1200 baud.
Similarly, switches may be selected based on terminal type:
-=vt100+T set +T on vt100
-=tvi920-ETERM=mytvi get a special termcap entry
-=tvi920-ERNMACRO=%./.rnmac.tvi
set up special key-mappings
+=paper-v set verify mode if not hardcopy
Some switch arguments, such as environment variable values, may require
spaces in them. Such spaces should be quoted via ", ’, or \ in the
conventional fashion, even when passed via TRNINIT or the & command.
Regular Expressions
The patterns used in article searching are regular expressions such as
those used by ed(1). In addition, \w matches an alphanumeric character
and \W a non-alphanumeric. Word boundaries may be matched by \b, and
non-boundaries by \B. The bracketing construct \( ... \) may also be
used, and \digit matches the digit’th substring, where digit can range
from 1 to 9. \0 matches whatever the last bracket match matched. Up
to 10 alternatives may given in a pattern, separated by \│, with the
caveat that \( ... \│ ... \) is illegal.
Character Set Conversions
trn can use character set conversions when displaying articles. This
helps users in non-English-speaking countries to display special
characters on 7-bit displays. trn assumes that articles use the
ISO-8859-1 character set and converts the special characters (e.g.,
"umlauts") to a string of ASCII characters. Currently the following
conversions are supported (see the -Q option):
p Plain. No change. This is the default.
a ISO->ASCII. Special characters are mapped to ASCII, e.g. the
umlaut-o character becomes oe.
m ISO->ASCII monospaced. Special characters are mapped to exactly
one similar-looking ASCII character, e.g. umlaut-o becomes o. Used
where correct spacing is more important than accuracy.
t TeX->ISO. Assuming your display can handle the ISO-8859-1 charset,
trn transforms umlauts in the TeX notation, which is commonly used
in Germany, to real ISO characters, e.g. "a becomes umlaut-a.
The selected conversion, if different from p, will be displayed in the
article level and pager prompt. The conversion is also used when
including original articles in a reply or followup. It is not used when
saving articles to files.
Interpretation and Interpolation
Many of the strings that trn handles are subject to interpretations of
several types. Under filename expansion, an initial "~/" is translated
to the name of your home directory, and "~name" is translated to the
login directory for the user specified. Filename expansion will also
expand an initial environment variable, and also does the backslash,
caret and percent expansion mentioned below.
All interpreted strings go through backslash, caret and percent
interpretation. The backslash escapes are the normal ones (such as \n,
\t, \033, etc.). The caret escapes indicate control codes (such as ^i,
^l, etc.). If you wish to pass through a backslash or a caret it must
be escaped with a backslash. The special percent escapes are similar
to printf percent escapes. These cause the substitution of various
run-time values into the string. The following are currently
recognized:
%a Current article number.
%A Full name of current article (%P/%c/%a).
%b Destination of last save command, often a mailbox.
%B The byte offset to the beginning of the part of the article to
be saved, set by the save command. The ’s’ and ’S’ commands
set it to 0, and the ’w’ and ’W’ commands set it to the byte
offset of the body of the article.
%c Current newsgroup, directory form.
%C Current newsgroup, dot form.
%d Full name of newsgroup directory (%P/%c).
%D "Distribution:" line from the current article.
%e The last command executed to extract data from an article.
%E The last directory where an extracted file went.
%f "From:" line from the current article, or the "Reply-To:" line
if there is one. This differs from %t in that comments (such
as the full name) are not stripped out with %f.
%F "Newsgroups:" line for a new article, constructed from
"Newsgroups:" and "Followup-To:" lines of current article.
%g The general mode of trn, for use in conditional macros.
I Init mode.
s Selector mode.
r Rn mode.
i Input mode (newline terminated).
p Prompt mode (single-character input).
c Choice mode (multi-choice input).
