Newsgroup Propagation Search Engine

The Newsgroup Propagation Search Engine checks for availability of specific newsgroups at certain News Service Providers (NSPs).

Frequently Asked Questions

To be honest, this is somewhat of a misnomer. There haven't yet been any questions asked, let along enough to determine statistically which are asked most frequently. However, it is useful, I think, to provide some answers to questions I predict might be asked. In that vein, consider this the Potentially-Frequently Asked Questions page. Be assured that any questions which are asked frequently (and even some that are asked occasionally but are interesting) will make an appearance here. Under no circumstances will I include question to which I don't know the answer ;).

Table of Contents

1. What is the point of this search engine?
2. Why would anyone want to know that?
3. What is 'Propagation'?
4. Why is is that alt.my.pet.group seems to have poor propagation? How can I improve it?
5. I want to discuss a certain subject. Can I use this engine to find the appropriate newsgroup?
6. Can I contact you to improve propagation?
7. I know alt.my.pet.group is carried on news.example.com, but I don't see it listed. Why?
8. Why is this site butt-ugly?
9. Does the search engine reflect the current status of the servers?
10. Did you steal this site from someone? (it looks so familiar)
11. Why doesn't this search engine search through the ISC archives?
12. What servers do you check?
13. Where is that search engine you are talking about?
14. Anything new to report?

Answers

1. What is the point of this search engine?
   In short, the idea is to learn which servers have made a particular group available. Before I get too far it would be wise to mention that these are Usenet newsgroups that you are searching for, not Yahoo!Groups, or any other type of discussion-group-du-jour.
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2. Why would anyone want to know that?
   Two main reasons come to mind.
   First, you want to participate in the newsgroup, but do not know which servers have the group available. This isn't too useful a tool in that case, because almost every server will add a newsgroup on customer request.
   The other reason is to learn which popular news service providers (NSPs) have made the group available. This could be useful when promoting a new newsgroup.
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3. What is 'Propagation'?
   Propagation means dissemination of messages posted to a newsgroup throughout Usenet. For a user to read a message posted to a specific newsgroup, his news server must make that newsgroup available. The more servers that make that newsgroup available, the more widely messages posted to it will propagate. This search engine will tell you, of the servers it checks, which ones will be able to receive a message posted to a particular newsgroup.
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4. Why is is that alt.my.pet.group seems to have poor propagation? How can I improve it?
   There is no central authority in Usenet.
   As a consequence, every server administrator has their own idea of what constitutes a good newsgroup, and what groups should be available. It is not surprising then, that no two servers have the same list of groups.
   
   Some server administrators prefer that a proponent of an alt.* group discuss the proposal for at least a week in alt.config so to resolve issues before a control message sent. See Mark Kelly's 'How to create an ALT newsgroup' or -=Hawks=-'s .sig.
   Most servers don't have all possible hierarchies available.
   Some server administrators don't follow the recommendations from a hierarchy administrator.
   Most server administrators check the archive at ftp.isc.org to verify that the control message is in the correct syntax and available.
   
