🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Dec18.162951.12616@rick.dgbt.doc.ca> andrew@calvin.dgbt.doc.ca (Andrew Patrick) writes:
>Is there a way for me to have private local newsgroups?
>
>That is, I have a list of users and they should be the only ones who
>can read and post to this newsgroup.  Better yet, no one else should
>even know about this newsgroup.

It can't be kept secret and still be readable in the same ways as the
normal groups; the list of groups is in the active file and is public
knowledge.

You *can* set up a completely separate news system, using different
directories, and then give your privileged users instructions on how
to point their news readers at those directories.  (The details vary
from reader to reader.)  That way you can have a private active file.

However, bear in mind that people can read news with "cat" if they must.
The only way to keep groups private is to use the Unix protection system
to ensure that unauthorized people cannot read the files at all.

If all your readers are coming in only via NNTP, and the filesystem(s)
in question are not accessible via NFS or equivalent, then you can play
arbitrarily-complex games in the NNTP daemon.  The capabilities depend
on which NNTP daemon you're using.
-- 
"God willing... we shall return."       | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
       -Gene Cernan, the Moon, Dec 1972 |  henry@zoo.toronto.edu  utzoo!henry