%h Name of the header file to pass to the mail or news poster,
containing all the information that the poster program needs in
the form of a message header. It may also contain a copy of
the current article. The format of the header file is
controlled by the MAILHEADER and NEWSHEADER environment
variables.
%H Host name (your machine’s name).
%i "Message-I.D.:" line from the current article, with <>
guaranteed.
%I The reference indication mark for citing prior articles (see
the -F switch.)
%l The news administrator’s login name, if any.
%L Login name (yours).
%m The current mode of trn, for use in conditional macros.
i Initializing.
n Newsgroup-list level.
f End (finis) of newsgroup-list level.
t The thread/subject/article selector.
c Newsrc selector.
w Newsgroup selector.
j Addgroup selector.
l Option selector.
a Article level ("What next?").
e End of the article level.
p Pager level ("MORE" prompt).
u Unkill prompt.
d Selector mode prompt.
o Selector order prompt.
m Memorize thread command prompt.
r Memorize subject command prompt.
z Option edit prompt.
k Processing memorized (KILL-file) commands.
A Add this newsgroup?
B Abandon confirmation.
C Catchup confirmation.
D Delete bogus newsgroups?
F Is follow-up a new topic?
M Use mailbox format?
R Resubscribe to this newsgroup?
K Press any key prompt.
Note that yes/no questions are all upper-case modes. If, for
example, you wanted to disallow defaults on all yes/no
questions, you could define the following macro:
\040 %(%m=[A-Z]?h: )
%M The number of articles marked to return via the ’M’ command.
If the same article is Marked multiple times, "%M" counts it
multiple times in the current implementation.
%n "Newsgroups:" line from the current article.
%N Full name (yours).
%o Organization (yours).
%O Original working directory (where you ran trn from).
%p Your private news directory, normally ~/News.
%P Public news spool directory, normally /usr/spool/news on
systems that don’t use NNTP.
%q The value of the last "quoted" input string (see the %"
interp).
%r Last reference on references line of current article (parent
article id).
%R References list for a new article, constructed from the
references and article ID of the current article.
%s Subject, with all Re’s and (nf)’s stripped off.
%S Subject, with one "Re:" stripped off.
%t "To:" line derived from the "From:" and "Reply-To:" lines of
the current article. This always returns an Internet format
address.
%T "To:" line derived from the "Path:" line of the current article
to produce a uucp path.
%u The number of unread articles in the current newsgroup.
%U The number of unread articles in the current newsgroup, not
counting the the current article. When threads are selected,
this count reflects only selected articles.
%v The number of unselected articles, not counting the current
article if it is unselected.
%w The directory where mthreads keeps its tmp files.
%W The directory where thread files are placed.
%x The news library directory.
%X The trn library directory.
%z The length of the current article in bytes.
%Z The number of selected threads.
%~ Your home directory.
%. The directory containing your dot files, which is your home
directory unless the environment variable DOTDIR is defined
when trn is invoked.
%# The current count for a multi-file save, starting with 1. This
value is incremented by one for each file saved or extracted
within a single command.
%$ Current process number.
%/ Last search string.
%? A space unless the current interp string is > 79 characters, at
which point it turns into a newline.
%% A percent sign.
%{name} or %{name-default}
The environment variable "name".
%[name] The value of header line "Name:" from the current article. The
"Name: " is not included. For example "%D" and
"%[distribution]" are equivalent. The name must be spelled out
in full.
%‘command‘
Inserts the output of the command, with any embedded newlines
translated to space.
%""prompt""
Prints prompt on the terminal, then inputs one string, and
inserts it.
%(test_text=pattern?then_text:else_text)
If test_text matches pattern, has the value then_text,
otherwise else_text. The ":else_text" is optional, and if
absent, interpolates the null string. The = may be replaced
with != to negate the test. To quote any of the meta-
characters (’=’, ’?’, ’:’, or ’)’), precede with a backslash.
