2003-03-22 Frank Schmitt <ich@frank-schmitt.net>

[gnus] / GNUS-NEWS

GNUS NEWS -- history of user-visible changes.
Copyright (C) 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
See the end for copying conditions.

Please send Gnus bug reports to bugs@gnus.org.
For older news, see Gnus info node "New Features".

\f
* Changes in Oort Gnus

** New make.bat for compiling and installing Gnus under MS Windows

Use make.bat if you want to install Gnus under MS Windows, the first
argument to the batch-program should be the directory where xemacs.exe
respectively emacs.exe is located, iff you want to install Gnus after
compiling it, give make.bat /copy as the second parameter.

Make.bat has been rewritten from scratch, it now features automatic
recognition of XEmacs and GNU Emacs, generates gnus-load.el, checks if
errors occur while compilation and generation of info files and reports
them at the end of the build process. It now uses makeinfo if it is
available and falls back to infohack.el otherwise. Make.bat should now
install all files which are necessary to run Gnus and be generally a
complete replacement for the "configure; make; make install" cycle used
under Unix systems.

The new make.bat makes make-x.bat superfluous, so it has been removed.

** Support for non-ASCII domain names

Message supports non-ASCII domain names in From:, To: and Cc: and will
query you whether to perform encoding when you try to send a message.
The variable `message-use-idna' controls this.  Gnus will also decode
non-ASCII domain names in From:, To: and Cc: when you view a message.
The variable `gnus-use-idna' controls this.

** Better handling of Microsoft citation styles

Gnus now tries to recognize the mangled header block that some Microsoft
mailers use to indicate that the rest of the message is a citation, even
though it is not quoted in any way.  The variable
`gnus-cite-unsightly-citation-regexp' matches the start of these
citations.

** gnus-article-skip-boring

If you set `gnus-article-skip-boring' to t, then Gnus will not scroll
down to show you a page that contains only boring text, which by
default means cited text and signature.  You can customize what is
skippable using `gnus-article-boring-faces'.

This feature is especially useful if you read many articles that
consist of a little new content at the top with a long, untrimmed
message cited below.

** The format spec %C for positioning point has changed to %*.

** The new variable `gnus-parameters' can be used to set group parameters.

Earlier this was done only via `G p' (or `G c'), which stored the
parameters in ~/.newsrc.eld, but via this variable you can enjoy the
powers of customize, and simplified backups since you set the variable
in ~/.emacs instead of ~/.newsrc.eld.  The variable maps regular
expressions matching group names to group parameters, a'la:

     (setq gnus-parameters
           '(("mail\\..*"
              (gnus-show-threads nil)
              (gnus-use-scoring nil))
             ("^nnimap:\\(foo.bar\\)$"
              (to-group . "\\1"))))

** Smileys (":-)", ";-)" etc) are now iconized for Emacs too.

Put (setq gnus-treat-display-smileys nil) in ~/.emacs to disable it.

** Gnus no longer generate the Sender: header automatically.

Earlier it was generated iff the user configurable email address was
different from the Gnus guessed default user address.  As the guessing
algorithm is rarely correct these days, and (more controversally) the
only use of the Sender: header was to check if you are entitled to
cancel/supersede news (which is now solved by Cancel Locks instead,
see another entry), generation of the header has been disabled by
default.  See the variables `message-required-headers',
`message-required-news-headers', and `message-required-mail-headers'.

** Features from third party message-utils.el added to message.el.

Message now asks if you wish to remove "(was: <old subject>)" from
subject lines (see `message-subject-trailing-was-query').  C-c M-m and
C-c M-f inserts markers indicating included text.  C-c C-f a adds a
X-No-Archive: header.  C-c C-f x inserts appropriate headers and a
note in the body for cross-postings and followups (see the variables
`message-cross-post-*').

** References and X-Draft-Headers are no longer generated when you
   start composing messages.

** Improved anti-spam features.

Gnus is now able to take out spam from your mail and news streams
using a wide variety of programs and filter rules. Among the supported
methods are RBL blocklists, bogofilter and white/blacklists.  Hooks
for easy use of external packages such as SpamAssassin and Hashcash
are also new.

** Easy inclusion of X-Faces headers.

** In the summary buffer, the new command / N inserts new messages and
/ o inserts old messages.

** Gnus decodes morse encoded messages if you press W m.

** Unread count correct in nnimap groups.

The estimated number of unread articles in the group buffer should now
be correct for nnimap groups.  This is achieved by calling
`nnimap-fixup-unread-after-getting-new-news' from the
`gnus-setup-news-hook' (called on startup) and
gnus-after-getting-new-news-hook. (called after getting new mail).  If
you have modified those variables from the default, you may want to
add n-f-u-a-g-n-n again.  If you were happy with the estimate and want
to save some (minimal) time when getting new mail, remove the
function.

