What's up with Google???

On Mon, 30 Oct 2006 14:37:17 -0800, "Peter Duniho"
wrote:

I tried to explain that to him already. He apparently just doesn't want to
listen. There's absolutely no good reason he shouldn't be able to use the
news server account that he *already has* with his home Mediacom account,
even though he's connected through the Internet via his business Qwest DSL
account.

A not insignificant number of providers filter things like POP and
NNTP servers to prevent people from using those servers from source
addresses not within their allocation.

wrote in message
...
I didn't *say* my problem was related to Google's...just that whatever
the problem *is* accessing Usenet in this past week or so, it isn't
"surely 100% Google's problem" or the rest of us wouldn't be
experiencing the same thing using other methods of accessing Usenet.

I don't see how you can avoid claiming that your problem is unrelated to
Google's, while at the same time claim that all concurrent problems related
to "accessing Usenet" must be related.

I've already explained that you, I, and every other end-user will *never*
see a general Usenet problem show up as a client-side error. A client-side
error is *always* going to be strictly between the user and their news
provider. As such, when people with different providers are having problems
at the same time, those problems are necessarily unrelated. It can be no
other way.

Your refusal to accept that it is just coincidence may make you feel better,
but it has absolutely zero basis in reality. There is no single "whatever
THE problem *is* accessing Usenet" that is affecting both you and people
going through Google.

Whatever errors Newswatcher is reporting to you, they are entirely
irrelevant to whatever errors someone using Google may have reported to
them. There is no single general problem affecting both you and Google
users.

(And frankly, I've never heard of a general "Usenet problem"...the very
design of Usenet means that problems are generally localized to individual
news providers, such as Cox or Google, and do not spread or are otherwise
shared by those providers).

Pete

"Peter Duniho" wrote in message
...
I didn't *say* my problem was related to Google's...just that whatever
the problem *is* accessing Usenet in this past week or so, it isn't
"surely 100% Google's problem" or the rest of us wouldn't be
experiencing the same thing using other methods of accessing Usenet.

I don't see how you can avoid claiming that your problem is unrelated to
Google's, while at the same time claim that all concurrent problems
related to "accessing Usenet" must be related.

"unrelated" should, of course, read "related". I don't know how that "un"
got in there. Got my negatives mixed up somehow.

"Peter Duniho" wrote in message
...
I tried to explain that to him already. He apparently just doesn't want
to
listen. There's absolutely no good reason he shouldn't be able to use the
news server account that he *already has* with his home Mediacom account,
even though he's connected through the Internet via his business Qwest DSL
account.

Not necessarily... With the various ISPs that I've had over the years, I've
noticed that they seem to restrict access to their news servers to only
people who are connecting through their own network... For example, when I'm
out of town and at a hotel, I am not able to connect to RoadRunner's news
servers, I have to use Google Groups instead... Since RR does not require
you to enter a user ID and password to connect to their news servers, I
believe that they do it this way to prevent people who are not RR customers
from being able to use their system... Some of the ISPs also do the same for
the SMTP servers... Kind of an inconvenience... Enough so that I finally
decided to just use Gmail as my primary email account... If I'm away from
home, I'll either use Google Groups or one of the free news servers for
USENET access...

"Grumman-581" wrote in message
...
[...] For example, when I'm
out of town and at a hotel, I am not able to connect to RoadRunner's news
servers, I have to use Google Groups instead... Since RR does not require
you to enter a user ID and password to connect to their news servers, I
believe that they do it this way to prevent people who are not RR
customers
from being able to use their system...

I have yet to run into such a situation in which an authenticating server
was not available as an alternative. The "no authentication" thing is as
much a convenience for the ISP (fewer things to explain to their users when
setting up) as anything else. And as I've mentioned, with the consolidation
of news services, fewer and fewer ISPs are even providing their own news
servers anyway.

Bottom line he until Jay's tried it and failed, there's no reason to
assume he won't be able to succeed.

Kingfish wrote:
3-4 times in the last week I've posted replies only to get the Oops!
message and that the page is unavailable (reply got wiped out). This
after a masterfully crafted & often witty response on my part which the
group was denied tongue-in-cheek mode off Seriously, is anyone else
seeing this? Most annoying...


Yep. Just got it twice in a row. I've taken to copying my text to the
clipboard before hitting the "Post" button...
Also been happening just opening up Google Groups - to the page with
all my subscribed groups (before anyone says something about using
Google, the firewall I am behind, which I have no control over, blocks
NNTP traffic, so HTTP is it. :-) )


Randy

Jay -

If Qwest doesn't let you get to their news servers from outside their
network, then you could set your PC at home so you could access ir from
the hotel, thus using the same newsfeed and avoiding the problem of
having to keep two machines in sync with each other ("now, is this the
message I read at home or a new one?"

Remember, the Internet and the subset that is "Usenet" are nothing but
a bunch of computers connected to a common network.

With some exceptions, like only allowing certain IP addresses access
from/ to certain resources, which is something that the owner of the
"resource" or the ISP you are accessing the Internet from, controls
(like only giving out a room key to a paying guest - anybody can walk
down the hall or watch your lobby TV, but only those you allow, can get
into a room,) if you have access to the Internet, you can likely get
anywhere else that for which you have an address.

Randy

Yep. Just got it twice in a row. I've taken to copying my text to the
clipboard before hitting the "Post" button...

I sometimes compose in Notepad, saving to a temp directory every now and
then, if it's a long post. Then C&P into whatever I'm posting with.

Jose
--
"Never trust anything that can think for itself, if you can't see where
it keeps its brain." (chapter 10 of book 3 - Harry Potter).
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

Kingfish wrote:
3-4 times in the last week I've posted replies only to get the Oops!
message and that the page is unavailable (reply got wiped out). This
after a masterfully crafted & often witty response on my part which the
group was denied tongue-in-cheek mode off Seriously, is anyone else
seeing this? Most annoying...


Yep. Just got it twice in a row. I've taken to copying my text to the
clipboard before hitting the "Post" button...
Also been happening just opening up Google Groups - to the page with
all my subscribed groups (before anyone says something about using
Google, the firewall I am behind, which I have no control over, blocks
NNTP traffic, so HTTP is it. :-) )


Randy

"Randy Aldous" wrote in message
oups.com...
Jay -

If Qwest doesn't let you get to their news servers from outside their
network, then you could set your PC at home so you could access ir from
the hotel, thus using the same newsfeed and avoiding the problem of
having to keep two machines in sync with each other ("now, is this the
message I read at home or a new one?"

I think "ir" should be "it"?

Randy has a good point. Using Windows Remote Desktop, you can use your home
PC as if you were sitting right at it, even while you are at your hotel.

It's a bit of a clunky solution...Remote Desktop can be run over a dial-up
connection, but even on a relatively fast connection response time can be
annoying. Your home cable modem hookup is likely limited to a 128Kbps
upload speed, so even with a high download speed on each end, that's your
bottleneck...and it's only about three times the speed of a typical dial-up
connection.

*But* doing it that way does address the same issue that using a web
interface addresses: the question of how to keep your news browsing state in
sync. As Randy says, since you're really using the same computer regardless
of location, staying in sync happens automatically.

Caveats: enabling Remote Desktop does create a potential security hole on
your home PC. Also, if you have a router or firewall or something, you'll
have to configure it to allow the inbound connection request. This isn't
all that hard, but if you've never done it before it could take a little
while before you understand what you're doing.

Pete