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[gnus] / texi / gnus-faq.texi

@c \input texinfo @c -*-texinfo-*-
@c Uncomment 1st line before texing this file alone.
@c %**start of header
@c Copyright (C) 1995, 2001-2013 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
@c
@c @setfilename gnus-faq.info
@c @settitle Frequently Asked Questions
@c %**end of header
@c

@node Frequently Asked Questions
@section Frequently Asked Questions

@menu
* FAQ - Changes::
* FAQ - Introduction::                       About Gnus and this FAQ.
* FAQ 1 - Installation FAQ::                 Installation of Gnus.
* FAQ 2 - Startup / Group buffer::           Start up questions and the
                                             first buffer Gnus shows you.
* FAQ 3 - Getting Messages::                 Making Gnus read your mail
                                             and news.
* FAQ 4 - Reading messages::                 How to efficiently read
                                             messages.
* FAQ 5 - Composing messages::               Composing mails or Usenet
                                             postings.
* FAQ 6 - Old messages::                     Importing, archiving,
                                             searching and deleting messages.
* FAQ 7 - Gnus in a dial-up environment::    Reading mail and news while
                                             offline.
* FAQ 8 - Getting help::                     When this FAQ isn't enough.
* FAQ 9 - Tuning Gnus::                      How to make Gnus faster.
* FAQ - Glossary::                           Terms used in the FAQ
                                             explained.
@end menu

@subheading Abstract

This is the new Gnus Frequently Asked Questions list.

Please submit features and suggestions to the
@email{ding@@gnus.org, ding list}.

@node FAQ - Changes
@subsection Changes



@itemize @bullet

@item
2008-06-15: Adjust for message-fill-column.  Add x-face-file.
Clarify difference between ding and gnu.emacs.gnus.  Remove
reference to discontinued service.

@item
2006-04-15: Added tip on how to delete sent buffer on exit.
@end itemize

@node FAQ - Introduction
@subsection Introduction

This is the Gnus Frequently Asked Questions list.

Gnus is a Usenet Newsreader and Electronic Mail User Agent implemented
as a part of Emacs. It's been around in some form for almost a decade
now, and has been distributed as a standard part of Emacs for much of
that time. Gnus 5 is the latest (and greatest) incarnation. The
original version was called GNUS, and was written by Masanobu UMEDA@.
When autumn crept up in '94, Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen grew bored and
decided to rewrite Gnus.

Its biggest strength is the fact that it is extremely
customizable. It is somewhat intimidating at first glance, but
most of the complexity can be ignored until you're ready to take
advantage of it. If you receive a reasonable volume of e-mail
(you're on various mailing lists), or you would like to read
high-volume mailing lists but cannot keep up with them, or read
high volume newsgroups or are just bored, then Gnus is what you
want.

This FAQ was maintained by Justin Sheehy until March 2002. He
would like to thank Steve Baur and Per Abrahamsen for doing a wonderful
job with this FAQ before him. We would like to do the same: thanks,
Justin!

This version is much nicer than the unofficial hypertext
versions that are archived at Utrecht, Oxford, Smart Pages, Ohio
State, and other FAQ archives. See the resources question below
if you want information on obtaining it in another format.

The information contained here was compiled with the assistance
of the Gnus development mailing list, and any errors or
misprints are the Gnus team's fault, sorry.

@node FAQ 1 - Installation FAQ
@subsection Installation FAQ

@menu
* FAQ 1-1::    What is the latest version of Gnus?
* FAQ 1-2::    What's new in 5.10?
* FAQ 1-3::    Where and how to get Gnus?
* FAQ 1-4::    What to do with the tarball now?
* FAQ 1-5::    I sometimes read references to No Gnus and Oort Gnus,
               what are those?
* FAQ 1-6::    Which version of Emacs do I need?
* FAQ 1-7::    How do I run Gnus on both Emacs and XEmacs?
@end menu

@node FAQ 1-1
@subsubheading Question 1.1

What is the latest version of Gnus?

@subsubheading Answer

Jingle please: Gnus 5.10 is released, get it while it's
hot! As well as the step in version number is rather
small, Gnus 5.10 has tons of new features which you
shouldn't miss. The current release (5.13) should be at
least as stable as the latest release of the 5.8 series.

@node FAQ 1-2
@subsubheading Question 1.2

What's new in 5.10?

@subsubheading Answer

First of all, you should have a look into the file
GNUS-NEWS in the toplevel directory of the Gnus tarball,
there the most important changes are listed. Here's a
short list of the changes I find especially
important/interesting:

@itemize @bullet

@item
Major rewrite of the Gnus agent, Gnus agent is now
active by default.

@item
Many new article washing functions for dealing with
ugly formatted articles.

@item
Anti Spam features.

@item
Message-utils now included in Gnus.

@item
New format specifiers for summary lines, e.g., %B for
a complex trn-style thread tree.
@end itemize

@node FAQ 1-3
@subsubheading Question 1.3

Where and how to get Gnus?

@subsubheading Answer

Gnus is released independent from releases of Emacs and XEmacs.
Therefore, the version bundled with Emacs or the version in XEmacs's
package system might not be up to date (e.g., Gnus 5.9 bundled with Emacs
21 is outdated).
You can get the latest released version of Gnus from
@uref{http://www.gnus.org/dist/gnus.tar.gz}
or via anonymous FTP from
@uref{ftp://ftp.gnus.org/pub/gnus/gnus.tar.gz}.

@node FAQ 1-4
@subsubheading Question 1.4

What to do with the tarball now?

@subsubheading Answer

Untar it via @samp{tar xvzf gnus.tar.gz} and do the common
@samp{./configure; make; make install} circle.
(under MS-Windows either get the Cygwin environment from
@uref{http://www.cygwin.com}
which allows you to do what's described above or unpack the
tarball with some packer (e.g., Winace from
@uref{http://www.winace.com})
and use the batch-file make.bat included in the tarball to install
Gnus.) If you don't want to (or aren't allowed to) install Gnus
system-wide, you can install it in your home directory and add the
following lines to your ~/.xemacs/init.el or ~/.emacs:

@example
(add-to-list 'load-path "/path/to/gnus/lisp")
(if (featurep 'xemacs)
    (add-to-list 'Info-directory-list "/path/to/gnus/texi/")
  (add-to-list 'Info-default-directory-list "/path/to/gnus/texi/"))
@end example
@noindent

Make sure that you don't have any Gnus related stuff
before this line, on MS Windows use something like
"C:/path/to/lisp" (yes, "/").

@node FAQ 1-5
@subsubheading Question 1.5

I sometimes read references to No Gnus and Oort Gnus,
what are those?

@subsubheading Answer

Oort Gnus was the name of the development version of
Gnus, which became Gnus 5.10 in autumn 2003. No Gnus is
the name of the current development version which will
once become Gnus 5.12 or Gnus 6. (If you're wondering why
not 5.11, the odd version numbers are normally used for
the Gnus versions bundled with Emacs)

@node FAQ 1-6
@subsubheading Question 1.6

Which version of Emacs do I need?

@subsubheading Answer

Gnus 5.10 requires an Emacs version that is greater than or equal
to Emacs 20.7 or XEmacs 21.1.
The development versions of Gnus (aka No Gnus) requires Emacs 21
or XEmacs 21.4.

@node FAQ 1-7
@subsubheading Question 1.7

How do I run Gnus on both Emacs and XEmacs?

@subsubheading Answer

You can't use the same copy of Gnus in both as the Lisp
files are byte-compiled to a format which is different
depending on which Emacs did the compilation. Get one copy
of Gnus for Emacs and one for XEmacs.

@node FAQ 2 - Startup / Group buffer
@subsection Startup / Group buffer

@menu
* FAQ 2-1::    Every time I start Gnus I get a message "Gnus auto-save
               file exists. Do you want to read it?", what does this mean and
               how to prevent it?
* FAQ 2-2::    Gnus doesn't remember which groups I'm subscribed to,
               what's this?
* FAQ 2-3::    How to change the format of the lines in Group buffer?
* FAQ 2-4::    My group buffer becomes a bit crowded, is there a way to
               sort my groups into categories so I can easier browse through
               them?
* FAQ 2-5::    How to manually sort the groups in Group buffer? How to
               sort the groups in a topic?
@end menu

@node FAQ 2-1
@subsubheading Question 2.1

Every time I start Gnus I get a message "Gnus auto-save
file exists. Do you want to read it?", what does this mean
and how to prevent it?

@subsubheading Answer

This message means that the last time you used Gnus, it
wasn't properly exited and therefore couldn't write its
information to disk (e.g., which messages you read), you
are now asked if you want to restore that information
from the auto-save file.

To prevent this message make sure you exit Gnus
via @samp{q} in group buffer instead of
just killing Emacs.

