Subject: bug#60078: 30.0.50; Gnus: Can't remove groups of select methods that don't exist anymore

From: Jakub Ječmínek <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 22 Feb 2024 23:01:18 +0000

Björn Bidar <[email-masked]> writes:

> Steps to reproduce:
> 1. Add select method
> 2. Have a group either created before or in Gnus
> 3. Launch Gnus
> 4. Quit Gnus
> 5. Remove select method
> 6. Relaunch Gnus
> 7. execute gnus-group-check-bogus-groups or try to delete a group in
> Gnus
>
> Result:
> gnus-group-expunge-group: nil does not support expunging
> gnus-get-function: Trying to require a method that doesn’t exist [2
> times]
>
> Expected result:
> Groups gone, diagnostic message if needed.
>
> Either Gnus doesn't find bogus groups for no longer existing select
> methods or can't delete them.

Hello Björn, thanks for the bug report. I believe that the "correct" way
to deal with such groups is simply to kill them (C-k in *Group* buffer).

The documenatation says the following about the bogus group:

A group that exists in the ‘.newsrc’ file, but isn’t known to the server
(i.e., it isn’t in the active file), is a _bogus group_.  This means
that the group probably doesn’t exist (any more).

So basically if you remove the select method corresponding to a
particular group then Gnus is not able to check for bogus groups.

-- 
Kuba Ječmínek (http://kubajecminek.cz)