%digit The digits 1 through 9 interpolate the string matched by the
nth bracket in the last pattern match that had brackets. If
the last pattern had alternatives, you may not know the number
of the bracket you want -- %0 will give you the last bracket
matched.
Modifiers: to capitalize the first letter, insert ’^’: "%^C" produces
something like "Rec.humor". Inserting ’_’ causes the first letter
following the last ’/’ to be capitalized: "%_c" produces "rec/Humor".
Inserting ’\’ will insert a backslash before any characters that would
be magic in a regular expression, including ’%’: "%\C" produces
"rec\.humor".
Inserting "’" will insert a backslash before any single-quotes in the
result, suitable for enclosing in single-quotes and sending to a shell:
"’%’s’" might produce "’I’\’’m a subject’".
Inserting "’’" will insert a backslash before any double-quotes in the
result, suitable for enclosing in double-quotes and sending to a shell.
Inserting ">" will strip out just the address portion of an address
string such as the From line.
Inserting ")" will strip out just the comment (real name) portion of an
address string such as the From line.
Inserting ":FMT" will format the result according to the printf-style
FMT string: "%:-50.50s" left-justifies the subject into a 50 character
field.
ENVIRONMENT
The following environment variables are paid attention to by trn. In
general the default values assumed for these variables by trn are
reasonable, so if you are using trn for the first time, you can safely
ignore this section. Note that the defaults below may not correspond
precisely to the defaults on your system. To find the actual defaults
you would need to look in config.h and common.h in the trn source
directory, and the file INIT in the trn library directory.
Those variables marked (%) are subject to % interpolation, and those
marked (~) are subject to both % interpolation and ~ interpretation.
ATTRIBUTION (%)
Gives the format of the attribution line in front of the quoted
article included by an F command.
Default: In article %i,%?%)f <%>f> wrote:
AUTOSUBSCRIBE
When trn is checking for new newsgroups and finds one matching
one of the patterns in AUTOSUBSCRIBE, the new group is
automatically added to the end of the .newsrc, subscribed.
Newsgroups not matching this or AUTOUNSUBSCRIBE, below, are
offered to the user.
AUTOSUBSCRIBE is a comma separated list of newsgroup patterns
ala ’o’, ’/’, etc. It can also include "but not" entries
preceded by ’!’. "a,b,!c,d" is read as "matching a or b,
unless it also matches c; matching d regardless". Another way
to look at it is "(((a or b) and not c) or d)". To
automatically subscribe to all local groups but be choosy about
non-local groups, one might say "*,!*.*".
Default: (none)
AUTOUNSUBSCRIBE
AUTOUNSUBSCRIBE is very similar to AUTOSUBSCRIBE, above, but
new newsgroups matching it are automatically added to the end
of the .newsrc file, unsubscribed. If a newsgroup matches
AUTOSUBSCRIBE, AUTOUNSUBSCRIBE is not consulted.
Default: (none)
CANCEL (~)
The shell command used to cancel an article.
Default: inews -h < %h
CANCELHEADER (%)
The format of the file to pass to the CANCEL command in order
to cancel an article.
Default:
Newsgroups: %n
Subject: cmsg cancel %i
References: %R
Reply-To: %L@%H (%N)
Distribution: %D
Organization: %o
%i cancelled from trn.
DOTDIR Where to find your dot files, if they aren’t in your home
directory. Can be interpolated using "%.".
Default: $HOME
EDITOR (~)
The name of your editor, if VISUAL is undefined.
Default: whatever your news administrator compiled in, usually
vi.
EXSAVER (%)
The shell command to execute in order to extract data to either
/bin/sh or a user-specified command.
Default: tail -c +%B %A │ %e
FIRSTLINE (%)
Controls the format of the line displayed at the top of an
article. Warning: this may go away.
The default (ignoring the Marked to return display in
unthreaded groups) is approximately:
%C #%a%(%Z=^0$?%(%U!=^0$? (%U more\)): (%U + %v more\))
FORWARDHEADER (%)
The format of the header file for forwarding messages. See
also FORWARDPOSTER.