@node FAQ 2-2
@subsubheading Question 2.2

Gnus doesn't remember which groups I'm subscribed to,
what's this?

@subsubheading Answer

You get the message described in the q/a pair above while
starting Gnus, right? It's an other symptom for the same
problem, so read the answer above.

@node FAQ 2-3
@subsubheading Question 2.3

How to change the format of the lines in Group buffer?

@subsubheading Answer

You've got to tweak the value of the variable
gnus-group-line-format. See the manual node "Group Line
Specification" for information on how to do this. An
example for this (guess from whose .gnus :-)):

@example
(setq gnus-group-line-format "%P%M%S[%5t]%5y : %(%g%)\n")
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 2-4
@subsubheading Question 2.4

My group buffer becomes a bit crowded, is there a way to
sort my groups into categories so I can easier browse
through them?

@subsubheading Answer

Gnus offers the topic mode, it allows you to sort your
groups in, well, topics, e.g., all groups dealing with
Linux under the topic linux, all dealing with music under
the topic music and all dealing with scottish music under
the topic scottish which is a subtopic of music.

To enter topic mode, just hit t while in Group buffer. Now
you can use @samp{T n} to create a topic
at point and @samp{T m} to move a group to
a specific topic. For more commands see the manual or the
menu. You might want to include the %P specifier at the
beginning of your gnus-group-line-format variable to have
the groups nicely indented.

@node FAQ 2-5
@subsubheading Question 2.5

How to manually sort the groups in Group buffer? How to
sort the groups in a topic?

@subsubheading Answer

Move point over the group you want to move and
hit @samp{C-k}, now move point to the
place where you want the group to be and
hit @samp{C-y}.

@node FAQ 3 - Getting Messages
@subsection Getting Messages

@menu
* FAQ 3-1::     I just installed Gnus, started it via  @samp{M-x gnus}
                but it only says "nntp (news) open error", what to do?
* FAQ 3-2::     I'm working under Windows and have no idea what
                ~/.gnus.el means.
* FAQ 3-3::     My news server requires authentication, how to store
                user name and password on disk?
* FAQ 3-4::     Gnus seems to start up OK, but I can't find out how to
                subscribe to a group.
* FAQ 3-5::     Gnus doesn't show all groups / Gnus says I'm not allowed
                to post on this server as well as I am, what's that?
* FAQ 3-6::     I want Gnus to fetch news from several servers, is this
                possible?
* FAQ 3-7::     And how about local spool files?
* FAQ 3-8::     OK, reading news works now, but I want to be able to
                read my mail with Gnus, too. How to do it?
* FAQ 3-9::     And what about IMAP?
* FAQ 3-10::    At the office we use one of those MS Exchange servers,
                can I use Gnus to read my mail from it?
* FAQ 3-11::    Can I tell Gnus not to delete the mails on the server it
                retrieves via POP3?
@end menu

@node FAQ 3-1
@subsubheading Question 3.1

I just installed Gnus, started it via
@samp{M-x gnus}
but it only says "nntp (news) open error", what to do?

@subsubheading Answer

You've got to tell Gnus where to fetch the news from. Read
the documentation for information on how to do this. As a
first start, put those lines in ~/.gnus.el:

@example
(setq gnus-select-method '(nntp "news.yourprovider.net"))
(setq user-mail-address "you@@yourprovider.net")
(setq user-full-name "Your Name")
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 3-2
@subsubheading Question 3.2

I'm working under Windows and have no idea what ~/.gnus.el means.

@subsubheading Answer

The ~/ means the home directory where Gnus and Emacs look
for the configuration files.  However, you don't really
need to know what this means, it suffices that Emacs knows
what it means :-) You can type
@samp{C-x C-f ~/.gnus.el RET }
(yes, with the forward slash, even on Windows), and
Emacs will open the right file for you.  (It will most
likely be new, and thus empty.)
However, I'd discourage you from doing so, since the
directory Emacs chooses will most certainly not be what
you want, so let's do it the correct way.
The first thing you've got to do is to
create a suitable directory (no blanks in directory name
please), e.g., c:\myhome. Then you must set the environment
variable HOME to this directory.  To do this under Windows 9x
or Me include the line

@example
SET HOME=C:\myhome
@end example
@noindent

in your autoexec.bat and reboot.  Under NT, 2000 and XP, hit
Winkey+Pause/Break to enter system options (if it doesn't work, go
to Control Panel -> System -> Advanced). There you'll find the
possibility to set environment variables.  Create a new one with
name HOME and value C:\myhome.  Rebooting is not necessary.

Now to create ~/.gnus.el, say
@samp{C-x C-f ~/.gnus.el RET C-x C-s}.
in Emacs.

@node FAQ 3-3
@subsubheading Question 3.3

My news server requires authentication, how to store
user name and password on disk?

@subsubheading Answer

Create a file ~/.authinfo which includes for each server a line like this

@example
machine news.yourprovider.net login YourUserName password YourPassword
@end example
@noindent
.
Make sure that the file isn't readable to others if you
work on a OS which is capable of doing so.  (Under Unix
say
@example
chmod 600 ~/.authinfo
@end example
@noindent

in a shell.)

@node FAQ 3-4
@subsubheading Question 3.4

Gnus seems to start up OK, but I can't find out how to
subscribe to a group.

@subsubheading Answer

If you know the name of the group say @samp{U
name.of.group RET} in group buffer (use the
tab-completion Luke). Otherwise hit ^ in group buffer,
this brings you to the server buffer. Now place point (the
cursor) over the server which carries the group you want,
hit @samp{RET}, move point to the group
you want to subscribe to and say @samp{u}
to subscribe to it.

@node FAQ 3-5
@subsubheading Question 3.5

Gnus doesn't show all groups / Gnus says I'm not allowed to
post on this server as well as I am, what's that?

@subsubheading Answer

Some providers allow restricted anonymous access and full
access only after authorization. To make Gnus send authinfo
to those servers append

@example
force yes
@end example
@noindent

to the line for those servers in ~/.authinfo.

@node FAQ 3-6
@subsubheading Question 3.6

I want Gnus to fetch news from several servers, is this possible?

@subsubheading Answer

Of course. You can specify more sources for articles in the
variable gnus-secondary-select-methods. Add something like
this in ~/.gnus.el:

@example
(add-to-list 'gnus-secondary-select-methods
             '(nntp "news.yourSecondProvider.net"))
(add-to-list 'gnus-secondary-select-methods
             '(nntp "news.yourThirdProvider.net"))
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 3-7
@subsubheading Question 3.7

And how about local spool files?

@subsubheading Answer

No problem, this is just one more select method called
nnspool, so you want this:

@example
(add-to-list 'gnus-secondary-select-methods '(nnspool ""))
@end example
@noindent

Or this if you don't want an NNTP Server as primary news source:

@example
(setq gnus-select-method '(nnspool ""))
@end example
@noindent

Gnus will look for the spool file in /usr/spool/news, if you
want something different, change the line above to something like this:

@example
(add-to-list 'gnus-secondary-select-methods
             '(nnspool ""
                       (nnspool-directory "/usr/local/myspoolddir")))
@end example
@noindent

This sets the spool directory for this server only.
You might have to specify more stuff like the program used
to post articles, see the Gnus manual on how to do this.

@node FAQ 3-8
@subsubheading Question 3.8

OK, reading news works now, but I want to be able to read my mail
with Gnus, too. How to do it?

@subsubheading Answer

That's a bit harder since there are many possible sources
for mail, many possible ways for storing mail and many
different ways for sending mail. The most common cases are
these: 1: You want to read your mail from a pop3 server and
send them directly to a SMTP Server 2: Some program like
fetchmail retrieves your mail and stores it on disk from
where Gnus shall read it. Outgoing mail is sent by
Sendmail, Postfix or some other MTA@. Sometimes, you even
need a combination of the above cases.

