RFC 977 (rfc977) - Page 1 of 27

Network News Transfer Protocol

Alternative Format: Original Text Document
Next >
Network Working Group                      Brian Kantor (U.C. San Diego)
Request for Comments: 977                   Phil Lapsley (U.C. Berkeley)
                                                           February 1986

                     Network News Transfer Protocol
                                    
                A Proposed Standard for the Stream-Based
                          Transmission of News

Status of This Memo

   NNTP specifies a protocol for the distribution, inquiry, retrieval,
   and posting of news articles using a reliable stream-based
   transmission of news among the ARPA-Internet community.  NNTP is
   designed so that news articles are stored in a central database
   allowing a subscriber to select only those items he wishes to read.
   Indexing, cross-referencing, and expiration of aged messages are also
   provided. This RFC suggests a proposed protocol for the ARPA-Internet
   community, and requests discussion and suggestions for improvements.
   Distribution of this memo is unlimited.

1.  Introduction

   For many years, the ARPA-Internet community has supported the
   distribution of bulletins, information, and data in a timely fashion
   to thousands of participants.  We collectively refer to such items of
   information as "news".  Such news provides for the rapid
   dissemination of items of interest such as software bug fixes, new
   product reviews, technical tips, and programming pointers, as well as
   rapid-fire discussions of matters of concern to the working computer
   professional. News is very popular among its readers.

   There are popularly two methods of distributing such news: the
   Internet method of direct mailing, and the USENET news system.

1.1.  Internet Mailing Lists

   The Internet community distributes news by the use of mailing lists.
   These are lists of subscriber's mailbox addresses and remailing
   sublists of all intended recipients.  These mailing lists operate by
   remailing a copy of the information to be distributed to each
   subscriber on the mailing list.  Such remailing is inefficient when a
   mailing list grows beyond a dozen or so people, since sending a
   separate copy to each of the subscribers occupies large quantities of
   network bandwidth, CPU resources, and significant amounts of disk
   storage at the destination host.  There is also a significant problem
   in maintenance of the list itself: as subscribers move from one job
   to another; as new subscribers join and old ones leave; and as hosts
   come in and out of service.




Kantor & Lapsley
Next >