Default:
To:
Subject: %(%i=^$?:[subject] (fwd\\)
%(%{REPLYTO}=^$?:Reply-To: %{REPLYTO}
)Newsgroups: %n
In-Reply-To: %i)
%(%[references]=^$?:References: %[references]
)Organization: %o
Cc:
Bcc: \n\n
FORWARDPOSTER (~)
The shell command to be used by the forward command (^F) in
order to allow you to edit and deliver the file. trn will not
itself call upon an editor for replies -- this is a function of
the program referenced by FORWARDPOSTER. See also
FORWARDHEADER and MAILPOSTER.
Default: Rnmail -h %h
FROM (%)
What to put in the From: header of your posts, email replies,
and email forwards, instead of whatever the default name and
address are for your system. This will only work if you use
the default settings for the NEWSHEADER, MAILHEADER, and
FORWARDHEADER variables, or if your custom ones use FROM to set
the From: header.
Regardless of the settings of NEWSHEADER, MAILHEADER, and
FORWARDHEADER, the setting of FROM is used to determine which
articles may be cancelled or superseded.
Default: undefined
HIDELINE
If defined, contains a regular expression which matches article
lines to be hidden, in order, for instance, to suppress quoted
material. A recommended string for this purpose is "^>...",
which doesnt hide lines with only ’>’, to give some indication
that quoted material is being skipped. If you want to hide
more than one pattern, you can use "│" to separate the
alternatives. You can view the hidden lines by restarting the
article with the ’v’ command.
There is some overhead involved in matching each line of the
article against a regular expression. You might wish to use a
baud-rate modifier to enable this feature only at low baud
rates.
Default: undefined
HOME Your home directory. Affects ~ interpretation, and the
location of your dot files if DOTDIR is not defined.
Default: $LOGDIR
KILLGLOBAL (~)
Where to find the KILL file to apply to every newsgroup. See
the ’^K’ command at the newsgroup-selection level.
Default: %p/KILL
KILLLOCAL (~)
Where to find the KILL file for the current newsgroup. See the
commands ’K’ and ’^K’ at the article selection level, and the
search modifier ’K’.
Default: %p/%c/KILL
LOGDIR Your home directory if HOME is undefined. Affects ~
interpretation, and the location of your dot files if DOTDIR is
not defined.
Default: none.
Explanation: you must have either $HOME or $LOGDIR.
LOGNAME Your login name, if USER is undefined. May be interpolated
using "%L".
Default: value of getlogin().
LOCALTIMEFMT
The format used by strftime() to print the local time. The
Date line is only displayed in local time if the group is
threaded (see the -H option for more information on Date).
Default: %a %b %e %X %Z %Y
which is the same format as the date(1) command.
MAILCALL (~)
What to say when there is new mail.
Default: (Mail)
MAILFILE (~)
Where to check for mail.
Default: /usr/spool/mail/%L
MAILHEADER (%)
The format of the header file for replies. See also
MAILPOSTER.
Default:
To: %t
Subject: %(%i=^$?:Re: %S
%(%{REPLYTO}=^$?:Reply-To: %{REPLYTO}
)Newsgroups: %n
In-Reply-To: %i)
%(%[references]=^$?:References: %[references]
)Organization: %o
Cc:
Bcc: \n\n
MAILPOSTER (~)
The shell command to be used by the reply commands (r and R) in
order to allow you to enter and deliver the response. trn will
not itself call upon an editor for replies -- this is a
function of the program referenced by MAILPOSTER. See also
MAILHEADER.
Default: Rnmail -h %h
MBOXSAVER (~)
The shell command to save an article in mailbox format.