However, the first thing to do is to tell Gnus in which way
it should store the mail, in Gnus terminology which back end
to use. Gnus supports many different back ends, the most
commonly used one is nnml. It stores every mail in one file
and is therefore quite fast. However you might prefer a one
file per group approach if your file system has problems with
many small files, the nnfolder back end is then probably the
choice for you.  To use nnml add the following to ~/.gnus.el:

@example
(add-to-list 'gnus-secondary-select-methods '(nnml ""))
@end example
@noindent

As you might have guessed, if you want nnfolder, it's

@example
(add-to-list 'gnus-secondary-select-methods '(nnfolder ""))
@end example
@noindent

Now we need to tell Gnus, where to get its mail from. If
it's a POP3 server, then you need something like this:

@example
(eval-after-load "mail-source"
  '(add-to-list 'mail-sources '(pop :server "pop.YourProvider.net"
                                    :user "yourUserName"
                                    :password "yourPassword")))
@end example
@noindent

Make sure ~/.gnus.el isn't readable to others if you store
your password there. If you want to read your mail from a
traditional spool file on your local machine, it's

@example
(eval-after-load "mail-source"
  '(add-to-list 'mail-sources '(file :path "/path/to/spool/file"))
@end example
@noindent

If it's a Maildir, with one file per message as used by
postfix, Qmail and (optionally) fetchmail it's

@example
(eval-after-load "mail-source"
  '(add-to-list 'mail-sources '(maildir :path "/path/to/Maildir/"
                                        :subdirs ("cur" "new")))
@end example
@noindent

And finally if you want to read your mail from several files
in one directory, for example because procmail already split your
mail, it's

@example
(eval-after-load "mail-source"
  '(add-to-list 'mail-sources
                '(directory :path "/path/to/procmail-dir/"
                            :suffix ".prcml")))
@end example
@noindent

Where :suffix ".prcml" tells Gnus only to use files with the
suffix .prcml.

OK, now you only need to tell Gnus how to send mail. If you
want to send mail via sendmail (or whichever MTA is playing
the role of sendmail on your system), you don't need to do
anything. However, if you want to send your mail to an
SMTP Server you need the following in your ~/.gnus.el

@example
(setq send-mail-function 'smtpmail-send-it)
(setq message-send-mail-function 'smtpmail-send-it)
(setq smtpmail-default-smtp-server "smtp.yourProvider.net")
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 3-9
@subsubheading Question 3.9

And what about IMAP?

@subsubheading Answer

There are two ways of using IMAP with Gnus. The first one is
to use IMAP like POP3, that means Gnus fetches the mail from
the IMAP server and stores it on disk. If you want to do
this (you don't really want to do this) add the following to
~/.gnus.el

@example
(add-to-list 'mail-sources '(imap :server "mail.mycorp.com"
                                  :user "username"
                                  :pass "password"
                                  :stream network
                                  :authentication login
                                  :mailbox "INBOX"
                                  :fetchflag "\\Seen"))
@end example
@noindent

You might have to tweak the values for stream and/or
authentication, see the Gnus manual node "Mail Source
Specifiers" for possible values.

If you want to use IMAP the way it's intended, you've got to
follow a different approach.  You've got to add the nnimap
back end to your select method and give the information
about the server there.

@example
(add-to-list 'gnus-secondary-select-methods
             '(nnimap "Give the baby a name"
                      (nnimap-address "imap.yourProvider.net")
                      (nnimap-port 143)
                      (nnimap-list-pattern "archive.*")))
@end example
@noindent

Again, you might have to specify how to authenticate to the
server if Gnus can't guess the correct way, see the Manual
Node "IMAP" for detailed information.

@node FAQ 3-10
@subsubheading Question 3.10

At the office we use one of those MS Exchange servers, can I use
Gnus to read my mail from it?

@subsubheading Answer

Offer your administrator a pair of new running shoes for
activating IMAP on the server and follow the instructions
above.

@node FAQ 3-11
@subsubheading Question 3.11

Can I tell Gnus not to delete the mails on the server it
retrieves via POP3?

@subsubheading Answer

Yes, if the POP3 server supports the UIDL control (maybe almost servers
do it nowadays).  To do that, add a @code{:leave VALUE} pair to each
POP3 mail source.  See @pxref{Mail Source Specifiers} for VALUE.

@node FAQ 4 - Reading messages
@subsection Reading messages

@menu
* FAQ 4-1::     When I enter a group, all read messages are gone. How to
                view them again?
* FAQ 4-2::     How to tell Gnus to show an important message every time
                I enter a group, even when it's read?
* FAQ 4-3::     How to view the headers of a message?
* FAQ 4-4::     How to view the raw unformatted message?
* FAQ 4-5::     How can I change the headers Gnus displays by default at
                the top of the article buffer?
* FAQ 4-6::     I'd like Gnus NOT to render HTML-mails but show me the
                text part if it's available. How to do it?
* FAQ 4-7::     Can I use some other browser than w3 to render my
                HTML-mails?
* FAQ 4-8::     Is there anything I can do to make poorly formatted
                mails more readable?
* FAQ 4-9::     Is there a way to automatically ignore posts by specific
                authors or with specific words in the subject? And can I
                highlight more interesting ones in some way?
* FAQ 4-10::    How can I disable threading in some (e.g., mail-) groups,
                or set other variables specific for some groups?
* FAQ 4-11::    Can I highlight messages written by me and follow-ups to
                those?
* FAQ 4-12::    The number of total messages in a group which Gnus
                displays in group buffer is by far to high, especially in mail
                groups. Is this a bug?
* FAQ 4-13::    I don't like the layout of summary and article buffer,
                how to change it? Perhaps even a three pane display?
* FAQ 4-14::    I don't like the way the Summary buffer looks, how to
                tweak it?
* FAQ 4-15::    How to split incoming mails in several groups?
@end menu

@node FAQ 4-1
@subsubheading Question 4.1

When I enter a group, all read messages are gone. How to view them again?

@subsubheading Answer

If you enter the group by saying
@samp{RET}
in group buffer with point over the group, only unread and ticked messages are loaded. Say
@samp{C-u RET}
instead to load all available messages. If you want only the 300 newest say
@samp{C-u 300 RET}

Loading only unread messages can be annoying if you have threaded view enabled, say

@example
(setq gnus-fetch-old-headers 'some)
@end example
@noindent

in ~/.gnus.el to load enough old articles to prevent teared threads, replace 'some with t to load
all articles (Warning: Both settings enlarge the amount of data which is
fetched when you enter a group and slow down the process of entering a group).

If you already use Gnus 5.10, you can say
@samp{/o N}
In summary buffer to load the last N messages, this feature is not available in 5.8.8

If you don't want all old messages, but the parent of the message you're just reading,
you can say @samp{^}, if you want to retrieve the whole thread
the message you're just reading belongs to, @samp{A T} is your friend.

@node FAQ 4-2
@subsubheading Question 4.2

How to tell Gnus to show an important message every time I
enter a group, even when it's read?

@subsubheading Answer

You can tick important messages. To do this hit
@samp{u} while point is in summary buffer
over the message. When you want to remove the mark, hit
either @samp{d} (this deletes the tick
mark and set's unread mark) or @samp{M c}
(which deletes all marks for the message).

@node FAQ 4-3
@subsubheading Question 4.3

How to view the headers of a message?

@subsubheading Answer

Say @samp{t}
to show all headers, one more
@samp{t}
hides them again.

@node FAQ 4-4
@subsubheading Question 4.4

How to view the raw unformatted message?

@subsubheading Answer

Say
@samp{C-u g}
to show the raw message
@samp{g}
returns to normal view.

@node FAQ 4-5
@subsubheading Question 4.5

How can I change the headers Gnus displays by default at
the top of the article buffer?

@subsubheading Answer

The variable gnus-visible-headers controls which headers
are shown, its value is a regular expression, header lines
which match it are shown. So if you want author, subject,
date, and if the header exists, Followup-To and MUA / NUA
say this in ~/.gnus.el:

@example
(setq gnus-visible-headers
      '("^From" "^Subject" "^Date" "^Newsgroups" "^Followup-To"
        "^User-Agent" "^X-Newsreader" "^X-Mailer"))
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 4-6
@subsubheading Question 4.6

I'd like Gnus NOT to render HTML-mails but show me the
text part if it's available. How to do it?

@subsubheading Answer

Say

@example
(eval-after-load "mm-decode"
 '(progn
      (add-to-list 'mm-discouraged-alternatives "text/html")
      (add-to-list 'mm-discouraged-alternatives "text/richtext")))
@end example
@noindent

in ~/.gnus.el. If you don't want HTML rendered, even if there's no text alternative add

@example
(setq mm-automatic-display (remove "text/html" mm-automatic-display))
@end example
@noindent

too.

@node FAQ 4-7
@subsubheading Question 4.7

Can I use some other browser than w3 to render my HTML-mails?

@subsubheading Answer

Only if you use Gnus 5.10 or younger. In this case you've got the
choice between w3, w3m, links, lynx and html2text, which
one is used can be specified in the variable
mm-text-html-renderer, so if you want links to render your
mail say

@example
(setq mm-text-html-renderer 'links)
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 4-8
@subsubheading Question 4.8

Is there anything I can do to make poorly formatted mails
more readable?

@subsubheading Answer

Gnus offers you several functions to "wash" incoming mail, you can
find them if you browse through the menu, item
Article->Washing. The most interesting ones are probably "Wrap
long lines" (@samp{W w}), "Decode ROT13"
(@samp{W r}) and "Outlook Deuglify" which repairs
the dumb quoting used by many users of Microsoft products
(@samp{W Y f} gives you full deuglify.
See @samp{W Y C-h} or have a look at the menus for
other deuglifications).  Outlook deuglify is only available since
Gnus 5.10.

