I would like to submit for your consideration a patch to nntpsend.
The patch adds a flag, "-w delay", where delay is a number of
seconds to wait after flushing the site, but before launching
innxmit.  The purpose is to avoid competing with another feed that
goes over a less expensive link, by giving that feed time to feed
all the articles it can before innxmit offers them.

If you like the patch, I will work up a corresponding patch to the
man page.

-- 
Ben Rosengart     (212) 741-4400 x215

EOF


-- Attached file included as plaintext by Listar --

--- nntpsend	2001/10/19 20:48:18	1.1
+++ nntpsend	2001/10/19 23:49:00	1.9
@@ -1,12 +1,12 @@
 #! /bin/sh
 . /pkg/inn-2.3.2/lib/innshellvars
 
-##  $Revision: 1.1 $
+##  $Revision: 1.9 $
 ##  Send news via NNTP by running several innxmit processes in the background.
 ##  Usage:
 ##	nntpsend [-n][-p][-r][-s size][-S][-t timeout][-T limit][host fqdn]...
 ##	-a		Always have innxmit rewrite the batchfile
-##	-d		debug mode, run ixxmmits with debug as well
+##	-d		debug mode, run innxmits with debug as well
 ##	-D		same as -d except innxmits are not debugged
 ##	-p		Run innxmit with -p to prune batch files
 ##	-r		innxmit, don't requeue on unexpected error code
@@ -16,6 +16,7 @@
 ##	-T limit	innxmit connection transmit time limit (def: forever)
 ##	-P portnum	port number to use
 ##	-n		do not lock for nntpsend, do not sleep between sets
+##	-w delay	wait delay seconds just before innxmit
 ##	host fqdn	send to host and qualified domain (def: nntpsend.ctl)
 ##  If no "host fqdn" pairs appear on the command line, then ${CTLFILE}
 ##  file is read.
@@ -38,6 +39,7 @@
 TIMELIMIT=
 PP_FLAG=
 NOLOCK=
+W_SECONDS=
 
 ##  Parse JCL.
 MORETODO=true
@@ -112,6 +114,14 @@
     X-n)
 	NOLOCK=true
 	;;
+    X-w)
+	if [ -z "$2" ] ; then
+	    echo "${PROGNAME}: option requires an argument -- w" 1>&2
+	    exit 1
+	fi
+	W_SECONDS="$2"
+	shift
+	;;
     X--)
 	shift
 	MORETODO=false
@@ -283,6 +293,15 @@
 	X-T*)
 	    TIMELIMIT_PARAM="$1"
 	    ;;
+	X-w)
+	    if [ -z "$2" ] ; then
+		echo "${PROGNAME}: option requires an argument -- w" 1>&2
+	    rm -f "${NNTPLOCK}" "${LOCK}"
+	    exit 1
+	    fi
+	    W_SECONDS="$2"
+	    shift
+            ;;
 	*)
 	    MORETODO=false
 	    ;;
@@ -385,7 +404,7 @@
     fi
 
     ##  Start sending this site in the background.
-    export MAXSIZE SITE HOST PROGNAME PARENTPID SIZE TMPDIR LOCK BATCHFILE
+    export MAXSIZE SITE HOST PROGNAME PARENTPID SIZE TMPDIR LOCK BATCHFILE W_SECONDS
     sh -c '
 	# grab the lock from the parent
 	#
@@ -402,6 +421,10 @@
 	if [ -f "${BATCHFILE}" ]; then
 	    test -n "${SIZE}" && shrinkfile -m${MAXSIZE} -s${SIZE} -v ${BATCHFILE}
 	    if [ -s ${BATCHFILE} ] ; then
+		if [ -n "${W_SECONDS}" ] ; then
+		    echo "${PROGNAME}: [${PARENTPID}:$$] sleeping ${W_SECONDS} seconds before ${SITE}"
+		    sleep "${W_SECONDS}"
+		fi
 		echo "${PROGNAME}: [${PARENTPID}:$$] begin ${SITE} `date`"
 		echo "${PROGNAME}: [${PARENTPID}:$$] innxmit ${INNFLAGS} ${HOST} ..."
 		eval innxmit ${INNFLAGS} ${HOST} ${BATCH}/${BATCHFILE}