[tin-dev] LIST COUNT and '-Q' or '-nqd'

[Dennis Preiser]

I encountered a strange behaviour of tin in combination with some
news-servers when using '-Q' or '-nqd' command line switch. All
subscribed groups are marked with 'D' (group no longer exists) in this
case. news.tin.org shows this behaviour (invoked with '-Q' or '-nqd'):

                 Group Selection (news.tin.org  3)            h=help

->D     1       tin.dev
  D     2       tin.users
  D     3       tin.bugs

I tracked this issue down to the LIST COUNT capability.

With '-Q' or '-nqd' newsrc_active is TRUE and check_for_new_newsgroups
and show_description are FALSE. (If schow_description is set to OFF in
tinrc it is sufficient to use '-nq' to trigger this issue.)

Due to check_for_new_newsgroups and show_description are FALSE we skip
the if() in actice.c:read_news_active_file() ~769.

| 		if (read_news_via_nntp && !list_active && ((nntp_caps.type == CAPABILITIES && nntp_caps.list_active) || nntp_caps.type != CAPABILITIES) && (show_description || check_for_new_newsgroups)) {

When the server announces LIST COUNT, we also skip the if() in
active.c:read_active_file() ~872. 

| 		if (!nntp_caps.list_counts || do_group_cmds)
| 			read_newsrc_active_file();

do_group_cmds is set to

|	t_bool do_group_cmds = !nntp_caps.list_counts;

at the beginning of actice.c:read_news_active_file().

It seems to be that a code path for this specific combination is
missing.

inn supports LIST COUNT since 2.5.2, so older versions are not effected.
I've checked this with news.gmane.org (inn 2.5.1) and it works
flawlessly with '-Q' and '-nqd'.

Dennis