@node FAQ 4-9
@subsubheading Question 4.9

Is there a way to automatically ignore posts by specific
authors or with specific words in the subject? And can I
highlight more interesting ones in some way?

@subsubheading Answer

You want Scoring. Scoring means, that you define rules
which assign each message an integer value. Depending on
the value the message is highlighted in summary buffer (if
it's high, say +2000) or automatically marked read (if the
value is low, say -800) or some other action happens.

There are basically three ways of setting up rules which assign
the scoring-value to messages. The first and easiest way is to set
up rules based on the article you are just reading. Say you're
reading a message by a guy who always writes nonsense and you want
to ignore his messages in the future. Hit
@samp{L}, to set up a rule which lowers the score.
Now Gnus asks you which the criteria for lowering the Score shall
be. Hit @samp{?} twice to see all possibilities,
we want @samp{a} which means the author (the from
header). Now Gnus wants to know which kind of matching we want.
Hit either @samp{e} for an exact match or
@samp{s} for substring-match and delete afterwards
everything but the name to score down all authors with the given
name no matter which email address is used. Now you need to tell
Gnus when to apply the rule and how long it should last, hit
@samp{p} to apply the rule now and let it last
forever. If you want to raise the score instead of lowering it say
@samp{I} instead of @samp{L}.

You can also set up rules by hand. To do this say @samp{V
f} in summary buffer. Then you are asked for the name
of the score file, it's name.of.group.SCORE for rules valid in
only one group or all.Score for rules valid in all groups. See the
Gnus manual for the exact syntax, basically it's one big list
whose elements are lists again. the first element of those lists
is the header to score on, then one more list with what to match,
which score to assign, when to expire the rule and how to do the
matching. If you find me very interesting, you could add the
following to your all.Score:

@example
(("references" ("hschmi22.userfqdn.rz-online.de" 500 nil s))
 ("message-id" ("hschmi22.userfqdn.rz-online.de" 999 nil s)))
@end example
@noindent

This would add 999 to the score of messages written by me
and 500 to the score of messages which are a (possibly
indirect) answer to a message written by me. Of course
nobody with a sane mind would do this :-)

The third alternative is adaptive scoring. This means Gnus
watches you and tries to find out what you find
interesting and what annoying and sets up rules
which reflect this. Adaptive scoring can be a huge help
when reading high traffic groups. If you want to activate
adaptive scoring say

@example
(setq gnus-use-adaptive-scoring t)
@end example
@noindent

in ~/.gnus.el.

@node FAQ 4-10
@subsubheading Question 4.10

How can I disable threading in some (e.g., mail-) groups, or
set other variables specific for some groups?

@subsubheading Answer

While in group buffer move point over the group and hit
@samp{G c}, this opens a buffer where you
can set options for the group. At the bottom of the buffer
you'll find an item that allows you to set variables
locally for the group. To disable threading enter
gnus-show-threads as name of variable and nil as
value. Hit button done at the top of the buffer when
you're ready.

@node FAQ 4-11
@subsubheading Question 4.11

Can I highlight messages written by me and follow-ups to
those?

@subsubheading Answer

Stop those "Can I ..." questions, the answer is always yes
in Gnus Country :-). It's a three step process: First we
make faces (specifications of how summary-line shall look
like) for those postings, then we'll give them some
special score and finally we'll tell Gnus to use the new
faces.

@node FAQ 4-12
@subsubheading Question 4.12

The number of total messages in a group which Gnus
displays in group buffer is by far to high, especially in
mail groups. Is this a bug?

@subsubheading Answer

No, that's a matter of design of Gnus, fixing this would
mean reimplementation of major parts of Gnus'
back ends. Gnus thinks "highest-article-number @minus{}
lowest-article-number = total-number-of-articles". This
works OK for Usenet groups, but if you delete and move
many messages in mail groups, this fails. To cure the
symptom, enter the group via @samp{C-u RET}
(this makes Gnus get all messages), then
hit @samp{M P b} to mark all messages and
then say @samp{B m name.of.group} to move
all messages to the group they have been in before, they
get new message numbers in this process and the count is
right again (until you delete and move your mail to other
groups again).

@node FAQ 4-13
@subsubheading Question 4.13

I don't like the layout of summary and article buffer, how
to change it? Perhaps even a three pane display?

@subsubheading Answer

You can control the windows configuration by calling the
function gnus-add-configuration. The syntax is a bit
complicated but explained very well in the manual node
"Window Layout". Some popular examples:

Instead 25% summary 75% article buffer 35% summary and 65%
article (the 1.0 for article means "take the remaining
space"):

@example
(gnus-add-configuration
 '(article (vertical 1.0 (summary .35 point) (article 1.0))))
@end example
@noindent

A three pane layout, Group buffer on the left, summary
buffer top-right, article buffer bottom-right:

@example
(gnus-add-configuration
 '(article
   (horizontal 1.0
               (vertical 25
                         (group 1.0))
               (vertical 1.0
                         (summary 0.25 point)
                         (article 1.0)))))
(gnus-add-configuration
 '(summary
   (horizontal 1.0
               (vertical 25
                         (group 1.0))
               (vertical 1.0
                         (summary 1.0 point)))))
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 4-14
@subsubheading Question 4.14

I don't like the way the Summary buffer looks, how to tweak it?

@subsubheading Answer

You've got to play around with the variable
gnus-summary-line-format. Its value is a string of
symbols which stand for things like author, date, subject
etc. A list of the available specifiers can be found in the
manual node "Summary Buffer Lines" and the often forgotten
node "Formatting Variables" and its sub-nodes. There
you'll find useful things like positioning the cursor and
tabulators which allow you a summary in table form, but
sadly hard tabulators are broken in 5.8.8.

Since 5.10, Gnus offers you some very nice new specifiers,
e.g., %B which draws a thread-tree and %&user-date which
gives you a date where the details are dependent of the
articles age. Here's an example which uses both:

@example
(setq gnus-summary-line-format ":%U%R %B %s %-60=|%4L |%-20,20f |%&user-date; \n")
@end example
@noindent

resulting in:

@example
:O     Re: [Richard Stallman] rfc2047.el          |  13 |Lars Magne Ingebrigt |Sat 23:06
:O     Re: Revival of the ding-patches list       |  13 |Lars Magne Ingebrigt |Sat 23:12
:R  >  Re: Find correct list of articles for a gro|  25 |Lars Magne Ingebrigt |Sat 23:16
:O  \->  ...                                      |  21 |Kai Grossjohann      | 0:01
:R  >  Re: Cry for help: deuglify.el - moving stuf|  28 |Lars Magne Ingebrigt |Sat 23:34
:O  \->  ...                                      | 115 |Raymond Scholz       | 1:24
:O    \->  ...                                    |  19 |Lars Magne Ingebrigt |15:33
:O     Slow mailing list                          |  13 |Lars Magne Ingebrigt |Sat 23:49
:O     Re: `@@' mark not documented                |  13 |Lars Magne Ingebrigt |Sat 23:50
:R  >  Re: Gnus still doesn't count messages prope|  23 |Lars Magne Ingebrigt |Sat 23:57
:O  \->  ...                                      |  18 |Kai Grossjohann      | 0:35
:O    \->  ...                                    |  13 |Lars Magne Ingebrigt | 0:56
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 4-15
@subsubheading Question 4.15

How to split incoming mails in several groups?

@subsubheading Answer

Gnus offers two possibilities for splitting mail, the easy
nnmail-split-methods and the more powerful Fancy Mail
Splitting. I'll only talk about the first one, refer to
the manual, node "Fancy Mail Splitting" for the latter.

The value of nnmail-split-methods is a list, each element
is a list which stands for a splitting rule. Each rule has
the form "group where matching articles should go to",
"regular expression which has to be matched", the first
rule which matches wins. The last rule must always be a
general rule (regular expression .*) which denotes where
articles should go which don't match any other rule. If
the folder doesn't exist yet, it will be created as soon
as an article lands there.  By default the mail will be
send to all groups whose rules match. If you
don't want that (you probably don't want), say

@example
(setq nnmail-crosspost nil)
@end example
@noindent

in ~/.gnus.el.

