Re: Question for Agent (and other news reader) users

On Sun, 11 Dec 2005 01:47:51 GMT, Bob Cunningham <exw6sxq@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

>On Sat, 10 Dec 2005 20:33:50 +0000, Peter Duncanson
><mail@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> said:
>
>> On 10 Dec 2005 19:28:56 GMT, Dena Jo <me@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> > Can Agent filter by specific words in a post? I'm
>> > looking for a news reader that has that capability.
>
>> Agent 3.0 (the latest release) and earlier can filter
>> only on header data: Subject and Author.
>
>But, as you probably know, Agent will search on content
>(called "Global Search"). For example, you can search for
>all postings that contain the word "pronunciation", display
>a list of hits, then delete all of them without ever having
>brought any of them up for reading.
>
Yes. However as mentioned by Lars Eighner this will require the
downloading of the bodies of all messages, with attendant costs.

Perhaps someone should add a filtering service to a newsserver.

>The global search string can be a Boolean expression, like
>
> pronunciation and ASCII IPA and not (John Wells or
> Henry Sweet)
>
>which will give you a list of all postings that have both of
>the strings "pronunciation" and "ASCII IPA" except the ones
>that mention either "John Wells" or "Henry Sweet" or whose
>author is one of them.
>
Yes this could be done by someone who is happy to download all message
bodies.

I have Agent set to download bodies automatically. However, as I retain
at least one month's worth of messages in each newsgroup, routine use of
Global Search is either very time consuming, or would require
preliminary fiddling to restrict the "message view" to unread messages
followed by resetting the view to what I want.

>(Did I cross to another thread by saying "ones ... whose
>author is"? I wouldn't write it any other way.)
>
>> > (I tried asking such a question in news.software.readers,
>> > but the people there assume you're a moron who doesn't
>> > know what they're doing and they get snarky, and I don't
>> > respond to snarky well.)
>
>Every newsgroup has a few smartasses who think it's clever
>to be snarky. I usually assume they are teenagers or
>preteens and mark subsequent postings from them "already
>read" (my closest approach to a killfile). There's no
>minimum age for Usenet posters, so far as I've heard.
>
>This newsgroup has a few who delight in doing everything but
>be responsive, but for every one of them there must be four
>or five who will try to provide helpful responses.
>
>> Snarky is bad.
>
>Fortunately, so far as I've noticed, it's not the
>predominant characteristic of this newsgroup's posters.
>
>To see predominant snarky, look at
>alt.possessive.its.has.no.apostrophe, also known as "A Posse
>of Idiots Heading Nowhere Apace". Tell them Sideshow Bob
>referred you to them.

As a lurker and occasional poster in apihna it is my impression that the
denizens of that ng indulge in playful snarky.

Is the Hunting of the Snarky disgraceful trolling or an admirable public
service?
--
Peter Duncanson
UK (posting from a.u.e)
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Question for Agent (and other news reader) users
    ... >> Can Agent filter by specific words in a post? ... all postings that contain the word "pronunciation", ... >> know what they're doing and they get snarky, ...
    (alt.usage.english)
  • Agent and filters (was: Re: Test -please ignore)
    ... postings isn't such a bad idea. ... Unfortunately, Agent isn't capable of ... setting a filter on User-Agent ...
    (news.software.readers)
  • Re: Newbie Info
    ... JamesE wrote: ... >I have been looking through some postings where a group of people were ... >trying to get agent to be able to filter on the NTTP posting agent ...
    (alt.smokers.cigars)
  • Re: Agent and filters
    ... postings isn't such a bad idea. ... setting a filter on User-Agent ... I gave up Agent years ago. ... It's the only thing that I think Agent would filter it on. ...
    (news.software.readers)
  • Re: Agent and filters
    ... postings isn't such a bad idea. ... setting a filter on User-Agent ... I gave up Agent years ago. ... It's the only thing that I think Agent would filter it on. ...
    (news.software.readers)