Searching mailing list archives

[TRS-80]

Hello,

Some times I find a need to search mailing list archives, as often I can 
find the solution to my problem -- or, find some already existing 
discussion on the topic -- without even needing to post.[0]

However, unless I am really missing something, this seems to me to have 
become non-trivial nowadays.

1. I started using Gnus and Gmane over NNTP, which I thought surely 
would be a panacea!  However, apparently the search functionality 
depends on some URL which is no longer available (I gather since the web 
part of the archive is no longer up).  I numbered this '1.' because it 
would have been (and still is) by far my first choice.

So then, over the course of the last several months, I have come up with 
several alternatives, which variously have their downsides:

2. Setting up a local Leafnode[1] instance.  Although I would rather not 
have to learn to administer yet another piece of software (unless 
absolutely necessary).

3. Downloading mbox from archives[2] -> convert to Maildir -> Index and 
search with notmuch (or similar workflow).  Again, a lot of extra work. 
And then I need to keep importing new mbox file(s), and processing them, 
etc...

4. Doing some direct querying of NOV headers or something; perhaps from 
telnet, or some existing NNTP library.  Also seems a bit janky to me 
(and then I should build some local index probably while I am at it).  
Anyway, another project to add to my list of hundreds of others I will 
never get to...

5. Doing web based search, on some archive site.  Some projects have 
dedicated sites, and there is still at least one big online web based 
archive remaining.  However usually the search is poor, and I have to 
use the browser (leave Emacs), etc.

Apologies if I am coming across a bit frustrated, as I most certainly 
am.  Maybe I should have sent mail to the list sooner.  Anyway, what 
would be great would be if I have overlooked something, if there was 
some easy way to do this.  However I included all of the above, in case 
that turns out not to be the case (and also to demonstrate I have been 
thinking about this for some time).

Any pointers whatsoever would be greatly appreciated at this point!

Cheers,
TRS-80

N.B.: I sent this to both info-gnus-english and help-gnu-emacs, setting 
Followup-To the latter, as that's the higher traffic list.  As the 
question is, strictly speaking, not directly related to either, yet 
tangentially related to both (more or less).  I hope people don't mind 
too much.


[0] There are many other cases as well; checking for existing bug before 
reporting, checking temperature before implementing some feature, etc...
[1] Leafnode is (apparently) a local caching (store and forward) NNTP
server.
[2] GNU provide these, not sure who else though.