An example might be better than thousand words, so here's
my nnmail-split-methods. Note that I send duplicates in a
special group and that the default group is spam, since I
filter all mails out which are from some list I'm
subscribed to or which are addressed directly to me
before. Those rules kill about 80% of the Spam which
reaches me (Email addresses are changed to prevent spammers
from using them):

@example
(setq nnmail-split-methods
  '(("duplicates" "^Gnus-Warning:.*duplicate")
    ("XEmacs-NT" "^\\(To:\\|CC:\\).*localpart@@xemacs.invalid.*")
    ("Gnus-Tut" "^\\(To:\\|CC:\\).*localpart@@socha.invalid.*")
    ("tcsh" "^\\(To:\\|CC:\\).*localpart@@mx.gw.invalid.*")
    ("BAfH" "^\\(To:\\|CC:\\).*localpart@@.*uni-muenchen.invalid.*")
    ("Hamster-src" "^\\(CC:\\|To:\\).*hamster-sourcen@@yahoogroups.\\(de\\|com\\).*")
    ("Tagesschau" "^From: tagesschau <localpart@@www.tagesschau.invalid>$")
    ("Replies" "^\\(CC:\\|To:\\).*localpart@@Frank-Schmitt.invalid.*")
    ("EK" "^From:.*\\(localpart@@privateprovider.invalid\\|localpart@@workplace.invalid\\).*")
    ("Spam" "^Content-Type:.*\\(ks_c_5601-1987\\|EUC-KR\\|big5\\|iso-2022-jp\\).*")
    ("Spam" "^Subject:.*\\(This really work\\|XINGA\\|ADV:\\|XXX\\|adult\\|sex\\).*")
    ("Spam" "^Subject:.*\\(\=\?ks_c_5601-1987\?\\|\=\?euc-kr\?\\|\=\?big5\?\\).*")
    ("Spam" "^X-Mailer:\\(.*BulkMailer.*\\|.*MIME::Lite.*\\|\\)")
    ("Spam" "^X-Mailer:\\(.*CyberCreek Avalanche\\|.*http\:\/\/GetResponse\.com\\)")
    ("Spam" "^From:.*\\(verizon\.net\\|prontomail\.com\\|money\\|ConsumerDirect\\).*")
    ("Spam" "^Delivered-To: GMX delivery to spamtrap@@gmx.invalid$")
    ("Spam" "^Received: from link2buy.com")
    ("Spam" "^CC: .*azzrael@@t-online.invalid")
    ("Spam" "^X-Mailer-Version: 1.50 BETA")
    ("Uni" "^\\(CC:\\|To:\\).*localpart@@uni-koblenz.invalid.*")
    ("Inbox" "^\\(CC:\\|To:\\).*\\(my\ name\\|address@@one.invalid\\|address@@two.invalid\\)")
    ("Spam" "")))
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 5 - Composing messages
@subsection Composing messages

@menu
* FAQ 5-1::     What are the basic commands I need to know for sending
                mail and postings?
* FAQ 5-2::     How to enable automatic word-wrap when composing
                messages?
* FAQ 5-3::     How to set stuff like From, Organization, Reply-To,
                signature...?
* FAQ 5-4::     Can I set things like From, Signature etc. group based on
                the group I post too?
* FAQ 5-5::     Is there a spell-checker? Perhaps even on-the-fly
                spell-checking?
* FAQ 5-6::     Can I set the dictionary based on the group I'm posting
                to?
* FAQ 5-7::     Is there some kind of address-book, so I needn't
                remember all those email addresses?
* FAQ 5-8::     Sometimes I see little images at the top of article
                buffer. What's that and how can I send one with my postings,
                too?
* FAQ 5-9::     Sometimes I accidentally hit r instead of f in
                newsgroups. Can Gnus warn me, when I'm replying by mail in
                newsgroups?
* FAQ 5-10::    How to tell Gnus not to generate a sender header?
* FAQ 5-11::    I want Gnus to locally store copies of my send mail and
                news, how to do it?
* FAQ 5-12::    I want Gnus to kill the buffer after successful sending
                instead of keeping it alive as "Sent mail to...", how to do it?
* FAQ 5-13::    People tell me my Message-IDs are not correct, why
                aren't they and how to fix it?
@end menu

@node FAQ 5-1
@subsubheading Question 5.1

What are the basic commands I need to know for sending mail and postings?

@subsubheading Answer

To start composing a new mail hit @samp{m}
either in Group or Summary buffer, for a posting, it's
either @samp{a} in Group buffer and
filling the Newsgroups header manually
or @samp{a} in the Summary buffer of the
group where the posting shall be send to. Replying by mail
is
@samp{r} if you don't want to cite the
author, or import the cited text manually and
@samp{R} to cite the text of the original
message. For a follow up to a newsgroup, it's
@samp{f} and @samp{F}
(analogously to @samp{r} and
@samp{R}).

Enter new headers above the line saying "--text follows
this line--", enter the text below the line. When ready
hit @samp{C-c C-c}, to send the message,
if you want to finish it later hit @samp{C-c
C-d} to save it in the drafts group, where you
can start editing it again by saying @samp{D
e}.

@node FAQ 5-2
@subsubheading Question 5.2

How to enable automatic word-wrap when composing messages?

@subsubheading Answer

Starting from No Gnus, automatic word-wrap is already enabled by
default, see the variable message-fill-column.

For other versions of Gnus, say

@example
(unless (boundp 'message-fill-column)
  (add-hook 'message-mode-hook
            (lambda ()
              (setq fill-column 72)
              (turn-on-auto-fill))))
@end example
@noindent

in ~/.gnus.el.

You can reformat a paragraph by hitting @samp{M-q}
(as usual).

@node FAQ 5-3
@subsubheading Question 5.3

How to set stuff like From, Organization, Reply-To, signature...?

@subsubheading Answer

There are other ways, but you should use posting styles
for this. (See below why).
This example should make the syntax clear:

@example
(setq gnus-posting-styles
  '((".*"
     (name "Frank Schmitt")
     (address "me@@there.invalid")
     (organization "Hamme net, kren mer och nimmi")
     (signature-file "~/.signature")
     ("X-SampleHeader" "foobar")
     (eval (setq some-variable "Foo bar")))))
@end example
@noindent

The ".*" means that this settings are the default ones
(see below), valid values for the first element of the
following lists are signature, signature-file,
organization, address, name or body.  The attribute name
can also be a string.  In that case, this will be used as
a header name, and the value will be inserted in the
headers of the article; if the value is `nil', the header
name will be removed. You can also say (eval (foo bar)),
then the function foo will be evaluated with argument bar
and the result will be thrown away.

@node FAQ 5-4
@subsubheading Question 5.4

Can I set things like From, Signature etc group based on the group I post too?

@subsubheading Answer

That's the strength of posting styles. Before, we used ".*"
to set the default for all groups. You can use a regexp
like "^gmane" and the following settings are only applied
to postings you send to the gmane hierarchy, use
".*binaries" instead and they will be applied to postings
send to groups containing the string binaries in their
name etc.

You can instead of specifying a regexp specify a function
which is evaluated, only if it returns true, the
corresponding settings take effect. Two interesting
candidates for this are message-news-p which returns t if
the current Group is a newsgroup and the corresponding
message-mail-p.

Note that all forms that match are applied, that means in
the example below, when I post to
gmane.mail.spam.spamassassin.general, the settings under
".*" are applied and the settings under message-news-p and
those under "^gmane" and those under
"^gmane\\.mail\\.spam\\.spamassassin\\.general$". Because
of this put general settings at the top and specific ones
at the bottom.

@example
(setq gnus-posting-styles
      '((".*" ;;default
         (name "Frank Schmitt")
         (organization "Hamme net, kren mer och nimmi")
         (signature-file "~/.signature"))
        ((message-news-p) ;;Usenet news?
         (address "mySpamTrap@@Frank-Schmitt.invalid")
         (reply-to "hereRealRepliesOnlyPlease@@Frank-Schmitt.invalid"))
        ((message-mail-p) ;;mail?
         (address "usedForMails@@Frank-Schmitt.invalid"))
        ("^gmane" ;;this is mail, too in fact
         (address "usedForMails@@Frank-Schmitt.invalid")
         (reply-to nil))
        ("^gmane\\.mail\\.spam\\.spamassassin\\.general$"
         (eval (set (make-local-variable 'message-sendmail-envelope-from)
                    "Azzrael@@rz-online.de")))))
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 5-5
@subsubheading Question 5.5

Is there a spell-checker? Perhaps even on-the-fly spell-checking?

@subsubheading Answer

You can use ispell.el to spell-check stuff in Emacs. So the
first thing to do is to make sure that you've got either
@uref{http://fmg-www.cs.ucla.edu/fmg-members/geoff/ispell.html, ispell}
or @uref{http://aspell.sourceforge.net/, aspell}
installed and in your Path. Then you need
@uref{http://www.kdstevens.com/~stevens/ispell-page.html, ispell.el}
and for on-the-fly spell-checking
@uref{http://www-sop.inria.fr/members/Manuel.Serrano/flyspell/flyspell.html, flyspell.el}.
Ispell.el is shipped with Emacs and available through the XEmacs package system,
flyspell.el is shipped with Emacs and part of XEmacs text-modes package which is
available through the package system, so there should be no need to install them
manually.