   Brand-new groups are having issues becoming well-propagated. Typically, it is necessary to invest a lot of effort into promoting a new group. Asking interested users to petition their news service to make the group available. Many proponents include a short message in their sig which "gets the word out" on the group.
   If a server administrator hasn't yet made a group available, the admin will typically do so upon user request.
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5. I want to discuss a certain subject. Can I use this engine to find the appropriate newsgroup?
   The engine is limited to a search in the newsgroup name, of available newsgroups. You can use the partial match to search for your subject. A better search would be in the newsgroups file at ISC. Download the (big) file and unzip it using for instance 7-zip. The newsgroups file contains the newsgroup description, an important line to search for a specific topic. A complete archive of all possible newsgroups is also available at ISC. It's a bit hard to search through this archive. Perhaps a dead newsgroup can be revived by you. Perhaps alt.config can help you with that.
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6. Can I contact you to improve propagation?
   No you can't. I have no relation with the listed servers. If you want your alt.my.pet.group on a server you'll have to contact the administrator of that server.
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7. I know alt.my.pet.group is carried on news.example.com, but I don't see it listed. Why?
   The obvious answer is that this page only references a very small subset of available news servers. However, if you know of a server which has a publicly available active list (either through ftp or www, in txt or gz format), feel free to pass the word along to me.
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8. Why is this site butt-ugly?
   The creator of these pages is a programmer not an html guru. If you're volunteering to whip me up a new site, I'd be happy to accept. Caveat: No javascript crap.
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9. Does the search engine reflect the current status of the servers?
   No it doesn't so there is no need to search over and over again. The servers are checked once a day so there is no need to check propagation more often. Next to that, there is no guarantee that the collected data from the severs is up-to-date.
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10. Did you steal this site from someone? (it looks so familiar)
    Perhaps you are familiar with the group search pages that Mike Klaas once made. Mike didn't have the time to maintain the pages. That's why he installed it on this site and gave it all to me in September 2006. I have updated some of it, but the engine is so complex I don't dare to change it. I wanted to make a great Mike-is-a-nice-guy page but Mike told me: "Just put "original incarnation developed by Mike Klaas" or something". Well, there you go Mike.
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11. Why doesn't this search engine search through the ISC archives?
    The search page gives a link to the control archive but it doesn't search through the archives. There isn't room enough for this search and the ISC archive is only of interest after sending of a control. However, it does search through the ISC.org active file.
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12. What servers do you check?
    There are a gazillion servers (actually about 1500) out there and it's impossible to check them all.
    Currently the following 49 servers are listed:
    • usenetserver/ astraweb/ newsreader/ newsGuy/ individual/ easynews/ supernews/ altopia/ kanaga.Switch/ motzarella.org/ ISC (reference active file)/ linuxfan.it/ www.cu.mi.it/ netcologne.de/ bawue.net/ xmission.net/ garr.it/ isoc.lu/ datemas/ bubbanews/ xs4all/ newszilla.xs4all/ allnews.readfreenews.net/ doubleSlash.org/ ulcc.ac.uk/ ocn.ad.jp/ code-werk.net/ mb-net.net/ Germany.net/ France academic/ demon uk/ ciril.fr/ freenews.netfront.net/ usenethost.com/ usenetrocket/ ntu-kpi.kiev.ua/ teranews(x)/ readnews.com/ premium-news/ nntpjunkie/ nntpservers/ itl.ua/ usenet-fr.net/ x-privat.org/ newnet.co.uk/ club.cc.cmu.edu/ uiuc.edu/ shared secrets/ aioe.org
    • uncensored news/ airnews/ shaw/ newsfeeds/ giganews/ octanews/ eweka/ ispa.de/ imt-mrs.fr/ univ-aix.fr/ buzzardnews/ soft-gems.net/ buerger.net/ newshosting/ wanadoo.nl/ EuroNet/ cn99.com/ yaako.com/ maxwell/ meganetnews/ 100proofnews/ taunusstein.net/ eutelia.it/ kabelfoon.nl were once listed in this search, but have been removed. Either the required files couln't be downloaded anymore, are not updated, the server is a duplicate or the active file is corrupt.
    • (x) means that data collection appears to be unstable.
    • This list of servers is not intended as a recommendation.
    • Resellers of backend NSP's often have the same newsgroups. The website of AnchorDudes lists some big backend NSP's and their resellers.
    • The Top 1000 lists NSP's based on posted messages.
    • Use the newzbot! search engine to find newsgroup propagation on free servers.
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13. Where is that search engine you are talking about?
    Click here =>.

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Current Status/News:
Since there are some loyal users of this page, I will be trying to update this part of the page so that it isn't only the random people who email me who know what's going on.

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Last Updated: May 18, 2007