INN (InterNetNews) is an Usenet/Netnews news server.

Contents

  1. Installation
  2. Initial configuration
  3. Create news groups
  4. User access
  5. SSL support
  6. External Links

Installation

# apt install inn2-inews inn2

Initial configuration

edit /etc/news/inn.conf update the values as needed. 

organization:                "A poorly-installed InterNetNews site"
pathhost:                    server.example.net
domain:                      server.example.net

Create news groups

create newgroups 

# ctlinnd newgroup com.myblog

to add description, edit /var/lib/news/newsgroups 

com.myblog              My blog

User access

edit /etc/news/readers.conf copy between "auth localhost", and "access localhost" 

auth "world" {
    hosts: "*"
    default: "<world>"
}

access "world" {
    users: "<world>"
    newsgroups: "*"
    access: RPA
}

restart inn2 

# systemctl restart inn2
# journalctl -u inn2.service

Now, you may try to connect to your server using a newsgroup reader like (Pan or others) on port 119

SSL support

To add SSL support, generate certificate and key and store in /etc/news/{cert.pem,key.pem} 

# chown news:news /etc/news/cert.pem
# chmod 640 /etc/news/cert.pem
# chown news:news /etc/news/key.pem
# chmod 600 /etc/news/key.pem

edit /etc/news/inn.conf and add the following lines. 

tlscapath:                   /etc/news
tlscertfile:                 /etc/news/cert.pem
tlskeyfile:                  /etc/news/key.pem

note: keep port 119 as it was.

restart inn2 

# systemctl restart inn2

warning: changing default port 119 to secure port 563 in inn.conf did not work. as a workaround for ssl 

# /usr/lib/news/bin/nnrpd -D -p 563 -S

make sure ports are accepting connections 

# ss -nplt

Now, you can try to connect to secure port 563 with ssl support from your news clients.