Ispell.el assumes you use ispell, if you choose aspell say

@example
(setq ispell-program-name "aspell")
@end example
@noindent

in your Emacs configuration file.

If you want your outgoing messages to be spell-checked, say

@example
(add-hook 'message-send-hook 'ispell-message)
@end example
@noindent

In your ~/.gnus.el, if you prefer on-the-fly spell-checking say

@example
(add-hook 'message-mode-hook (lambda () (flyspell-mode 1)))
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 5-6
@subsubheading Question 5.6

Can I set the dictionary based on the group I'm posting to?

@subsubheading Answer

Yes, say something like

@example
(add-hook 'gnus-select-group-hook
          (lambda ()
            (cond
             ((string-match
               "^de\\." (gnus-group-real-name gnus-newsgroup-name))
              (ispell-change-dictionary "deutsch8"))
             (t
              (ispell-change-dictionary "english")))))
@end example
@noindent

in ~/.gnus.el. Change "^de\\." and "deutsch8" to something
that suits your needs.

@node FAQ 5-7
@subsubheading Question 5.7

Is there some kind of address-book, so I needn't remember
all those email addresses?

@subsubheading Answer

There's an very basic solution for this, mail aliases.
You can store your mail addresses in a ~/.mailrc file using a simple
alias syntax:

@example
alias al        "Al <al@@english-heritage.invalid>"
@end example
@noindent

Then typing your alias (followed by a space or punctuation
character) on a To: or Cc: line in the message buffer will
cause Gnus to insert the full address for you. See the
node "Mail Aliases" in Message (not Gnus) manual for
details.

However, what you really want is the Insidious Big Brother
Database bbdb. Get it through the XEmacs package system or from
@uref{http://bbdb.sourceforge.net/, bbdb's homepage}.
Now place the following in ~/.gnus.el, to activate bbdb for Gnus:

@example
(require 'bbdb)
(bbdb-initialize 'gnus 'message)
@end example
@noindent

Now you probably want some general bbdb configuration,
place them in ~/.emacs:

@example
(require 'bbdb)
;;If you don't live in Northern America, you should disable the
;;syntax check for telephone numbers by saying
(setq bbdb-north-american-phone-numbers-p nil)
;;Tell bbdb about your email address:
(setq bbdb-user-mail-names
      (regexp-opt '("Your.Email@@here.invalid"
                    "Your.other@@mail.there.invalid")))
;;cycling while completing email addresses
(setq bbdb-complete-name-allow-cycling t)
;;No popup-buffers
(setq bbdb-use-pop-up nil)
@end example
@noindent

Now you should be ready to go. Say @samp{M-x bbdb RET
RET} to open a bbdb buffer showing all
entries. Say @samp{c} to create a new
entry, @samp{b} to search your BBDB and
@samp{C-o} to add a new field to an
entry. If you want to add a sender to the BBDB you can
also just hit `:' on the posting in the summary buffer and
you are done. When you now compose a new mail,
hit @samp{TAB} to cycle through know
recipients.

@node FAQ 5-8
@subsubheading Question 5.8

Sometimes I see little images at the top of article
buffer. What's that and how can I send one with my
postings, too?

@subsubheading Answer

Those images are called X-Faces. They are 48*48 pixel b/w
pictures, encoded in a header line. If you want to include
one in your posts, you've got to convert some image to a
X-Face. So fire up some image manipulation program (say
Gimp), open the image you want to include, cut out the
relevant part, reduce color depth to 1 bit, resize to
48*48 and save as bitmap. Now you should get the compface
package from
@uref{ftp://ftp.cs.indiana.edu:/pub/faces/, this site}.
and create the actual X-face by saying

@example
cat file.xbm | xbm2ikon | compface > file.face
cat file.face | sed 's/\\/\\\\/g;s/\"/\\\"/g;' > file.face.quoted
@end example
@noindent

If you can't use compface, there's an online X-face converter at
@uref{http://www.dairiki.org/xface/}.
If you use MS Windows, you could also use the WinFace program from
@uref{http://www.xs4all.nl/~walterln/winface/}.
Now you only have to tell Gnus to include the X-face in your postings by saying

@example
(setq message-default-headers
        (with-temp-buffer
          (insert "X-Face: ")
          (insert-file-contents "~/.xface")
          (buffer-string)))
@end example
@noindent

in ~/.gnus.el.  If you use Gnus 5.10, you can simply add an entry

@example
(x-face-file "~/.xface")
@end example
@noindent

to gnus-posting-styles.

@node FAQ 5-9
@subsubheading Question 5.9

Sometimes I accidentally hit r instead of f in
newsgroups. Can Gnus warn me, when I'm replying by mail in
newsgroups?

@subsubheading Answer

Put this in ~/.gnus.el:

@example
(setq gnus-confirm-mail-reply-to-news t)
@end example
@noindent

if you already use Gnus 5.10, if you still use 5.8.8 or
5.9 try this instead:

@example
(eval-after-load "gnus-msg"
  '(unless (boundp 'gnus-confirm-mail-reply-to-news)
     (defadvice gnus-summary-reply (around reply-in-news activate)
       "Request confirmation when replying to news."
       (interactive)
       (when (or (not (gnus-news-group-p gnus-newsgroup-name))
                 (y-or-n-p "Really reply by mail to article author? "))
         ad-do-it))))
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 5-10
@subsubheading Question 5.10

How to tell Gnus not to generate a sender header?

@subsubheading Answer

Since 5.10 Gnus doesn't generate a sender header by
default. For older Gnus' try this in ~/.gnus.el:

@example
(eval-after-load "message"
      '(add-to-list 'message-syntax-checks '(sender . disabled)))
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 5-11
@subsubheading Question 5.11

I want Gnus to locally store copies of my send mail and
news, how to do it?

@subsubheading Answer

You must set the variable gnus-message-archive-group to do
this. You can set it to a string giving the name of the
group where the copies shall go or like in the example
below use a function which is evaluated and which returns
the group to use.

@example
(setq gnus-message-archive-group
        '((if (message-news-p)
              "nnml:Send-News"
            "nnml:Send-Mail")))
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 5-12
@subsubheading Question 5.12

I want Gnus to kill the buffer after successful sending instead of keeping
it alive as "Sent mail to...", how to do it?

@subsubheading Answer

Add this to your ~/.gnus:

@example
(setq message-kill-buffer-on-exit t)
@end example
@noindent

@node FAQ 5-13
@subsubheading Question 5.13

People tell me my Message-IDs are not correct, why
aren't they and how to fix it?

@subsubheading Answer

The message-ID is an unique identifier for messages you
send. To make it unique, Gnus need to know which machine
name to put after the "@@". If the name of the machine
where Gnus is running isn't suitable (it probably isn't
at most private machines) you can tell Gnus what to use
by saying:

@example
(setq message-user-fqdn "yourmachine.yourdomain.tld")
@end example
@noindent

in ~/.gnus.el.  If you use Gnus 5.9 or earlier, you can use this
instead (works for newer versions as well):

@example
(eval-after-load "message"
  '(let ((fqdn "yourmachine.yourdomain.tld"));; <-- Edit this!
     (if (boundp 'message-user-fqdn)
         (setq message-user-fqdn fqdn)
       (gnus-message 1 "Redefining `message-make-fqdn'.")
       (defun message-make-fqdn ()
         "Return user's fully qualified domain name."
         fqdn))))
@end example
@noindent

If you have no idea what to insert for
"yourmachine.yourdomain.tld", you've got several
choices. You can either ask your provider if he allows
you to use something like
yourUserName.userfqdn.provider.net, or you can use
somethingUnique.yourdomain.tld if you own the domain
yourdomain.tld, or you can register at a service which
gives private users a FQDN for free.

Finally you can tell Gnus not to generate a Message-ID
for News at all (and letting the server do the job) by saying

@example
(setq message-required-news-headers
  (remove' Message-ID message-required-news-headers))
@end example
@noindent

you can also tell Gnus not to generate Message-IDs for mail by saying

@example
(setq message-required-mail-headers
  (remove' Message-ID message-required-mail-headers))
@end example
@noindent

, however some mail servers don't generate proper
Message-IDs, too, so test if your Mail Server behaves
correctly by sending yourself a Mail and looking at the Message-ID.

@node FAQ 6 - Old messages
@subsection Old messages

@menu
* FAQ 6-1::    How to import my old mail into Gnus?
* FAQ 6-2::    How to archive interesting messages?
* FAQ 6-3::    How to search for a specific message?
* FAQ 6-4::    How to get rid of old unwanted mail?
* FAQ 6-5::    I want that all read messages are expired (at least in
               some groups). How to do it?
* FAQ 6-6::    I don't want expiration to delete my mails but to move
               them to another group.
@end menu

@node FAQ 6-1
@subsubheading Question 6.1

How to import my old mail into Gnus?

