9.5. Using NNTP as a User Interface

NNTP was designed to be a protocol for working with Usenet. But this doesn't prevent it from being used to access other kinds of messaging systems. Like the email protocols discussed in Chapter 7, you can use NNTP as an interface, a way to let users interact with your application's data. For example, you could provide an NNTP interface to a web discussion board. This would allow users familiar with Usenet to participate in the discussion board using their Usenet client, taking advantage of features like offline message reading, message threading, and spellcheck. NNTP is a good protocol to use any time you want to offer a public (nonauthenticated) means of reading and writing messages. This example demonstrates how you could use twisted.news to provide an NNTP interface to a popular type of public message: RSS news feeds.

RSS (short for Really Simple Syndication) is an XML format that many web sites use to publish a summary of their most recent articles or changes. By periodically checking the RSS feed, a client can see whether there is anything new on the site.