** Group Carbon Copy (GCC) quoting

To support groups that contains SPC and other weird characters, groups
are quoted before they are placed in the Gcc: header.  This means
variables such as `gnus-message-archive-group' should no longer
contain quote characters to make groups containing SPC work.  Also, if
you are using the string "nnml:foo, nnml:bar" (indicating Gcc into two
groups) you must change it to return the list ("nnml:foo" "nnml:bar"),
otherwise the Gcc: line will be quoted incorrectly.  Note that
returning the string "nnml:foo, nnml:bar" was incorrect earlier, it
just didn't generate any problems since it was inserted directly.

** ~/News/overview/ not used.

As a result of the following change, the ~/News/overview/ directory is
not used any more.  You can safely delete the entire hierarchy.

** gnus-agent

The Gnus Agent has seen a major updated and is now enabled by default,
and all nntp and nnimap servers from gnus-select-method and
gnus-secondary-select-method are agentized by default. Earlier only
the server in gnus-select-method was agentized by the default, and the
agent was disabled by default.  When the agent is enabled, headers are
now also retrieved from the Agent cache instead of the backends when
possible. Earlier this only happened in the unplugged state.  You can
enroll or remove servers with `J a' and `J r' in the server buffer.
Gnus will not download articles into the Agent cache, unless you
instruct it to do so, though, by using `J u' or `J s' from the Group
buffer.  You revert to the old behaviour of having the Agent disabled
with `(setq gnus-agent nil)'.  Note that putting (gnus-agentize) in
~/.gnus is not needed any more.

** gnus-summary-line-format

The default value changed to "%U%R%z%I%(%[%4L: %-23,23f%]%) %s\n".
Moreover gnus-extra-headers, nnmail-extra-headers and
gnus-ignored-from-addresses changed their default so that the users
name will be replaced by the recipient's name or the group name
posting to for NNTP groups.

** deuglify.el (gnus-article-outlook-deuglify-article)

A new file from Raymond Scholz <rscholz@zonix.de> for deuglifying
broken Outlook (Express) articles.

** (require 'gnus-load)

If you use a stand-alone Gnus distribution, you'd better add (require
'gnus-load) into your ~/.emacs after adding the Gnus lisp directory
into load-path.

File gnus-load.el contains autoload commands, functions and variables,
some of which may not be included in distributions of Emacsen.

** gnus-slave-unplugged

A new command which starts gnus offline in slave mode.

** message-insinuate-rmail

Adding (message-insinuate-rmail) and (setq mail-user-agent
'gnus-user-agent) in .emacs convinces RMAIL to compose, reply and
forward messages in message-mode, where you can enjoy the power of
MML.

** message-minibuffer-local-map

The line below enables BBDB in resending a message:

(define-key message-minibuffer-local-map [(tab)] 'bbdb-complete-name)

** Externalize attachments.

If gnus-gcc-externalize-attachments (or
message-fcc-externalize-attachments) is non-nil, attach local files as
external parts.

Command gnus-mime-save-part-and-strip (bound to \C-o on MIME buttons)
saves a part and replaces the part with an external one. It works only
on back ends that support editing.

** gnus-default-charset

The default value is determined from the current-language-environment
variable, instead of 'iso-8859-1. Also the ".*" item in
gnus-group-charset-alist is removed.

** gnus-posting-styles

Add a new format of match like

        ((header "to" "larsi.*org")
         (Organization "Somewhere, Inc."))

The old format like the lines below is obsolete, but still accepted.

        (header "to" "larsi.*org"
         (Organization "Somewhere, Inc."))

** message-ignored-news-headers and message-ignored-mail-headers

X-Draft-From and X-Gnus-Agent-Meta-Information have been added into
these two variables. If you customized those, perhaps you need add
those two headers too.

** Gnus reads the NOV and articles in the Agent if plugged.

If one reads an article while plugged, and the article already exists
in the Agent, it won't get downloaded once more.  (setq
gnus-agent-cache nil) reverts to the old behavior.

** Gnus supports the "format=flowed" (RFC 2646) parameter.

On composing messages, it is enabled by `use-hard-newlines'.  Decoding
format=flowed was present but not documented in earlier versions.

** Gnus supports the generation of RFC 2298 Disposition Notification requests.

This is invoked with the C-c M-n key binding from message mode.

** Gnus supports Maildir groups.

Gnus includes a new backend nnmaildir.el.

** Printing capabilities are enhanced.

Gnus supports Muttprint natively with O P from the Summary and Article
buffers.  Also, each individual MIME part can be printed using p on
the MIME button.

** Message supports the Importance: (RFC 2156) header.

In the message buffer, C-c C-f C-i or C-u cycles through the valid values.

** Gnus supports Cancel Locks in News.

This means a header "Cancel-Lock" is inserted in news posting.  It is
used to determine if you wrote a article or not (for cancelling and
superseding).  Gnus generates a random password string the first time
you post a message, and saves it in your ~/.emacs using the Custom
system.  While the variable is called `canlock-password', it is not
security sensitive data.  Publishing your canlock string on the web
will not allow anyone to be able to anything she could not already do.
The behaviour can be changed by customizing `message-insert-canlock'.