@subsubheading Answer

The easiest way is to tell your old mail program to
export the messages in mbox format. Most Unix mailers
are able to do this, if you come from the MS Windows
world, you may find tools at
@uref{http://mbx2mbox.sourceforge.net/}.

Now you've got to import this mbox file into Gnus. To do
this, create a nndoc group based on the mbox file by
saying @samp{G f /path/file.mbox RET} in
Group buffer. You now have read-only access to your
mail. If you want to import the messages to your normal
Gnus mail groups hierarchy, enter the nndoc group you've
just created by saying @samp{C-u RET}
(thus making sure all messages are retrieved), mark all
messages by saying @samp{M P b} and
either copy them to the desired group by saying
@samp{B c name.of.group RET} or send them
through nnmail-split-methods (respool them) by saying
@samp{B r}.

@node FAQ 6-2
@subsubheading Question 6.2

How to archive interesting messages?

@subsubheading Answer

If you stumble across an interesting message, say in
gnu.emacs.gnus and want to archive it there are several
solutions. The first and easiest is to save it to a file
by saying @samp{O f}. However, wouldn't
it be much more convenient to have more direct access to
the archived message from Gnus? If you say yes, put this
snippet by Frank Haun <pille3003@@fhaun.de> in
~/.gnus.el:

@example
(defun my-archive-article (&optional n)
  "Copies one or more article(s) to a corresponding `nnml:' group, e.g.,
`gnus.ding' goes to `nnml:1.gnus.ding'. And `nnml:List-gnus.ding' goes
to `nnml:1.List-gnus-ding'.

Use process marks or mark a region in the summary buffer to archive
more then one article."
  (interactive "P")
  (let ((archive-name
         (format
          "nnml:1.%s"
          (if (featurep 'xemacs)
              (replace-in-string gnus-newsgroup-name "^.*:" "")
            (replace-regexp-in-string "^.*:" "" gnus-newsgroup-name)))))
    (gnus-summary-copy-article n archive-name)))
@end example
@noindent

You can now say @samp{M-x
my-archive-article} in summary buffer to
archive the article under the cursor in a nnml
group. (Change nnml to your preferred back end)

Of course you can also make sure the cache is enabled by saying

@example
(setq gnus-use-cache t)
@end example
@noindent

then you only have to set either the tick or the dormant
mark for articles you want to keep, setting the read
mark will remove them from cache.

@node FAQ 6-3
@subsubheading Question 6.3

How to search for a specific message?

@subsubheading Answer

There are several ways for this, too. For a posting from
a Usenet group the easiest solution is probably to ask
@uref{http://groups.google.com, groups.google.com},
if you found the posting there, tell Google to display
the raw message, look for the message-id, and say
@samp{M-^ the@@message.id RET} in a
summary buffer.
Since Gnus 5.10 there's also a Gnus interface for
groups.google.com which you can call with
@samp{G W}) in group buffer.

Another idea which works for both mail and news groups
is to enter the group where the message you are
searching is and use the standard Emacs search
@samp{C-s}, it's smart enough to look at
articles in collapsed threads, too. If you want to
search bodies, too try @samp{M-s}
instead. Further on there are the
gnus-summary-limit-to-foo functions, which can help you,
too.

Of course you can also use grep to search through your
local mail, but this is both slow for big archives and
inconvenient since you are not displaying the found mail
in Gnus. Here comes nnir into action. Nnir is a front end
to search engines like swish-e or swish++ and
others. You index your mail with one of those search
engines and with the help of nnir you can search through
the indexed mail and generate a temporary group with all
messages which met your search criteria. If this sound
cool to you get nnir.el from
@uref{ftp://ls6-ftp.cs.uni-dortmund.de/pub/src/emacs/}
or @uref{ftp://ftp.is.informatik.uni-duisburg.de/pub/src/emacs/}.
Instructions on how to use it are at the top of the file.

@node FAQ 6-4
@subsubheading Question 6.4

How to get rid of old unwanted mail?

@subsubheading Answer

You can of course just mark the mail you don't need
anymore by saying @samp{#} with point
over the mail and then say @samp{B DEL}
to get rid of them forever. You could also instead of
actually deleting them, send them to a junk-group by
saying @samp{B m nnml:trash-bin} which
you clear from time to time, but both are not the intended
way in Gnus.

In Gnus, we let mail expire like news expires on a news
server. That means you tell Gnus the message is
expirable (you tell Gnus "I don't need this mail
anymore") by saying @samp{E} with point
over the mail in summary buffer. Now when you leave the
group, Gnus looks at all messages which you marked as
expirable before and if they are old enough (default is
older than a week) they are deleted.

@node FAQ 6-5
@subsubheading Question 6.5

I want that all read messages are expired (at least in
some groups). How to do it?

@subsubheading Answer

If you want all read messages to be expired (e.g., in
mailing lists where there's an online archive), you've
got two choices: auto-expire and
total-expire. Auto-expire means, that every article
which has no marks set and is selected for reading is
marked as expirable, Gnus hits @samp{E}
for you every time you read a message. Total-expire
follows a slightly different approach, here all article
where the read mark is set are expirable.

To activate auto-expire, include auto-expire in the
Group parameters for the group. (Hit @samp{G
c} in summary buffer with point over the
group to change group parameters). For total-expire add
total-expire to the group-parameters.

Which method you choose is merely a matter of taste:
Auto-expire is faster, but it doesn't play together with
Adaptive Scoring, so if you want to use this feature,
you should use total-expire.

If you want a message to be excluded from expiration in
a group where total or auto expire is active, set either
tick (hit @samp{u}) or dormant mark (hit
@samp{u}), when you use auto-expire, you
can also set the read mark (hit
@samp{d}).

@node FAQ 6-6
@subsubheading Question 6.6

I don't want expiration to delete my mails but to move them
to another group.

@subsubheading Answer

Say something like this in ~/.gnus.el:

@example
(setq nnmail-expiry-target "nnml:expired")
@end example
@noindent

(If you want to change the value of nnmail-expiry-target
on a per group basis see the question "How can I disable
threading in some (e.g., mail-) groups, or set other
variables specific for some groups?")

@node FAQ 7 - Gnus in a dial-up environment
@subsection Gnus in a dial-up environment

@menu
* FAQ 7-1::    I don't have a permanent connection to the net, how can I
               minimize the time I've got to be connected?
* FAQ 7-2::    So what was this thing about the Agent?
* FAQ 7-3::    I want to store article bodies on disk, too. How to do
               it?
* FAQ 7-4::    How to tell Gnus not to try to send mails / postings
               while I'm offline?
@end menu

@node FAQ 7-1
@subsubheading Question 7.1

I don't have a permanent connection to the net, how can
I minimize the time I've got to be connected?

@subsubheading Answer

You've got basically two options: Either you use the
Gnus Agent (see below) for this, or you can install
programs which fetch your news and mail to your local
disk and Gnus reads the stuff from your local
machine.

If you want to follow the second approach, you need a
program which fetches news and offers them to Gnus, a
program which does the same for mail and a program which
receives the mail you write from Gnus and sends them
when you're online.

Let's talk about Unix systems first: For the news part,
the easiest solution is a small nntp server like
@uref{http://www.leafnode.org/, Leafnode} or
@uref{http://infa.abo.fi/~patrik/sn/, sn},
of course you can also install a full featured news
server like
@uref{http://www.isc.org/products/INN/, inn}.
Then you want to fetch your Mail, popular choices
are @uref{http://www.catb.org/~esr/fetchmail/, fetchmail}
and @uref{http://pyropus.ca/software/getmail/, getmail}.
You should tell those to write the mail to your disk and
Gnus to read it from there. Last but not least the mail
sending part: This can be done with every MTA like
@uref{http://www.sendmail.org/, sendmail},
@uref{http://www.qmail.org/, postfix},
@uref{http://www.exim.org/, exim} or
@uref{http://www.qmail.org/, qmail}.

On windows boxes I'd vote for
@uref{http://www.tglsoft.de/, Hamster},
it's a small freeware, open-source program which fetches
your mail and news from remote servers and offers them
to Gnus (or any other mail and/or news reader) via nntp
respectively POP3 or IMAP@. It also includes a smtp
server for receiving mails from Gnus.

@node FAQ 7-2
@subsubheading Question 7.2

So what was this thing about the Agent?

