Links in Newsgroup Notice emails not working

[Guest Bob Day]

Not sure where to post this question...please move it there is a better place

for it.

 

I post alot of questions to many different MS forums and newsgroups (I am a

developer). When someone responds, i get an email like this:

 

"A Microsoft Community member has responded to your question entitled

"ASP net version" . Please read the response and indicate whether it answered

your question or not. By rating a post as an answer, you help others find the

answer more quickly, you give the person who posted the answer credit for

their contribution, and you help increase the quality of answers in the

discussion group. Read and rate the response"

 

where the last sentence is a link. However, when I click the link, IE &

connects to a URL, but noting is displayed. The email does not indicate the

newsgroup or forum, so I actually do a google seard on the subject I

originally entered (in quotes above).

 

Any idea why this is not working? It sure makes things easy when it it does

work. By the way, if I copy the URL from IE7 to FireFox I have the same

problem.

 

Thanks

Bob

[Guest Shenan Stanley]

Re: Links in Newsgroup Notice emails not working

 

Bob Day wrote:

> Not sure where to post this question...please move it there is a

> better place for it.

>

> I post alot of questions to many different MS forums and newsgroups

> (I am a developer). When someone responds, i get an email like

> this:

>

> "A Microsoft Community member has responded to your question

> entitled "ASP net version" . Please read the response and indicate

> whether it answered your question or not. By rating a post as an

> answer, you help others find the answer more quickly, you give the

> person who posted the answer credit for their contribution, and you

> help increase the quality of answers in the discussion group. Read

> and rate the response"

>

> where the last sentence is a link. However, when I click the link,

> IE & connects to a URL, but noting is displayed. The email does

> not indicate the newsgroup or forum, so I actually do a google

> seard on the subject I originally entered (in quotes above).

>

> Any idea why this is not working? It sure makes things easy when

> it it does work. By the way, if I copy the URL from IE7 to FireFox

> I have the same problem.

 

I cannot help beyond suggesting you stop using the Web Interface (which is

horrible) for the newsgroups and use a proper newsreader application (or at

least Outlook Express or Windows Mail...)

 

Outlook Express:

How to Configure Outlook Express for Internet News

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/171164

 

How to Subscribe to Newsgroups in Outlook Express

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/171190

 

A little more detail...

http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/outlookexpressnewreader.htm

 

 

Windows Mail (Windows Vista):

http://www.web-articles.info/e/a/title/Windows-Vista:-How-to-Read-News-with-Windows-Mail/

 

Setting Up Windows Mail to Read Newsgroups

 

When you set up Windows Mail for e-mail, it automatically sets itself up

with a news account for the Microsoft Communities newsgroups. This account

gives you access to a wide range of Microsoft related newsgroups. For wider

reading, you'll probably want to set Windows Mail up to read newsgroups

provided by your ISP or another online service provider. To set up Windows

Mail to read newsgroups, take the following steps:

 

1. Open Windows Mail as usual for example, choose Start E-mail.

2. Choose Tools Accounts. Windows Mail displays the Internet Accounts dialog

box.

3.Click the Add button. Windows Mail displays the Select Account Type screen

..

4. Select the Newsgroup Account item, and then click the Next button.

Windows Mail displays the Your Name screen.

5. In the Display Name text box, type the name you want to use for your

posts. Depending on whether you'll be posting personally or professionally,

you may want to use a pseudonym or a variation of your name.

6. Click the Next button. Windows Mail displays the Internet News E-mail

Address screen.

7. In the E-mail Address text box, type the e-mail address that you want to

use for your posts. You may want to use a variation of your real e-mail

address to throw off spammers.

8. Click the Next button. The wizard displays the Internet News Server Name

screen.

9. Type the name of your news server in the News NNTP Server text box. If

you don't know the name, consult your ISP.

10. If you need to log on to the news server, select the My News Server

Requires Me to Log On check box. Many news servers don't require you to log

on.

11. Click the Next button. If you didn't select the check box in the

previous step, the wizard displays its Congratulations page. Go to step 13.

12. If you did select the My News Server Requires Me to Log On check box,

the wizard displays the Internet News Server Logon screen. Enter your

account name and password. Select the Remember Password check box if you

think the convenience of not having to enter the password outweighs the

marginal risk of storing it. Then click the Next button. The wizard displays

the Congratulations page.

13.Click the Finish button. The wizard closes, returning you to the Internet

Accounts dialog box.

14. Click the Close button. Windows Mail displays the Subscribe to

Newsgroups dialog box.

15. Click the appropriate button:

 

.. If you want to use Windows Mail's Communities features which include the

ability to see message ratings and rankings and download a list of

newsgroups, click the Show Available Newsgroups and Turn on Communities

button. At this writing, many newsgroups do not support Communities, and in

others, the Communities features appear not to be fully implemented - but

matters may have improved by the time you read this.

 

.. If you just want to download a list of newsgroups, click the Show

Available Newsgroups, but Don't Turn on Communities button.

 

.. If you don't want to download the list of newsgroups now, click the Don't

Download Newsgroups Now button. You'll need to download the list of

newsgroups at some point, but if you're currently using a dial-up

connection, you might prefer to leave the download until later.

 

16.If you chose to download the newsgroups, Windows Mail displays the

Downloading Newsgroups dialog box while it downloads them.

 

Searching for OLDER postings/answers?

http://groups.google.com/

 

--

Shenan Stanley

MS-MVP

--

How To Ask Questions The Smart Way

http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

[Guest Tim Slattery]

Re: Links in Newsgroup Notice emails not working

 

Bob Day <BobDay@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:

>Not sure where to post this question...please move it there is a better place

>for it.

>

>I post alot of questions to many different MS forums and newsgroups (I am a

>developer). When someone responds, i get an email like this:

>

> "A Microsoft Community member has responded to your question entitled

>"ASP net version" . Please read the response and indicate whether it answered

>your question or not. By rating a post as an answer, you help others find the

>answer more quickly, you give the person who posted the answer credit for

>their contribution, and you help increase the quality of answers in the

>discussion group. Read and rate the response"

 

Some websites suck content from these groups and send out emails to

OPs when somebody responds to a post. They want you to go to their

site (and see their ads) to read the response.

>where the last sentence is a link. However, when I click the link, IE &

>connects to a URL, but noting is displayed.

 

So the website is not working correctly

>The email does not indicate the newsgroup or forum,

 

Of course not. They want you to go to their site, they don't want to

make it easy to find the response any other way.

 

Set up Outlook Express to use the MS news server

(msnews.microsoft.com), or get a better, third-party newsreader

(Agent, http://www.forteinc.com/agent ; Thunderbird,

http://www.mozilla.org/thunderbird ; or others)

 

--

Tim Slattery

MS MVP(Shell/User)

Slattery_T@bls.gov

http://members.cox.net/slatteryt