binsearch.net

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

General

What is Binsearch?

BinSearch is a binary newsgroup search engine. Our system crawls the most popular Usenet newsgroups and makes the information found available for users to search. Unlike other search engines that merely index text discussions, we store information about binary files that are posted in newsgroups.

What is Usenet?

Usenet is a global bulletin board system that allows its users to hold discussions about a wide variety of topics. It features forums called "newsgroups" that cover a particular subject. e.g. the newsgroup "alt.politics" is meant to discuss politics.
In addition to providing a place where users can post text-only messages, it can also be used to share files. Groups that are meant to share files are called "binary newsgroups" and usually have a name that reflects that (e.g. alt.binaries.misc).

How do I access Usenet?

To access Usenet one typically uses a newsreader. This is a software program that connects to a newsserver and can be used to send (post) and receive messages to and from newsgroups.

What newsserver do I use?

A newsserver is usually provided by the Internet Service Provider you use to connect to the Internet.
However since millions of people post messages to the newsgroups, it is impossible for the newsservers to keep all messages. Therefore newsservers delete older posts to make room for newer ones. The time a post is kept before it is removed, is called retention.
Servers that have more storage space at their disposal have longer retention times, than others. In addition to using your ISP's newsserver which usually has very limited storage space, several companies sell premium access to their newsservers offering a higher retention time for a modest subscription fee.

Premium Usenet providers:

Provider	Price range	Binary retention	Notes
Power Usenet	$ 14.95 - $ 19.99	401 days
Astraweb	$ 10 - $ 15	483 days
Giganews	$ 2.99 - $ 29.99	492 days and growing	14 days free trial, 2362+ days text retention.

Can I download files using this site?

We merely index the content found on Usenet, and do NOT offer any files to download. You need a newsreader and newsserver to download files.

Searching

How do I use Binsearch?

There are two ways to use BinSearch. If you know what you are looking for, you can use the Search function. Alternatively you can browse individual newsgroups to see what they have to offer.

What search options do I have?

You can search for the subject, the filename of a post, or the contents of a .nfo file. In addition you can limit your search to a certain newsgroup or timeframe.

I have found what I was looking for. Now what?

When the search is complete a page displaying the results is shown. You can select the files (or collections of files) you are interested in, by clicking the checkbox on the left. After you have selected the files you can click the "create NZB" button to download a .nzb file

What are .nzb files?

NZB is an open file format originally designed by Newzbin. A .nzb file contains information about one or multiple files, like the name of the Usenet group and the message-ids uniquely identifying the posts that make up the file. You can pass the nzb file to a capable newsreader, which will then begin to download the files referenced, if they are available on your newsserver.

What newsreaders offer nzb support?

The following newsreaders offer NZB support:

• NewsLeecher
• Newsbin Pro
• NewsPro
• Slicknews
• nget
• BNR2
• 123NewZ
• NZB-O-Matic
• Newsman Pro
• NewsReactor
• NZBGet
• News Rover
• Grab-It

See the Newzbin site for more information.

What are .nfo files?

When people post a binary file to Usenet, they usually post a .nfo file along with the file itself. A .nfo is a text file describing what they are posting. That way people know more about the post, without having to download the entire set of files first.

Misc questions

How long are posts kept in the database?

To maintain a decent performance we purge older posts regulary. Since this is a process which takes several hours, this is only done once every few weeks. Therefore retention may vary a bit. See group statistics for current status.

Why do you not index group x?

New groups are automatically added every monday provided that they are supported by the newsgroup providers we use. Make sure your group has a proper charter.

What kind of queries does the search engine support?

At the moment the search engine only performs AND queries. We use a technology called stemming to include word variations, e.g. a search for the word "dog" will return results containing the word "dogs" as well. No modifiers, wildcards or other fancy features are supported. To maintain a decent performance it is not possible to searching for words that occur very often in our database (so called "stop words"). The maximum number of search results returned is 1000.