Default: %X/mbox.saver %A %P %c %a %B %C "%b" \
"From %t %‘date‘"
Explanation: the first seven arguments are the same as for
NORMSAVER. The eighth argument to the shell script is the new
From line for the article, including the posting date, derived
either directly from the Posted: line, or not-so-directly from
the Date: line. Header munging at its finest.
MODSTRING
The string to insert in the group summary line, which heads
each article, for a moderated group. See also NOPOSTRING.
Default: " (moderated)"
NAME Your full name. May be interpolated using "%N".
Default: name from /etc/passwd, or ~/.fullname.
NEWSHEADER (%)
The format of the header file for follow-ups. See also
NEWSPOSTER.
Default:
%(%[followup-to]=^$?:%(%[followup-to]=^%n$?:X-ORIGINAL-
NEWSGROUPS: %n
))Newsgroups: %(%F=^$?%C:%F)
Subject: %(%S=^$?%"\n\nSubject: ":Re: %S)
Summary:
Expires:
%(%R=^$?:References: %R
)Sender:
Followup-To:
%(%{REPLYTO}=^$?:Reply-To: %{REPLYTO}
)Distribution: %(%i=^$?%"Distribution: ":%D)
Organization: %o
Keywords: %[keywords]
Cc: \n\n
NEWSORG Either the name of your organization, or the name of a file
containing the name of your organization. (For use at sites
where the ORGANIZATION environmental variable is already in
use. NEWSORG will override ORGANIZATION if both are present.)
May be interpolated using "%o".
Default: whatever your news administrator compiled in.
NEWSPOSTER (~)
The shell command to be used by the follow-up commands (f and
F) in order to allow you to enter and post a follow-up news
article. If not set, trn handles the whole process and calls
inews directly. See also NEWSHEADER.
NNTPSERVER
The hostname of your NNTPSERVER. [This does not apply unless
you are running the NNTP version of trn.]
Default: the hostname listed in the server file, usually
/usr/local/lib/rn/server.
NOPOSTRING
The string to insert in the group summary line, which heads
each article, for a group to which local posting is not
allowed. See also MODSTRING.
Default: " (no posting)"
NORMSAVER (~)
The shell command to save an article in the normal (non-
mailbox) format.
Default: %X/norm.saver %A %P %c %a %B %C "%b"
ORGANIZATION
Either the name of your organization, or the name of a file
containing the name of your organization. (If NEWSORG is set,
it will override ORGANIZATION.) May be interpolated using
"%o".
Default: whatever your news administrator compiled in.
PAGESTOP
If defined, contains a regular expression which matches article
lines to be treated as form-feeds. There are at least two
things you might want to do with this. To cause page breaks
between articles in a digest, you might define it as
"^--------". To force a page break before a signature, you
could define it as "^-- $". (Then, when you see "--" at the
bottom of the page, you can skip the signature if you so desire
by typing ’n’ instead of space.) To do both, you could use
"^--". If you want to break on more than one pattern, you can
use "│" to separate the alternatives.
There is some overhead involved in matching each line of the
article against a regular expression. You might wish to use a
baud-rate modifier to enable this feature only at low baud
rates.
Default: undefined
PIPESAVER (%)
The shell command to execute in order to accomplish a save to a
pipe ("s │ command" or "w │ command"). The command typed by
the user is substituted in as %b.
Default: %(%B=^0$?<%A:tail -c +%B %A │) %b
Explanation: if %B is 0, the command is "<%A %b", otherwise the
command is "tail -c +%B %A │ %b".
REPLYTO The value of the "Reply-To:" header, if needed.
RNINIT This variable is used when initializing trn in rn-compatibility
mode (see the -x switch) or when the TRNINIT variable isn’t
defined. See the TRNINIT variable for a description.
RNMACRO (~)
The name of the file containing macros and key mappings when
running trn as rn. See also the TRNMACRO variable and the
CUSTOM MACROS section.
Default: %./.rnmac
SAVEDIR (~)
The name of the directory to save to, if the save command does
not specify a directory name.