** Gnus supports server-side mail filtering using Sieve.

Sieve rules can be added as Group Parameters for groups, and the
complete Sieve script is generated using `D g' from the Group buffer,
and then uploaded to the server using `C-c C-l' in the generated Sieve
buffer.  Search the online Gnus manual for "sieve", and see the new
Sieve manual, for more information.

** Extended format specs.

Format spec "%&user-date;" is added into
gnus-summary-line-format-alist.  Also, user defined extended format
specs are supported.  The extended format specs look like "%u&foo;",
which invokes function gnus-user-format-function-foo.  Because "&" is
used as the escape character, old user defined format "%u&" is no
longer supported.

** `/ *' (gnus-summary-limit-include-cached) is rewritten.

It was aliased to `Y c' (gnus-summary-insert-cached-articles). The new
function filters out other articles.

** Group names are treated as UTF-8 by default.

This is supposedly what USEFOR wants to migrate to.  See
`gnus-group-name-charset-group-alist' and
`gnus-group-name-charset-method-alist' for customization.

** The nnml and nnfolder backends store marks for each groups.

This makes it possible to take backup of nnml/nnfolder servers/groups
separately of .newsrc.eld, while preserving marks.  It also makes it
possible to share articles and marks between users (without sharing
the .newsrc.eld file) within e.g. a department.  It works by storing
the marks stored in .newsrc.eld in a per-group file ".marks" (for
nnml) and "groupname.mrk" (for nnfolder, named "groupname").  If the
nnml/nnfolder is moved to another machine, Gnus will automatically use
the .marks or .mrk file instead of the information in .newsrc.eld.
The new server variables `nnml-marks-is-evil' and
`nnfolder-marks-is-evil' can be used to disable this feature.

** The menu bar item (in Group and Summary buffer) named "Misc" has
been renamed to "Gnus".

** The menu bar item (in Message mode) named "MML" has been renamed to
"Attachments".

** gnus-group-charset-alist and gnus-group-ignored-charsets-alist.

The regexps in these variables are compared with full group names
instead of real group names in 5.8.  Users who customize these
variables should change those regexps accordingly. For example:

   ("^han\\>" euc-kr) -> ("\\(^\\|:\\)han\\>" euc-kr)

** Gnus supports PGP (RFC 1991/2440), PGP/MIME (RFC 2015/3156) and
** S/MIME (RFC 2630-2633).
It needs an external S/MIME and OpenPGP implementation, but no additional
lisp libraries.

** Gnus inlines external parts (message/external).

** MML (Mime compose) prefix changed from `M-m' to `C-c C-m'.

This change was made to avoid conflict with the standard binding of
`back-to-indentation', which is also useful in message mode.

** Bug fixes.

\f
* Changes in Pterodactyl Gnus (5.8/5.9)

The Gnus NEWS entries are short, but they reflect sweeping changes in
four areas: Article display treatment, MIME treatment,
internationalization and mail-fetching.

** The mail-fetching functions have changed.  See the manual for the
many details.  In particular, all procmail fetching variables are gone.

If you used procmail like in

(setq nnmail-use-procmail t)
(setq nnmail-spool-file 'procmail)
(setq nnmail-procmail-directory "~/mail/incoming/")
(setq nnmail-procmail-suffix "\\.in")

this now has changed to 

(setq mail-sources
      '((directory :path "~/mail/incoming/"
                   :suffix ".in")))

More information is available in the info doc at Select Methods ->
Getting Mail -> Mail Sources

** Gnus is now a MIME-capable reader.  This affects many parts of
Gnus, and adds a slew of new commands.  See the manual for details.

** Gnus has also been multilingualized.  This also affects too
many parts of Gnus to summarize here, and adds many new variables.

** gnus-auto-select-first can now be a function to be
called to position point.

** The user can now decide which extra headers should be included in
summary buffers and NOV files.

** `gnus-article-display-hook' has been removed.  Instead, a number
of variables starting with `gnus-treat-' have been added.

** The Gnus posting styles have been redone again and now works in a
subtly different manner.

** New web-based backends have been added: nnslashdot, nnwarchive
and nnultimate.  nnweb has been revamped, again, to keep up with
ever-changing layouts.

** Gnus can now read IMAP mail via nnimap.

\f
* For older news, see Gnus info node "New Features".

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright information:

Copyright (C) 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002 Free Software Foundation, Inc.

   Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim copies
   of this document as received, in any medium, provided that the
   copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved,
   thus giving the recipient permission to redistribute in turn.

   Permission is granted to distribute modified versions
   of this document, or of portions of it,
   under the above conditions, provided also that they
   carry prominent notices stating who last changed them.
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