______  ___
      /  ___/ /  /
     /  /    /  /
  __/  /_   /  / _______    _______    ___     ___  _______
 /_   __/  /  / /  ___  \  /  ___  \  /  /    /  / /  _____\
  /  /    /  / /  /  /  / /  /__/__/ /  /_/|_/  / /__/_____
 /  /    /  / /  /  /  / /  /_____  /   ___    / ______/  /
/__/    /__/ /__/  /__/  \_______/  \__/  /___/  \_______/
      

A fast and lightweight USENET newsreader for Unix.

• News
• Security
• General
• Screenshots
• Dependencies
• TLS configuration
• Apple macOS (formerly OSX)
• Documentation
• Source code
• Successful builds
• Binary packages

News

• 2022-06-26: Application bundle on "Apple macOS" page updated.
• 2022-05-21: flnews 1.1.0 is now available
  Authentication without password is now rejected (not sent to server).
  Option to automatically check for new articles added.
  Support for estimated article count in subscription window added.
  Support for group descriptions in subscription window added. Based on LIST NEWSGROUPS command (RFC 3977).
  Support for subscription proposals from server added (offered to user after server was changed and group list is empty). Based on LIST SUBSCRIPTIONS command (RFC 6048).
  File save operations now suggest a pathname in the file selection window.
  File save operations now ask the user before an existing file is overwritten.
  Message-IDs are now generated with algorithm A3 (uses a modified Base64 alphabet with "/" replaced by "-"). This allows to generate RFC 5538 conformant "news"-URIs without percent-encoding.
  Support for LibreSSL 3.5 API added.
  See CHANGELOG for the complete list.
• 2022-01-03: flnews 1.0.1 is now available
  Off-by-one read from uninitialized data in MIME encoded-word decoder fixed.
  Clickable references are now restored after ROT13 was applied twice.
  Server configuration: Click on "Cancel" button no longer creates an error message in the status bar.
  Server configuration: Automatically modify service name when TLS is enabled/disabled.
  "Group->Mark subthread read" now redraws the widget and closes the processed subthread.
  Unicode database updated to version 14.0.0.
  See CHANGELOG for the complete list.
• 2021-10-23: Section "Reply by e-mail via Mail.app" on "Apple macOS" page added
• 2021-10-23: Section "Binary packages" extended
  Link to Debian binary package from Detlef Graef added

Security

The last version with known security vulnerabilites is 0.12 from 2015.
Update if you are not already using a newer version.

General

flnews is a client with graphical user interface to read USENET newsgroups.
It is intended for POSIX compliant operating systems running the X window system.
On macOS Cocoa can be used too (FLTK must be compiled to use the Cocoa backend).

The main development goals are (in order of importance):

• No bloat
• Support for old workstations
  Something like a Sun SPARCstation with 60MHz processor and SunOS 5.7 operating system.
• Standard compliance
• Be conservative in what you do, be liberal in what you accept from others
• Compatibility with other newsreaders
• Usable X display redirection via network (or ssh tunnel)
• Warn users about things that are not forbidden but considered "bad practice"

Features that are currently not implemented (or not usable yet):

• Multiple servers
• Offline mode (for network connection via dialup line)
• UUCP

Dependencies

• POSIX.1-1996 compliant operating system with BSD socket API
  Read the INSTALL file in the source tree for details
• X window system (Cocoa is supported too on macOS)
• FLTK library (Version 1.3.x or 1.4.x is required)

Optional

• OpenSSL or LibreSSL (required for TLS connections and Cancel-Lock)
• zlib (required for NNTP COMPRESS extension)
• xdg-utils (required for sending e-mail and following external hyperlinks)

Documentation

• Manual page
• Documentation of internals

Binary packages

• NetBSD
• openSUSE
• Debian
• GNU/Linux