[5614] in SIPB bug reports
Re: Problem starting xrn
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (chad brown)
Thu Nov 2 17:58:05 1995
To: Bruce R Haimowitz <bhaim@MIT.EDU>
Cc: bug-sipb@MIT.EDU
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Thu, 02 Nov 1995 10:06:12 EST."
<9511021506.AA23568@ctpid-47.MIT.EDU>
Date: Thu, 02 Nov 1995 17:53:56 EST
From: chad brown <yandros@MIT.EDU>
This sounds very much like a somewhat known problem with xrn.
Essentially, malloc errors usually mean that the program in question
needed more physical memory than the machine could provide. For
Athena machines, this shouldn't really be a problem, but some programs
make `unreasonable' demands.
As a `not very nice but perhaps helpful' suggestion, could you try to
run `trn' (also in the sipb locker) once, and see if it works? If so,
quit out of trn (hit `q') and then try running xrn again. If the
problem with xrn is as I suspect it may be, this might help, and
you'll only have to do this one time (not every time you use xrn).
As an alternative, you can try using a different newsreader. The one
mentioned above, `trn', is a powerful, somewhat cryptic newsreader
with threading capabilities. Also, `tin' is a nice menu-based
newsreader that trades off some of the power of trn for a simpler
interface. Both of these are text-based, and both are in the sipb
locker. Additionally, currently in the outland locker there is a
program called `knews' that is a threading X-bsed newsreader, but it
is incomplete at this time and is available on something like a
beta-test basis, so it is not as stable as the sipb locker. Reading
through /mit/outland/README is probably a good idea.
chad
