button to check all the groups (or
uncheck all the groups).After following the directions on setting up Ink Spot, you need to specify the groups to download and connect to your news server.
When you first start Ink Spot, you see a list of "subscribed"
groups, which you can add to or delete from. The checked groups will be
downloaded. Tap on the check box next to each group, or tap the button to check all the groups (or
uncheck all the groups).
After checking the groups you want to download, physically connect your Windows CE device to a phone line, ethernet connection, or whatever other device you use to connect to the internet.
Now tap the 
button, or choose
Connect from the File menu, and Ink Spot will connect to your server. If
your server requires an additional
login and you have set your news server name and password, Ink Spot
will log in for you. Ink Spot will display a number of messages while it
connects. When the connection is established, a dialog box will show the
downloading progress. Ink Spot will show the name of the group being
downloaded, the NNTP article number of the article currently being
downloaded, and whether the article is skipped because it is
too long or matches your
killfile.
Downloading can take a number of minutes. Ink Spot can connect to your news server at a predetermined time and download articles for you. All you need to do is set the time to download and leave your PDA physically connected as you would for manual connection and download.
Go to the Scheduling tab in the preferences and check the "Automatic (scheduled) download" box. In the time picker that appears, set the time to download (don't forget to select a.m. or p.m.). Make sure you have checked the groups you want Ink Spot to download.
Soon, you may want to limit the number or size of articles Ink Spot downloads, or skip articles about a particular subject or from a particular person. You may also want to leave yourself some extra space on your PDA. These are all preferences in Ink Spot. Ink Spot does offer a number of ways to conserve space and download as much information as possible.
When first installed, Ink Spot limits downloads to no more than 50 messages per newsgroup and articles that are 4 K or less. You may want to change these limits if your newsgroups are popular ("high traffic"), or you don't read news often. The 4 K limit will need to be changed if you read binary newsgroups.
The limits for number and size of articles are in the Storage options tab in the preferences. Enter the maximum size (in K) for each article, and the maximum count of articles downloaded for each group. If you download four groups with a limit of ten articles, you will download forty articles at most. You can limit Ink Spot to downloading as few as 1 article per group, or download an unlimited number of articles. Of course, if you run out of storage, reach your chosen storage limit, or download all articles remaining on the server, Ink Spot will stop downloading.
Killfiles keep Netnews as civil as it is. They allow you to pre-edit the news you will see. Ink Spot can kill messages based on the author or the subject; these articles are not downloaded to your PDA and do not waste your storage space. Alternatively, you can kill all messages except those with a certain author or subject.
Go to the Killfile tab in the preferences. Separate killfiles are maintained for each group. The group picker allows you to choose which group's killfile you will see. The "Global Killfile" option shows you those entries that are common to every group. Entries can be added while reading a group.
Once you have chosen a group, the killfile entries for that group will be shown. The Kill Item column shows the author or subject of interest. The Type column specifies whether it is a kill type or require type, and the Kind column whether the Kill Item is an author or subject. All entries marked as kill will be compared to each article, and if the article matches any of them, the article will not be downloaded. All entries marked as require will be compared to each article, and if the article matches any of them, the article will be downloaded. Killing takes precedence over requiring.
Ink Spot ignores the case of authors and subjects listed in the killfile; it also ignores the position of the phrase in the author or subject line. In other words, Ink Spot will kill MAKE MONEY FAST, Make Money Fast, and YOU CAN MAKE MONEY FAST!!!!! A downside to this is that an entry in the killfile can be too generic. If you add just the letter E to the subject killfile and mark it as kill, Ink Spot will not download any articles with the letter e anywhere in the subject.
You can change the type (kill/require) or kind (author/subject) of an entry by tapping on the option you wish to change. A pop-up menu will appear, allowing you to change the option. Tapping in the Kill Item column will allow you to delete the entry from the group's killfile, delete the entry from the killfiles of all groups in which it appears, or propagate the entry to the killfiles of all groups (and thus make it a Global Killfile entry). Tapping in the Kill Item column of the Global Killfile will only allow you to delete the entry from the killfiles of all groups.
Obviously, Ink Spot can't download any more articles than you have space for on your PDA. However, you can control how much space it uses, and which store it uses.
When first installed, Ink Spot will stop downloading when the storage is 98 percent full. You can change this in the preferences, under the Storage options tab. A slider will show how much storage Ink Spot is set to use. Ink Spot will also show how much of the store is currently used.
You can set where Ink Spot will save to under the Database Management tab. There you'll find a picker which will contain an item for Internal, and for any external storage card(s) you have inserted.
If you want to move the articles from one storage location to another, you can do this by selecting a new storage device using the picker. This will automatically move the articles to the new device. If you just want to make a backup of the articles, go to the folder named "Ink Spot CE News" in the main directory. This contains the database files that Ink Spot maintains. These are just regular files, which can be copied like any other file.
Because space on your PDA can be tight (especially if you have bytes and bytes and bytes of junk like we do), Ink Spot can compact its databases and discard header information. It also provides many ways to delete articles.
Ink Spot maintains three databases on your PDA, one to hold the articles, one for newsgroup information, and one for your pending posts. In order to make Ink Spot as fast as possible some shortcuts were taken in the maintenance of these databases, which can cause them to grow larger than they need to be. Compacting squeezes the databases into the smallest possible space.
To compact the databases, go to the Database Management tab in the preferences press the "Compact" button. The "Purge" button will delete all articles from the databases before compacting.
One feature specially incorporated into Ink Spot is the ability to see full headers in articles you have downloaded, in addition to the abbreviated version shown at the top of the article view. If you don't want to view full headers ever, there is no reason to waste storage space on them. Go to the Storage options section of the preferences, and uncheck the "Keep all headers" option.
If you want, Ink Spot will beep at you when it has finished downloading. Go to the Download options section of the preferences and check the "Beep when done downloading" option. When first installed, this option is on.
Occasionally, new versions of news servers are released that have problems with some permutations of commands. These are generally hard to track down, and sometimes only affect certain news readers. The Advanced: Debugging preferences cause Ink Spot to keep a "Transaction Log" which will help us pinpoint whether the error you're having is the fault of your news server. The log slows down the downloading process and takes up additional memory, so this should be turned off unless you're looking for a problem.
To enable the transaction log, go to the Advanced: Debugging section of the preferences. Check the "Keep transaction log" box. After your session has disconnected, tapping the "Save log" button will save the log on your PDA as a text file.
In addition to downloading articles, Ink Spot is also capable of importing articles that have been saved in mbox format. First create an mbox file on your desktop computer, usually by downloading news in some newsreader and exporting the articles in mbox format. Next, copy the file onto your PDA. Then from the group view in Ink Spot, simply choose Import from the File menu and select the file. The articles will be imported and displayed as usual.
If you retrieve news from multiple sources (more than one server, or both downloading and importing) you can sometimes get the same article twice. Ink Spot will only keep one copy, but the way it chooses to handle duplicates can impact performance. One way is to pause after downloading the header of each article and see if it is in the database already. If so it can move on to the next article's header, if not it can go ahead and download the body. The other approach is to download the head and body of each article, and try to store it in the database. If it's in the database already, the duplicate is disposed of.
If you don't use multiple servers, or don't expect to get lots of duplicates, checking for duplicates while downloading each article is overkill. On the other hand, if you do tend to get a lot of duplicates, downloading the body of each duplicate article only to throw it away is more wasteful. You can control which method Ink Spot uses in the Server section of the preferences. The "Check for duplicates during d/l" box is unchecked by default, since this is applicable in most situations. If you think you're getting a lot of duplicates and want to try the other method, check the box and see if it makes a difference.
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