Default:
If -/ is set: %p/%c
If +/ is set: %p
SAVENAME (%)
The name of the file to save to, if the save command contains
only a directory name.
Default:
If -/ is set: %a
If +/ is set: %^C
SELECTCHARS
The characters used by the thread selector to select the
associated thread of discussion. You can specify up to 64
visible characters, including upper- and lower-case letters,
numbers, and many punctuation characters. Selection characters
override command characters in the selector, but are not
excluded from macro expansion, so be careful.
Default: abdefgijlorstuvwxyz1234567890BCFGHIKMVW
(You’ll notice various characters are omitted to allow them to
be typed as commands in the selector.)
SHELL The name of your preferred shell. It will be used by the ’!’,
’S’ and ’W’ commands.
Default: whatever your news administrator compiled in.
SUBJLINE (%)
Controls the format of the lines displayed by the ’=’ command
at the article selection level.
Default: %s
SUPERSEDEHEADER (%)
The format of the header file for a supersede article.
Default:
From: %L@%H (%N)
Newsgroups: %n
Subject: %S
Distribution: %D
Organization: %o
Supersedes: %i
TERM Determines which termcap entry to use, unless TERMCAP contains
the entry.
TERMCAP Holds either the name of your termcap file, or a termcap entry.
Default: /etc/termcap, normally.
TRNINIT Default values for switches may be passed to trn by placing
them in the TRNINIT variable (or RNINIT if you’re starting trn
in rn-compatibility mode). Any switch that is set in this way
may be overruled on the command line, or via the ’&’ command
from within trn. Binary-valued switches that are set with
"-switch" may be unset using "+switch".
If TRNINIT begins with a ’/’ it is assumed to be the name of a
file containing switches. You can put comments in this file by
preceding them with a ’#’ as long as this is the first
character on a line or it follows some white-space (which
delimits the switches in the file). If you want to set many
environment variables but don’t want to keep them all in your
environment, or if the use of any of these variables conflicts
with other programs, you can use this feature along with the -E
switch to set the environment variables upon startup.
Default: " ".
TRNMACRO (~)
The name of the file containing macros and key mappings. If
the file is not found, the RNMACRO variable is used to look for
your rn macros. For information on what to put into this file,
see the CUSTOM MACROS section.
Default: %./.trn/macros
UNSHAR (~)
The shell command to execute in order to accomplish the
unshar’ing of a shell archive.
Default: /bin/sh
USER Your login name. May be interpolated using "%L".
Default: $LOGNAME
VISUAL (~)
The name of your editor.
Default: $EDITOR
XTERMMOUSE
If you set this variable to ’y’ (yes), trn will enable the use
of the xterm mouse in the selector if you are using an xterm.
Once enabled left-clicking on an item selects it while middle-
clicking an item will move to that item. If you click the top
(header) line of the selector it moves up a page. If you click
the bottom (footer) line of the selector it executes the
default command for the page (left click) or goes down a page
(middle click). You can also use the right mouse button to
move up or down a page by clicking in the upper-half or lower-
half of the screen, respectively.
YOUSAID (%)
Gives the format of the attribution line in front of the quoted
article included by an R command.
Default: In article %i you write:
AUTOMATIC MACROS
On startup trn attempts to build a set of macros that map your keypad
arrow keys to useful functions. These default actions are mentioned in
the prior description of each level’s commands. If you don’t like this
(or trn gets it wrong), you can disable the automatic macros by using
the -A option.
CUSTOM MACROS
When trn starts up it looks for a file containing macro definitions
(see environment variables TRNMACRO and RNMACRO). Any sequence of
commands may be bound to any sequence of keys, so you could re-map your
entire keyboard if you desire. Blank lines or lines beginning with #
in the macro file are considered comments; otherwise trn looks for two
fields separated by white space. The first field gives the sequence of
keystrokes that trigger the macro, and the second field gives the
sequence of commands to execute. Both fields are subject to %
interpolation, which will also translate backslash and caret sequences.
