"news:" URL proxies

From: <P.Lister@dont-contact.us>
Date: Thu, 09 Jan 97 16:41:28 +0000

Have the Squidders given any thought to adding NNTP proxying in the
same way as gopher and FTP? I'm NOT suggesting adding an NNTP server
to the code, but simply to map "just another URL type" to "just
another back-end script" (nntpget?), and cache whatever passes
through.

A working system needs a minimal "front-end" server to translate news
client's NNTP into requests for URLs, access control, etc. The hard
work of pulling the group info and articles would be done by the
back-end. This is the kind of thing the NNTP::Client perl5 module
seems to do extremely well.

The result should be an easy to administer news server for simple
non-feeding news sites like us which would less disk space and
have a much longer effective article expiry time than a traditional
news server, since Squid is happy to refetch expired objects. The
Rolls Royce version might pull from multiple upstream servers, and put
its group info into a fast DB. I can see lots of advantages to making
news demand driven rather than the traditional pushing feed model,
especially with ICP connected caches.

It's also possible that sites which do not have (or feel they can't
justify) a reasonably configured web proxy could be persuaded to
convert an existing news server to do both. Sites with separate news
and proxy servers could be motivated to configure them as identical
dual purpose siblings for a bit more resilience.

Peter Lister Email: p.lister@cranfield.ac.uk
Computer Centre, Cranfield University Voice: +44 1234 754200 ext 2828
Cranfield, Bedfordshire MK43 0AL UK Fax: +44 1234 751814
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     (1) "Yes" (2) "No" (3) "That would be an ecumenical matter"
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Received on Thu Jan 09 1997 - 09:24:29 MST

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