NEWSGROUPS

How it all works

On your home PC, you use a newsgroup client (aka newsreader). There are lots of different newsreaders, like Opera, Netscape, Mozilla, KNode, emacs, and many others. Outlook Express also has a newsreader.

Your newsreader connects to a news server, usually the one run by your ISP. The ISP's news server exchanges postings with other news servers around the world. Typically, an ISP will carry about 50,000 newsgroups. If they don't carry the group you are interested in, let them know as they can probably just add it to the list.

Sometimes, ISP news servers don't update properly. This means that you might not be able to see all the posts made to that group, and other people may not see your post. This appears to be something to do with how ISPs configure their news servers, and I don't know why they can't get it right.

Google archives lots of newsgroups at groups.google.com. Here you can search for something over all groups (good for finding which groups cover a topic), or you can restrict your search to a particular group.
I find google particularly good for troubleshooting computer problems. Just search on the exact error message, and usually it comes back with a fix or helpful comment.

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