I posted a file to a newsgroup, however it does not appear to be indexed by BinSearch!

Note that it might take a while before a newsgroup post is propagated to all the different newsservers in the world. However, if you post a file to a newsgroup supported by BinSearch and it does not appear in the index after several hours, something might be wrong.

The most common problem is that people post files using non-standard subject lines.
The yEnc specification strongly recommends that you use the following format:

[Comment1] "filename" yEnc (partnum/numparts) [size] [Comment2]

If you do not include quotation marks around the filename, BinSearch will not be able to distinguish between the Comment1 and filename part. Since BinSearch uses the filename to group individual files into collections, this might result in your posts being indexed incorrectly.

Valid subjects:

My home video - "movie1.mpg" yEnc (1/120)
My home video - "movie1.mpg" yEnc (1/120) 50000000 bytes
[1/10] My home video - "movie1.mpg" yEnc (1/120) - file 1 of 10

INvalid subjects:

My home video - movie1.mpg yEnc (1/120)

Why is this wrong?

Binsearch will not be able to determinate the filename.

Is it "My home video - movie1.mpg" ?
..or "home video - movie1.mpg" ?
..or "movie - movie1.mpg" ?
..or "movie1.mpg" ?

My home video (1/10) - "movie1.mpg" (1/120)

Why is this wrong?

Does the file has 120 parts and belongs to a series of 10 files?
Or does the file has 10 parts and belongs to a series of 120 files?

Use the square brackets [ and ] if a file is part of a series of files.

Mike the great poster posts My home video - "movie1.mpg" (1/120)

Why is this wrong?

Please put your name in the "from" header field instead of the subject. Although Binsearch will index this fine, long subjects are just plain annoying.

My repost does not appear to be indexed by Binsearch!

If you repost files to the same newsgroup, Binsearch will assume that you are doing so because your previous post was incomplete, and add the files to your original post instead of listing it seperately. Search for your original post and click on the "collection" link to see if this is the case.

I am getting the message "Your system does NOT support the automatic handling of compression"

Our webhosting provider charges us for the datatraffic Binsearch generates every month. In order to minimize the amount of traffic needed, we send the data to your computer in a compressed format (called gzip content encoding). You normally do not notice this, as your webbrowser automatically decompresses the data.

Unfortunately some people use mediorce firewall software that is incapable of handling compressed content.

We could send those people content without compression, but since uncompressed NZBs can be up to 10 times larger as compressed ones, we rather not.
So if your system does not support compression and you generate a NZB, we will send you a compressed file nevertheless, that you have to unpack yourself.
Save the file to disk first and then open it in Winrar or similar software.

Problems opening .nzb.gz files in Internet Explorer

SAVE the file to disk FIRST, then open it.
If you press the "open" button without saving, IE might rename the file extension, causing problems

Proxy servers and Internet Explorer

If you use a proxy server and receive the message that your system does not support compression, try the following:

- Go to: "tools" -> "options" -> tab "advanced"
- Under "HTTP 1.1 settings" check the "Use HTTP 1.1 through proxy connections" box.

Problems with Outpost firewall software

Older versions of Outpost do not support compression, this is fixed in release 6.0. See their knowledge base for more details.

About us

Why did you create this site?

This search engine was initially created for our own private use. Since we thought others might benefit from tools to make Usenet more accessible as well, we created this public site. And yes, we have too much free time :)

How can I contact you guys?

The easiest way to send your hate and fan mail is by e-mail, the following address should work: info _AT_ binsearch.net

For intellectual property issues, please fill in our standarized notice-and-takedown form. You can send the form back to us either by regular mail to the address indicated, or scan and e-mail it to us.

I like your site. Can I send a donation?

No, you cannot. We already generate income from advertising, which covers the basic costs of operating this site, like renting a server and bandwidth. If you insist on sending a donation nevertheless, the following organizations can use it better than us:

• Amnesty International

• Unicef

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