Re: Gnus, expiry and group parameters

[David Z Maze]

Krishnakumar B <kitty@dre.vanderbilt.edu> writes:

> Is there some variable that I should use to set the group
> parameters?

I always do it with 'G p' from the group buffer to set parameters for
individual groups; you could also use 'G c' if you want something
prettier.

> The manual isn't very clear about how to associate parameters with a
> group. Is it done as an addition to nnmail-split-methods?

No, but you could also use `gnus-parameters' if you wanted to set
parameters across a large number of groups.  (I think if you use
topics you can also set parameters on the topic and they'll propagate
to subgroups, but I've never tried that.)

> If I have total-expire turned on for a group, all articles that are read
> are deleted as soon as I exit the group.

...all articles that are read are considered expirable, and are
deleted after `nnmail-expiry-wait' days.

> If I have auto-expire turned on for a group, all articles that are
> read are marked as expirable, and are deleted after a week from when
> the mail arrived.

That's correct.

> So if I mark an article received a month ago as expirable, it will
> be deleted immediately. Is this correct?

I'm not *entirely* clear (there's probably something in the manual),
but it always feels to me like if I leave a large total-expirable
group sitting around (*cough mail.misc.spam cough*) messages expire a
week after I see them, not a week after they arrive.

Also:

-- You can mark individual articles as expirable ('E') even if the
   group doesn't have mass-expiry enabled;
-- `gnus-total-expirable-newsgroups' and
   `gnus-auto-expirable-newsgroups' can be used to control expiry
   without setting group parameters.

-- 
David Maze             dmaze@mit.edu          http://www.mit.edu/~dmaze/
"Theoretical politics is interesting.  Politicking should be illegal."
        -- Abra Mitchell