bug#34983: 27.0.50; Gnus cannot start

[Deus Max <deusmax@gmx.com>]

On Sun, Mar 24 2019, Eric Abrahamsen wrote:

> Bastien <bzg@gnu.org> writes:
>
>> I checked out and buil Emacs from master today 24-03-2019.
>>
>> I started Gnus using my usual configuration (see
>> https://github.com/bzg/dotemacs/blob/master/emacs.el) and got this
>> error:
>>
>> Debugger entered--Lisp error: (wrong-type-argument number-or-marker-p nil)
>>   <=(nil 6)
>>   gnus-get-unread-articles(nil nil)
>>   gnus-setup-news(nil nil nil)
>>   #f(compiled-function () #<bytecode 0x1556149e8b91>)()
>>   gnus-1(nil nil nil)
>>   gnus(nil)
>>   funcall-interactively(gnus nil)
>>   call-interactively(gnus record nil)
>>   command-execute(gnus record)
>>   execute-extended-command(nil "gnus" "gnus")
>>   funcall-interactively(execute-extended-command nil "gnus" "gnus")
>>   call-interactively(execute-extended-command nil nil)
>>   command-execute(execute-extended-command)
>>
>> Starting Gnus *without* a .newsrc.eld file, I can list local groups
>> from my dovecot local IMAP server, but I get another weird behavior:
>> after leaving the summary buffer, the group I just left is listed one
>> more time; if I enter the group and leave it again, I get three groups
>> of the same name in the group buffer, etc.
>>
>> To read Gnus using my .newsrc.eld file again, I tried to revert back
>> to Emacs 26.0.92 but now Emacs seems unable to read my .newsrc.eld at
>> all.  Is it possible that recent changes against Gnus changed the way
>> Gnus parses .newsrc.eld?
>>
>> Copying Eric, as he seems to have been active on Gnus recently.
>
> This is frustrating -- this was the most important part of the patch,
> and the part I thought I'd tested most thoroughly. At worst I think Gnus
> may be trying to read .newsrc.eld using the wrong encoding, so I don't
> think you will have lost anything permanently. (Still, I'm very sorry
> this is causing you Gnus outage.)
>
> First -- did you run "make bootstrap" before running this new version?
> Second, can you tell me if your non-ascii group names are being saved in
> .newsrc.eld in utf-8, or if they have literal byte sequences in them?
>
Confirm for me, non-ascii group names are now being saved in literal
byte sequences in them. Here's an example:
"nnimap+AIA:Union/\316\224\316\243-\316\243\317\211\316\274\316\261\317\204\316\265\316\257\316\277\317\205"

Didn't have any such issues before. Compiled using "make bootstrap", 3
days ago (and today).