@subsubheading Answer

The Gnus agent is part of Gnus, it allows you to fetch
mail and news and store them on disk for reading them
later when you're offline. It kind of mimics offline
newsreaders like Forte Agent. If you want to use
the Agent place the following in ~/.gnus.el if you are
still using 5.8.8 or 5.9 (it's the default since 5.10):

@example
(setq gnus-agent t)
@end example
@noindent

Now you've got to select the servers whose groups can be
stored locally.  To do this, open the server buffer
(that is press @samp{^} while in the
group buffer).  Now select a server by moving point to
the line naming that server.  Finally, agentize the
server by typing @samp{J a}.  If you
make a mistake, or change your mind, you can undo this
action by typing @samp{J r}.  When
you're done, type 'q' to return to the group buffer.
Now the next time you enter a group on a agentized
server, the headers will be stored on disk and read from
there the next time you enter the group.

@node FAQ 7-3
@subsubheading Question 7.3

I want to store article bodies on disk, too. How to do it?

@subsubheading Answer

You can tell the agent to automatically fetch the bodies
of articles which fulfill certain predicates, this is
done in a special buffer which can be reached by
saying @samp{J c} in group
buffer. Please refer to the documentation for
information which predicates are possible and how
exactly to do it.

Further on you can tell the agent manually which
articles to store on disk. There are two ways to do
this: Number one: In the summary buffer, process mark a
set of articles that shall be stored in the agent by
saying @samp{#} with point over the
article and then type @samp{J s}. The
other possibility is to set, again in the summary
buffer, downloadable (%) marks for the articles you
want by typing @samp{@@} with point over
the article and then typing @samp{J u}.
What's the difference? Well, process marks are erased as
soon as you exit the summary buffer while downloadable
marks are permanent.  You can actually set downloadable
marks in several groups then use fetch session ('J s' in
the GROUP buffer) to fetch all of those articles.  The
only downside is that fetch session also fetches all of
the headers for every selected group on an agentized
server.  Depending on the volume of headers, the initial
fetch session could take hours.

@node FAQ 7-4
@subsubheading Question 7.4

How to tell Gnus not to try to send mails / postings
while I'm offline?

@subsubheading Answer

All you've got to do is to tell Gnus when you are online
(plugged) and when you are offline (unplugged), the rest
works automatically. You can toggle plugged/unplugged
state by saying @samp{J j} in group
buffer. To start Gnus unplugged say @samp{M-x
gnus-unplugged} instead of
@samp{M-x gnus}. Note that for this to
work, the agent must be active.

@node FAQ 8 - Getting help
@subsection Getting help

@menu
* FAQ 8-1::    How to find information and help inside Emacs?
* FAQ 8-2::    I can't find anything in the Gnus manual about X (e.g.,
               attachments, PGP, MIME...), is it not documented?
* FAQ 8-3::    Which websites should I know?
* FAQ 8-4::    Which mailing lists and newsgroups are there?
* FAQ 8-5::    Where to report bugs?
* FAQ 8-6::    I need real-time help, where to find it?
@end menu

@node FAQ 8-1
@subsubheading Question 8.1

How to find information and help inside Emacs?

@subsubheading Answer

The first stop should be the Gnus manual (Say
@samp{C-h i d m Gnus RET} to start the
Gnus manual, then walk through the menus or do a
full-text search with @samp{s}). Then
there are the general Emacs help commands starting with
C-h, type @samp{C-h ? ?} to get a list
of all available help commands and their meaning. Finally
@samp{M-x apropos-command} lets you
search through all available functions and @samp{M-x
apropos} searches the bound variables.

@node FAQ 8-2
@subsubheading Question 8.2

I can't find anything in the Gnus manual about X
(e.g., attachments, PGP, MIME...), is it not documented?

@subsubheading Answer

There's not only the Gnus manual but also the manuals for message,
emacs-mime, sieve, EasyPG Assistant, and pgg. Those packages are
distributed with Gnus and used by Gnus but aren't really part of core
Gnus, so they are documented in different info files, you should have
a look in those manuals, too.

@node FAQ 8-3
@subsubheading Question 8.3

Which websites should I know?

@subsubheading Answer

The most important one is the
@uref{http://www.gnus.org, official Gnus website}.

Tell me about other sites which are interesting.

@node FAQ 8-4
@subsubheading Question 8.4

Which mailing lists and newsgroups are there?

@subsubheading Answer

There's the newsgroup gnu.emacs.gnus (also available as
@uref{http://dir.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.gnus.user,
gmane.emacs.gnus.user}) which deals with general Gnus
questions.  If you have questions about development versions of
Gnus, you should better ask on the ding mailing list, see below.

If you want to stay in the big8,
news.software.readers is also read by some Gnus
users (but chances for qualified help are much better in
the above groups).  If you speak German, there's
de.comm.software.gnus.

The ding mailing list (ding@@gnus.org) deals with development of
Gnus. You can read the ding list via NNTP, too under the name
@uref{http://dir.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.gnus.general,
gmane.emacs.gnus.general} from news.gmane.org.

@node FAQ 8-5
@subsubheading Question 8.5

Where to report bugs?

@subsubheading Answer

Say @samp{M-x gnus-bug}, this will start
a message to the
@email{bugs@@gnus.org, gnus bug mailing list}
including information about your environment which make
it easier to help you.

@node FAQ 8-6
@subsubheading Question 8.6

I need real-time help, where to find it?

@subsubheading Answer

Point your IRC client to irc.freenode.net, channel #gnus.

@node FAQ 9 - Tuning Gnus
@subsection Tuning Gnus

@menu
* FAQ 9-1::    Starting Gnus is really slow, how to speed it up?
* FAQ 9-2::    How to speed up the process of entering a group?
* FAQ 9-3::    Sending mail becomes slower and slower, what's up?
@end menu

@node FAQ 9-1
@subsubheading Question 9.1

Starting Gnus is really slow, how to speed it up?

@subsubheading Answer

The reason for this could be the way Gnus reads its
active file, see the node "The Active File" in the Gnus
manual for things you might try to speed the process up.
An other idea would be to byte compile your ~/.gnus.el (say
@samp{M-x byte-compile-file RET ~/.gnus.el
RET} to do it). Finally, if you have require
statements in your .gnus, you could replace them with
eval-after-load, which loads the stuff not at startup
time, but when it's needed. Say you've got this in your
~/.gnus.el:

@example
(require 'message)
(add-to-list 'message-syntax-checks '(sender . disabled))
@end example
@noindent

then as soon as you start Gnus, message.el is loaded. If
you replace it with

@example
(eval-after-load "message"
      '(add-to-list 'message-syntax-checks '(sender . disabled)))
@end example
@noindent

it's loaded when it's needed.

@node FAQ 9-2
@subsubheading Question 9.2

How to speed up the process of entering a group?

@subsubheading Answer

A speed killer is setting the variable
gnus-fetch-old-headers to anything different from nil,
so don't do this if speed is an issue. To speed up
building of summary say

@example
(gnus-compile)
@end example
@noindent

at the bottom of your ~/.gnus.el, this will make gnus
byte-compile things like
gnus-summary-line-format.
then you could increase the value of gc-cons-threshold
by saying something like

@example
(setq gc-cons-threshold 3500000)
@end example
@noindent

in ~/.emacs. If you don't care about width of CJK
characters or use Gnus 5.10 or younger together with a
recent GNU Emacs, you should say

@example
(setq gnus-use-correct-string-widths nil)
@end example
@noindent

in ~/.gnus.el (thanks to Jesper harder for the last
two suggestions). Finally if you are still using 5.8.8
or 5.9 and experience speed problems with summary
buffer generation, you definitely should update to
5.10 since there quite some work on improving it has
been done.

@node FAQ 9-3
@subsubheading Question 9.3

Sending mail becomes slower and slower, what's up?

@subsubheading Answer

The reason could be that you told Gnus to archive the
messages you wrote by setting
gnus-message-archive-group. Try to use a nnml group
instead of an archive group, this should bring you back
to normal speed.

@node FAQ - Glossary
@subsection Glossary

@table @dfn

@item ~/.gnus.el
When the term ~/.gnus.el is used it just means your Gnus
configuration file. You might as well call it ~/.gnus or
specify another name.

@item Back End
In Gnus terminology a back end is a virtual server, a layer
between core Gnus and the real NNTP-, POP3-, IMAP- or
whatever-server which offers Gnus a standardized interface
to functions like "get message", "get Headers" etc.

@item Emacs
When the term Emacs is used in this FAQ, it means either GNU
Emacs or XEmacs.

@item Message
In this FAQ message means a either a mail or a posting to a
Usenet Newsgroup or to some other fancy back end, no matter
of which kind it is.

@item MUA
MUA is an acronym for Mail User Agent, it's the program you
use to read and write e-mails.

@item NUA
NUA is an acronym for News User Agent, it's the program you
use to read and write Usenet news.

@end table