Crossposting to multiple newsgroups is not possible if at least one newsgroup is exclusively subscribed through a different server than the others. If one tries to do, one will get an alert saying "You can only send a message to one news server at a time." See http://lxr.mozilla.org/seamonkey/source/mailnews/news/src/nsNntpService.cpp#826 ff. for the comment and code. If no newsserver is given for a group in parameter newsgroupsList, FindHostFromGroup() will return the first server where the group is subscribed. If this one differs for subsequent groups (e.g. because group a is only subscribed via server x and group b only via server y), we throw the error. Since the server we finally use to send the message is only dependent from the identity/account the user used while composing the message, I don't see a reason for this code (lines 893-898). Removing the code would result in the same behaviour we see if on isn't subscribed to either group a or group b. In particular the X-Mozilla-News-Host:-line will be empty. Don't know if that's bad. An alternative would be to first look at the server we're going to post the message for the group in FindHostFromGroup(). But I don't think we know about this server at this point.

A simple repro to produce the behavior this bug was opened to fix is at http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=54911#c114

Maybe we should do away with searching for the account where each 'group is subscribed, and just have an Account dropdown in the composition window like in OE. Then the only issue left to consider'll be if the selected server doesn't carry the 'group. There are a few news servers that let you post to a 'group they don't carry, but most I've used don't. What should we do about this? Alert the user? Just try posting it anyway?

At the moment we don't care and we shouldn't in future. If a newsserver doesn't carry a group we want to post to, Mozilla will get an error responese we can present to the user. So why should we do a search and guess if the server will take it or not? But I don't know what you mean with a Account dropdown in the composition window - I don't know OE.

> So why should we do a search and guess if the server will take it or not? I think that some users _will_ care if: - they come across a crossposted message - they don't realise that one of the 'groups isn't on their server, because it's either a narrowly-carried 'group or a narrowly-carrying server - the post has therefore been rejected altogether - the number of consequent failed posts, and the time taken to resolve the issue (on multiple occasions and/or multiple followups on one thread), amount to something of a waste of online time What would a typical user make of a prompt like this? The server news.fredbloggs.example doesn't carry the newsgroup example.billbloggs.joebloggs. Do you wish to try posting anyway? [ ] Always post anyway for this server > But I don't know what you mean with a Account dropdown in the composition window - I don't know OE. Simple - a dropdown list enabling the user to choose which server to post to. (There seems to be some overlap between the terms "server" and "account" in this respect - maybe "server" would be the best word to use.)

> What would a typical user make of a prompt like this? > > [...] Since I'm not a typical user - I don't know. Aside from this, I think that's not the issue of this bug, more a RFE, see http://lxr.mozilla.org/seamonkey/source/mailnews/news/src/nsNntpService.cpp#746 > Simple - a dropdown list enabling the user to choose which server to post to. And what would be the benefit of this? Currently the server to use is taken from the identity drop-down in the From: line and then it would be taken from a separate drop-down. This bugs issue would persist.

*** Bug 241014 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

IMO Mozilla should here just try to post the message on the server that is selected in the drop-down. If it works, ok, if it doesn't work, present a error message to the user (and maybe a hint that the newsserver doesn't carry the group x.y.z).

Maybe it should try posting anyway, and if it fails with an error to the right effect, set a "don't try posting to uncarried 'groups" option in the account settings.

It is also reprosable, if two newsservers carries all groups which are named in the crossposting, but one of the groups isn't subscribed at the newsaccount of the newsserver to which the posting should be sent, but it is subscribed at another newsaccount. You can only fix it, when you unsubscribe this newsgroup at the other newsaccount after the error that the posting cannot be sent. After Unsubscribing the newsgroup at the other account the posting just can be sent. But this is annoying, because all read-flags on that other newsaccount are away and all postings are set to unread. Also the sequence of the newsgroups on that account is distroyed, when the user wants to resubscribe this group on that account.

This problem got worse when periodically saving compositions to the drafts folder was implemented. Each time it wants to save to drafts, the same modal pops up as if the send button had been clicked.

Note that this happens on replies, not just new messages. It's highly annoying to need to keep Netscape 4 installed to open each time this happens in order to copy and paste the already composed message content in order to get it legitimately sent. There are perfectly valid reasons to have groups subscribed on more than one server. People shouldn't have to change their group subscriptions in order to reply to an existing message. Most probably wouldn't even be able to tell from the modal dialog message what really needs doing in order to succeed, and will unnecessarily break the thread in one or more of the groups by removing all but one destination from their reply.

I know this happens.

Now I have a similar Problem with TB 24.1.0 under Mac. If I answer to a x-postet message sometimes it comes the Message: crossposting of News article not possible if newsgroups subscribed on different server But all the groups are subscribes on this NNTP sever. I have configured more than one NNTP server.

(In reply to Frank Wein [:mcsmurf] from comment #7) > IMO Mozilla should here just try to post the message on the server that is selected > in the drop-down. If it works, ok, if it doesn't work, present a error message ... Do you mean the account selection? If so, then this is precisely the manner in which it has worked for the past 10 years. Proof: - Subscribe group mozilla.test on two servers (<news.server.foo> & news.mozilla.org). - Select mozilla.test on <news.server.foo> - Create a new article - Modify the newsgroup-header to news.mozilla.org/mozilla.test (In generateNewsHeaderValsForPosting() newshostHeaderVal is set to news.mozilla.org) - Post the article Result: The Article goes to <news.server.foo> The whole host check is completely useless. So, why not simply remove it?!