(The keystroke field is interpreted at startup time, but the command
field is interpreted at macro execution time so that you may refer to %
values in a macro.) For example, if you want to reverse the roles of
carriage return and space in trn
^J \040
^M \040
\040 ^J
will do just that. By default, all characters in the command field are
interpreted as the canonical trn characters, i.e. no macro expansion is
done. Otherwise the above pair of macros would cause an infinite loop.
To force macro expansion in the command field, enclose the macro call
with ^( ... ^) thusly:
@s │mysavescript
@w w^(@s^)
You can use the %() conditional construct to construct macros that work
differently under different circumstances. In particular, the current
mode (%m) of trn could be used to make a command that only works at a
particular level. This is particularly vital for the selector which
uses most of the lower-case letters to select the associated item in
its display. For example,
a %(%m=t?a:s art.hold\n)
will return the original letter (a) in the selector, and the command "s
art.hold\n" everywhere else.
%(%{TERM}=vt100?^[[O) /^J
will do the binding only if the terminal type is vt100, though if you
have many of these it would be better to have separate files for each
terminal.
If you want to bind a macro to a function key that puts a common
garbage character after the sequence (such as the carriage return on
the end of Televideo 920 function sequences), DO NOT put the carriage
return into all the sequences or you will waste a CONSIDERABLE amount
of internal storage. Instead of "^AF^M", put "^AF+1", which indicates
to trn that it should gobble up one character after the F.
WHAT’S NEW
Here’s a quick run-down of trn’s features and commands aimed at the
knowledgeable rn or trn user.
The addition of true reference-line threading is one of the biggest
improvements over rn. This threading allows you to read a discussion
in reply order with an article’s replies being attached to the article
that inspired them. Threads will encompass multiple subjects whenever
a reply to an article in the thread arrives with a different subject.
This is usually done to better indicate the topic in the reply when it
diverges from the original subject.
Another big improvement is the selector, which is bound to the ’+’ key.
The selector displays a list of threads, subjects, or individual
articles to allow you to select the topics that interest you by typing
their associated letter. The difference between the thread and the
subject selector is that the subject selector displays all subjects
with a separate selection letter, even those tied together via their
references. This can be quite useful if you select some threads and
desire to weed out some extraneous discussions: you could switch the
selector into exclusive mode (’E’ shows only selected threads) and then
into subject mode (’Ss’) to separate the threads into their component
subjects and deselect or kill the subjects you don’t care about. You
don’t have to go to all this trouble using the selector if you prefer
to just hit the ’k’ key when you start reading a subject you’re not
interested in. The selector can also switch between showing unread
articles and articles that have already been read, allowing you to
selectively re-read discussions (this is the ’U’ command in the
selector).
Another threaded addition is the article-tree display in the upper-
right corner of the header. Looking at the tree gives you a feel for
how the articles you are reading relate to each other, allowing you to
see at a glance when there are lots of replies and decide if you want
to junk an uninteresting set of replies or perhaps tough it out.
The header display has also been modified to hide a few more lines by
default (e.g. References), but, as always, you can override these with
-h. There is also some more "magic" in the header: the From header can
be trimmed to be just the comment portion (if available), and the Date
header is displayed in local time (by default). Use -H and +H to turn
header magic on and off.
Once you begin reading articles, use the regular movement commands (n,
N, p, P, etc.) as you normally would. You’ll find that these commands
track the reply order shown in the tree display. Then try using ^N and
^P, which follow a subject in the order the articles were posted.
Finally, check out the [, ], (, ), {, and } commands to move around in
the article tree a bit more directly. The first four commands should
also be bound to your keypad’s arrow keys, making them easier to type.
For example, typing ’[’ (left) takes you to your parent article, even
if it was already read, which is very useful for tracking down the
cited portion of the article in its original context.
