Indira <indira@ghandi.net> wrote:
(and also multi-posted to other newsgroups)

> https://groups.google.com/g/alt.comp.freeware
> Google Groups no longer supports new Usenet posts or subscriptions.
> Historical content remains viewable.

Yay! This was known to occur a couple months ago.

> An updated web-searchable no-login web-search archive that reports a unique
> URL will need to be located that allows people to search before they post
> to the a.c.f. newsgroup and which allows unique references to recent posts.

Nope, not needed. One, use the search in your own NNTP client. How
much you can search depends on the retention of your NNTP client. Two,
modus operandi is no one bothers to search any newsgroup before posting.

VanguardLH wrote:

> Nope, not needed. One, use the search in your own NNTP client. How
> much you can search depends on the retention of your NNTP client. Two,
> modus operandi is no one bothers to search any newsgroup before posting.

While you're almost certainly aware of <http://al.howardknight.net/>
there are other ways to construct a URL based on the Message-ID.

http://news.chmurka.net/mid.php?mid=ur8tvukvca@paganini.bofh.team
http://usenet.ovh/index.php?article=ual&msgid=ur8tvukvca@paganini.bofh.team

Still... there was merit in having a Usenet-only keyword search engine that
was provided by dejanews (which Google took over) and which was available
to everyone with just a web browser, and which only searched Usenet and
which cost nothing which allowed the user to read the entire thread - not
just one post like Howard Knight does - and which allowed users to
reference the post to others who also had only a web browser,
etc).

If you want to search before you post, then there will probably be new
engines that come up, although none with the retention that Google had.

It has always been the case that the worst posters to Usenet were
never ones who searched before they posted anything, and for those
people, there was never (and will never) be a utility to a search engine.

For example
http://microsoft.public.windowsxp.general.narkive.com

But that web site by David Cavion is no longer maintained once he got a
full-time job and now has no time to maintain it.

The Usenet-only replacement search engine needs to be free to all, with
just a browser, not needing an account, and having infinite retention.