bug#18198: Gnus fails to read ~/.newsrc with group names which are not symbols

[Ivan Shmakov]

Package:  emacs, gnus
Severity: minor
Tags:     patch

        As it seems, gnus-newsrc-to-gnus-format fails to correctly
        process ~/.newsrc entries with group names not being /complete/
        Emacs Lisp expressions (integers, symbols, etc.), as in:

[Hello]/World: 42
[[[This-fails: 1

        I believe that the problem is at the following point.

  2556        (narrow-to-region
  2557         (point)
  2558         (progn (skip-chars-forward "^ \t!:\n") (point)))
  2559        (goto-char (point-min))
  2560        (setq symbol
  2561              (and (/= (point-min) (point-max))
  2562                   (let ((obarray gnus-active-hashtb)) (read buf))))
  2563        (widen)

        Here, the “group” field of .newsrc is read as an Emacs Lisp
        expression.  Which may result either in an error, or, in the
        case of [Hello]/World – and, similarly, (Hello)/World – in only
        the leading [Hello] or (Hello) being actually read.

        Instead, I believe that the entire string is to be read and
        interned, as in (untested):

   (setq symbol
         (let ((save (point)))
           (skip-chars-forward "^ \t!:\n")
           (and (> (point) save)
                (intern (buffer-substring-no-properties save (point))
                        gnus-active-hashtb))))

  2582         (symbol
  2583          ;; Group names can be just numbers.
  2584          (when (numberp symbol)
  2585            (setq symbol (intern (int-to-string symbol) 
gnus-active-hashtb)))
  2586          (unless (boundp symbol)
  2587            (set symbol nil))

        Naturally, the numberp check above will no longer be necessary
        after the change suggested.

        Please note that this change also prevents the boundp check here
        from raising an error should the group name be a valid Emacs
        Lisp non-symbol form (say, a vector or a list.)

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