Ubuntu Manpage: expire - Usenet article and history expiration program

NAME

       expire - Usenet article and history expiration program

SYNOPSIS

       expire [-iNnptx] [-d dir] [-f file] [-g file] [-h file] [-r reason] [-s size] [-v level] [-w number] [-z
       file] [expire.ctl]

DESCRIPTION

       expire scans the history(5)-format text file pathdb/history and uses the information recorded in it to
       purge itself of old news articles.  Articles stored using a storage method that has self-expire
       functionality are by default not affected by expire's primary behavior (but see the -N flag to disable
       this).  In this case, expire.ctl is ignored except the "/remember/" line for that article; expire does
       still probe to see if the article still exists and purges the relevant history and overview entries if
       appropriate.  However, if groupbaseexpiry in inn.conf is true, expire acts on all articles as specified
       by expire.ctl regardless of whether their storage methods have self-expire functionality.

       Note that expire never purges articles which do not match any entry in expire.ctl.

OPTIONS

-d dir
If the -d flag is used, then the new history file and database is created in the specified directory
dir. This is useful when the filesystem does not have sufficient space to hold both the old and new
history files. When this flag is used, expire leaves the server paused and creates a zero-length
file named after the new history file, with an extension of ".done" to indicate that it has
successfully completed the expiration. The calling script should install the new history file and
unpause the server. The -r flag should be used with this flag.

-f file
To specify an alternate history file, use the -f flag. This flag is valid when used with the -d
flag, and the output will be written to the specified file. The default without -f is "history".

-g file
If the -g flag is given, then a one-line summary equivalent to the output of -v 1, except preceded by
the current time, will be appended to the specified file.

-h file
To specify an alternate input text history file, use the -h flag. expire uses the old dbz(3)
database to determine the size of the new one. (If the -d flag is not used, the output filename will
be the same as the input filename with an extension of ".n".)

The default without the -h flag is pathdb/history.

-i To ignore the old database, use the -i flag.

-N The control file is normally ignored for articles in storage methods which have self-expire
functionality. If the -N flag is used, expire still uses the control file for these articles.

-n If innd is not running, use the -n flag and expire will not send the "pause" or "go" commands. (For
more details on the commands, see ctlinnd(8)). Note that expire only needs exclusive access for a
very short time -- long enough to see if any new articles arrived since it first hit the end of the
file, and to rename the new files to the working files.

-p expire makes its decisions on the time the article arrived, as found in the history file. This means
articles are often kept a little longer than with other expiration programs that base their decisions
on the article's posting date. To use the article's posting date, use the -p flag.

-r reason
expire normally sends a "pause" command to the local innd daemon when it needs exclusive access to
the history file, using the string "Expiring" as the reason. To give a different reason, use the -r
flag. The process ID will be appended to the reason. When expire is finished and the new history
file is ready, it sends a "go" command. See also the -n flag.

-s size
Optimize the new history database for approximately size pairs (lines in history). Accurately
specifying the size will create a more efficient database. (The size should be the estimated
eventual size of the file, typically the size of the old file.)

-t If the -t flag is used, then expire will generate a list of the tokens that should be removed on its
standard output, and the new history file will be left in history.n, history.n.dir, history.n.index
and history.n.hash. This flag is useful for debugging when used with the -n flag. Note that if the
-f flag is used, then the name specified with that flag will be used instead of history.

-v level
The -v flag is used to increase the verbosity of the program, generating messages to standard output.
The level should be a number, where higher numbers result in more output. Level one will print
totals of the various actions done (not valid if a new history file is not written), level two will
print a report on each individual file, while level five results in multiple lines of output for
every history line processed.

-w number
Use the -w flag to "warp" time so that expire thinks it is running at some time other then the
current time. The value should be a signed floating point number indicating the number of days to
use as the offset.

-x If the -x flag is used, then expire will not create any new history files. This is most useful when
combined with the -n and -t flags to see how different expiration policies would change the amount of
disk space used.

-z file
If the -z flag is used, then articles are not removed, but their names are appended to the specified
file. See the description of delayrm in news.daily(8). If a filename is specified, it is taken as
the control file and parsed according to the rules in expire.ctl. A single dash ("-") may be used to
read the file from standard input. If no file is specified, the file pathetc/expire.ctl is read.

HISTORY

       Written by Rich $alz <rsalz@uunet.uu.net> for InterNetNews.  Converted to POD by Julien Elie.

       $Id: expire.pod 8573 2009-08-18 13:49:54Z iulius $

NAME

SYNOPSIS

DESCRIPTION

OPTIONS

HISTORY

SEE ALSO