newsbin.com

Having a devil of a time tonight. I started my nightly run and the internet went out in the middle of it. Reflexively did the download latest headers once the router was reset and ... unhappiness. I seem to have lost ... or never had ... about nine hours of headers, from roughly 5 pm to 2 am. And I know have a couple of headers from post 2 am. But all attempts to turn back the clock to download those missing nine hours has failed. I am CLOSE to wiping out the whole newsgroup group that I have and telling it to download the last 100K of headers.

By the way, this issue raises its ugly header BOTH with the group of groups and the individual one. I have taken to looking at one particular group out of the group because it updates quicker and seems to have things the fuller groups with the other binary group, does NOT have. But there's been a price to pay. I have had HORRIBLE results in terms of noting WHICH files have been downloaded. The overall group does NOT seem to be consistently being updated as to what's been downloaded when I do it through the single group. And vice versa. Also, in at least two personal sets of groups, the failure to mark downloaded files as such are resulting in a LOT of wasted time reselecting files for download that have been already downloaded in one case, and in the other case, the file will be listed as a failed file unless I specifically choose DL Bypass filters. Which is an annoyance.

I am running 6.72.4776. The problems with the marking has been an issue since I upgraded from v.6.6. Running Win7x64.

1 - Set a short download age. Say 1 day,
2 - Right click the group and select "Post Storage/Use Download Age"
3 - Download headers normally.

Your symptoms could simply be that the posting robot that normally posts dropped out. It happens from time to time. I have a group I watch and one of the posting bots dropped out.

If you PM the group I can check it out. "Downloaded" state is stored in a database file called "downloadmarker.db3". It only applies after the load finishes so, if the group is still in the process of loading the "downloaded" state might not have been applied.

Quade wrote:1 - Set a short download age. Say 1 day,
2 - Right click the group and select "Post Storage/Use Download Age"
3 - Download headers normally.

Your symptoms could simply be that the posting robot that normally posts dropped out. It happens from time to time. I have a group I watch and one of the posting bots dropped out.

If you PM the group I can check it out. "Downloaded" state is stored in a database file called "downloadmarker.db3". It only applies after the load finishes so, if the group is still in the process of loading the "downloaded" state might not have been applied.

The A.B group is teevee. I did as you asked and found that I still have a hole from Oct 13 at 3:12 to Oct 14 at 10:28. That was just filtering for the word teevee. The unfiltered results DO show a massive number of headers with the long series of random characters, along with a part-of number and ".rar".

I went back in and disabled the age limitation. The next header download showed NEWER files but still didn't fill in the hole. However, I went to the Search tab and "\.hdtv\.x264" and got everything I basically wanted. Using a filter that limited THAT search to just about the desired list made that search invaluable. That one search filtered to only the regular resolution was followed by a filter than then included 720p and then a third filter that added 1080 and that let get my wants list pretty well. I wonder if I might not just do that search with a age limitation, rather than downloading the full header list of teevee, etc, and a list of smaller newsgroups, which I have grouped under T2013. Pretty sure the filter set I've been using is applied by each NG, accounting for progress bar repeatedly. If I don't wait before clicking on the T2013_Scope filter, I'm guessing that does BAD things. Mostly, I can manage to wait until I hear no drive thrashing. But not always.

Which takes me back to the Search tab on the Internet. The search for what I want limited to three days is fast and when filtered as I desire, right on target. NO long downloading of headers I won't ever see due to filters. And I'm guessing that the marking will be better. The lack of updating when running my group or any of the NGs in my group then becomes a non-issue. So, Quade, don't waste your valuable time on my no-longer aggravating issue.

Thanks for the product that resolves it's own issues, if I was smarter about how to use it.

I went back in and disabled the age limitation. The next header download showed NEWER files but still didn't fill in the hole.

1 - Header downloads never go backwards in time unless you force it. Setting a short "Download age" then right clicking the group and select "Post Storage/Use Download Age" is how you force it.

I see a bunch of "full" results between that timespan which suggest the problem is with the header download or the servers. The fact you have other files in that time span suggests that your server is just missing these files.

2 - What's your "display age"? If loading is slow for you, you might need to cut back the "display age" or kill the poster lockout list. The shorter the "Display Age" the faster the load. The age filter on the display is just cosmetic. It doesn't improve loading speed any. I think I have mine set to 3 days. Then I can force loading older posts if I want to see them.

You know you can "filter in" posters now with your filter? So, you can totally remove the poster lockout list (which is slow) and only add posters you want to see to your filters.

3 - I pretty much use headers exclusively so, it's still important to me anyway.

You can use watch lists and internet search to fill in pseudo groups from the search engine and then display them like groups. If you don't have an unlimited account you'll want to reduce the search poll inteval or it'll consume your searches.

Thanks Quade for the pointers.

I'm of an age that when I find something that works, I stick with that. I'm also a hoarder. But I think hoarding the years of the various NGs that I have at this point, is counter-productive. What I really want is to get the files I know (from the internet) that I want and also have some 'discoverability' too. I think this latest variation on searching for what I want IN THIS PARTICULAR AREA will do me fine for awhile. It costs me two to three searches per day and I have 500 a month to use, which I never come close to using. Thus, I think I can afford to burn 60-90 searches, knowing that I am saving on disk space resources AND getting what I want quicker. To me, that makes me a winner.

The other groups I have, I will continue to operate as a collector. THOSE groups are ones where I tend to DL most everything. Or a very healthy percentage. So, this mixed approach works for me.

YOUR tips will come in handy for experimenting. After all, I don't even use NZBs, although I wonder if a tough file to get completely or two might be my introduction to using them. There's still new tricks for this old dog to learn.

Appreciate your help and guidance.