=head1 NAME

active - List of newsgroups carried by the server

=head1 DESCRIPTION

The file I<pathdb>/active lists the newsgroups carried by INN.  This file
is generally maintained using ctlinnd(8) to create and remove groups, or
by letting controlchan(8) do so on the basis of received control messages.
This file should not be edited directly without throttling B<innd>, and
must be reloaded using B<ctlinnd> before B<innd> is unthrottled.  Editing
it directly even with those precautions may make it inconsistent with the
overview database and won't update F<active.times>, so B<ctlinnd> should
be used to make modifications whenever possible.

Each newsgroup should be listed only once.  Each line specifies one group.
The order of groups does not matter.  Within each newsgroup, received
articles for that group are assigned monotonically increasing numbers as
unique names.  If an article is posted to newsgroups not mentioned in this
file, those newsgroups are ignored.

If none of the newsgroups listed in the Newsgroups header of an article
are present in this file, the article is either rejected (if I<wanttrash>
is false in F<inn.conf>), or is filed into the newsgroup C<junk> and only
propagated to sites that receive the C<junk> newsgroup (if I<wanttrash> is
true).

Each line of this file consists of four fields separated by a space:

    <name> <high> <low> <flag>

The first field is the name of the newsgroup.  The newsgroup C<junk> is
special, as mentioned above.  The newsgroup C<control> and any newsgroups
beginning with C<control.> are also special; control messages are filed
into a control.* newsgroup named after the type of control message if that
group exists, and otherwise are filed into the newsgroup C<control>
(without regard to what newsgroups are listed in the Newsgroups header).
If I<mergetogroups> is set to true in F<inn.conf>, newsgroups that begin
with C<to.> are also treated specially; see innd(8).

The second field is the highest article number that has been used in that
newsgroup.  The third field is the lowest article number in the group;
this number is not guaranteed to be accurate, and should only be taken to
be a hint.  It is normally updated nightly as part of the expire process;
see news.daily(8) and look for C<lowmark> or C<renumber> for more details.
Note that because of article cancellations, there may be gaps in the
numbering sequence.  If the lowest article number is greater then the
highest article number, then there are no articles in the newsgroup.  In
order to make it possible to update an entry in-place without rewriting
the entire file, the second and third fields are padded out with leading
zeros to make them a fixed width.

The fourth field contains one of the following flags:

    y         Local postings are allowed.
    m         The group is moderated and all postings must be approved.
    n         No local postings are allowed, only articles from peers.
    j         Articles are filed in the junk group instead.
    x         No local postings and ignored for articles from peers.
    =foo.bar  Articles are filed in the group foo.bar instead.

If a newsgroup has the C<j> flag, no articles will be filed in that
newsgroup, and local postings to that group will be rejected.  If an
article for that newsgroup is received from a remote site, and it is not
crossposted to some other valid group, it will be filed into the C<junk>
newsgroup instead.  This is different than simply not listing the group,
since the article will still be accepted and can be propagated to other
sites that receive the C<junk> group, and the C<junk> group can be made
available to readers if wished.

If the <flag> field begins with an equal sign, the newsgroup is an alias.
Articles cannot be posted to that newsgroup, but they can be received from
other sites.  Any articles received from peers for that newsgroup are
treated as if they were actually posted to the group named after the equal
sign.  Note that the Newsgroups header of the articles are not modified.
(Alias groups are typically used during a transition and are typically
created manually with ctlinnd(8).)  An alias should not point to another
alias.

=head1 HISTORY

Written by Rich $alz <rsalz@uunet.uu.net> for InterNetNews.  Converted to
POD by Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu>.

$Id: active.pod,v 1.1 2003/04/06 21:50:07 rra Exp $

=head1 SEE ALSO

active.times(5), controlchan(8), ctlinnd(8), inn.conf(5), innd(8),
news.daily(8)

=cut
