inn

This is INN version 1.x, provided for smaller sites which do not need the complexity of INN 2.x. Large sites should use Debian's inn2 package instead. The news transport is the part of the system that stores the articles and the lists of which groups are available and so on, and provides those articles on request to users. It receives news (either posted locally or from a newsfeed site), files it, and passes it on to any downstream sites. Each article is kept for a period of time and then deleted (this is known as `expiry'). By default Debian's INN will install in a fairly simple `local-only' configuration. In order to make use of the services provided by INN you'll have to use a user-level newsreader program such as pan. The newsreader is the program that fetches articles from the server and shows them to the user, remembering which the user has seen so that they don't get shown again. It also provides the posting interface for the user.

inn2

This package provides INN 2.x, which is a very complex news server daemon useful for big sites. The 'inn' package still exists for smaller sites which do not need the complexity of INN 2.x. The news transport is the part of the system that stores the articles and the lists of which groups are available and so on, and provides those articles on request to users. It receives news (either posted locally or from a newsfeed site), files it, and passes it on to any downstream sites. Each article is kept for a period of time and then deleted (this is known as 'expiry'). By default Debian's INN will install in a fairly simple 'local-only' configuration. In order to make use of the services provided by INN you'll have to use a user-level newsreader program such as pan. The newsreader is the program that fetches articles from the server and shows them to the user, remembering which the user has seen so that they don't get shown again. It also provides the posting interface for the user.