[gentoo-user] How to access newsgroup?

[wenpin cui]

hi, all,

    I want to read some newsgroup so emerged net-nntp/slrn.

    Then I uncompressed "/usr/share/doc/slrn-0.9.9_p1/slrn.rc.bz2" and modify
    username/hostname/realname, then saved as $HOME/.slrnrc.

    After that, I run

        wenpincui@Gentoo ~ $ slrn --create -h news.newsgroup.com.hk
        slrn 0.9.9p1

        Loading /usr/share/slrn/slang/slrn.sl
        Reading startup file /home/wenpincui/.slrnrc.***Warning: Unable to find 
a unique fully-qualified host name.
                    slrn will not generate any Message-IDs.
                    Please note that the "hostname" setting does not affect 
this;
                    see the "slrn reference manual" for details.

        Using newsrc file /home/wenpincui/.jnewsrc for server 
news.newsgroup.com.hk.
        Connecting to host news.newsgroup.com.hk ...
        Unable to make connection. Giving up.

        Run-Time Error
        slrn fatal error:
        Failed to initialize server.

    My question is:
        Am I using slrn correctly?
        If so, maybe it's resulted by damn firewall, I have to give up.
      
-- 

Best regards
Wenpin Cui (崔文频）
Hangzhou, Zhejiang, PRC
Tel: +86-0571-86726288 ext:8095