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Gnus Manual

6.7.1 Agent Basics

First, let's get some terminology out of the way.

The Gnus Agent is said to be unplugged when you have severed the connection to the net (and notified the Agent that this is the case). When the connection to the net is up again (and Gnus knows this), the Agent is plugged.

The local machine is the one you're running on, and which isn't connected to the net continuously.

Downloading means fetching things from the net to your local machine. Uploading is doing the opposite.

Let's take a typical Gnus session using the Agent.

• You start Gnus with gnus-unplugged. This brings up the Gnus Agent in a disconnected state. You can read all the news that you have already fetched while in this mode.

• You then decide to see whether any new news has arrived. You connect your machine to the net (using PPP or whatever), and then hit J j to make Gnus become plugged and use g to check for new mail as usual. To check for new mail in unplugged mode, see (see section 6.3.4.1 Mail Source Specifiers).

• You can then read the new news immediately, or you can download the news onto your local machine. If you want to do the latter, you press g to check if there are any new news and then J s to fetch all the eligible articles in all the groups. (To let Gnus know which articles you want to download, see section 6.7.2 Agent Categories.)

• After fetching the articles, you press J j to make Gnus become unplugged again, and you shut down the PPP thing (or whatever). And then you read the news offline.

• And then you go to step 2.

Here are some things you should do the first time (or so) that you use the Agent.

• Decide which servers should be covered by the Agent. If you have a mail back end, it would probably be nonsensical to have it covered by the Agent. Go to the server buffer (^ in the group buffer) and press J a the server (or servers) that you wish to have covered by the Agent (see section 6.7.3.3 Server Agent Commands). This will typically be only the primary select method, which is listed on the bottom in the buffer.

• Decide on download policy. See section 6.7.2 Agent Categories.

• Uhm... that's it.