There are additional kill commands for the entire thread (J) and the
current article and all its replies (,).
The KILL files have been extended and the commands inside them are now
referred to memorized commands, since they are often used for selection
rather than killing of articles. There are new, easier ways to add
memorized commands using the ’A’dd and ’T’hread commands. The ’A’
command is subject-oriented, while the ’T’ command is article-oriented
(meaning they affect a specific set of articles rather than any article
that happens to have a matching subject). They both prompt you for
what kind of command you want to add, making both auto-killing and
auto-selecting just as easy.
There is also an easy way to skip around among the various threads with
the < and > commands. Use them if you want to skip a set of article
and read them later instead of junking them.
Note: your news administrator has the option of turning thread
processing off for individual groups, and thus it is possible for some
groups to not have any pre-processed thread information available for
use. When trn encounters such a group, it generates the thread
information on the fly while entering the group. For really large
groups (or really slow systems), this can take an appreciable amount of
time. If you can’t talk your news administrator into pre-threading the
group, you can turn off the threading on a group-by-group basis using
the ’t’ command at the newsgroup-selection level. Groups turned off in
this way are read in the rn style -- articles arranged in arrival order
unless you specify the -S option, which reads the articles in date
order by subject.
Take note of the "e dir" command, which is used to extract a shell
archive or uuencoded file into the specified directory. It is even
possible to extract other data formats if you specify the appropriate
filter command (e.g. "e dir│cmd".
Also, if you plan to use macro definitions, it is good to keep in mind
that the selector uses most of the lower-case letters for selection,
and thus it is a good idea to explicitly set the mode(s) in which a
macro applies. For example, if you want to press ’f’ from the article
pager/selector to forward the current article to the user "smith", you
could define:
f %(%m=[pa]?│mail smith\n:f)
This checks the current mode (%m) and if it is ’p’ or ’a’ it expands it
to the string "│mail smith\n", otherwise it returns the letter ’f’. In
some cases, you may simply wish to exclude the selector from a macro
with the conditional "%m!=t".
Finally, you’ll probably want to use the new options, -x and -X to
ensure that all the newest features are available for use. These
options might be on by default, depending on how your administrator
decided to install trn.
AUTHORS
Rn was created by Larry Wall <lwall@jpl-devvax.jpl.nasa.gov>
and is now under the direction of Stan Barber <sob@bcm.tmc.edu>.
Threaded version by Wayne Davison <wayne@clari.net>
(Mail all bug reports for trn to Wayne.)
Regular expression routines are borrowed from emacs, by James Gosling.
Hashing routines are modified versions from Geoffrey Collyer.
FILES
%./.newsrc status of your news reading
%./.oldnewsrc
backup copy of your .newsrc from start of session
%./.rnlock lock file so you don’t screw up your .newsrc
%./.rnlast info from last run of trn
%./.rnsoft soft pointers into /usr/lib/news/active to speed startup,
synchronous with .newsrc
%./.rnhead temporary header file to pass to a mailer or news poster
%./.[t]rnmac
macro and keymap definitions
%p your news save directory, usually ~/News
%x/active the list of active newsgroups, usually
/usr/lib/news/active on systems that don’t use NNTP
%P the public news spool directory, usually /usr/spool/news
on systems that don’t use NNTP
%X/INIT system-wide default switches
SEE ALSO
newsrc(5), more(1), readnews(1), Pnews(1), Rnmail(1)
DIAGNOSTICS
Generally self-documenting, as they say.
BUGS
The -h switch can only hide header lines that trn knows about.
The ’-’ command doesn’t cross newsgroup boundaries, and only undoes the
last article selection.
If you edit your .newsrc while trn is running, trn will happily wipe
out your changes when it decides to write out the .newsrc file.
Marking of duplicate articles as read in cross-referenced newsgroups
will not work unless the Xref patch is installed in inews.
If you get carried away with % or escape substitutions, you can
overflow buffers.