Information Technology Services. Quick Start Guide for Listserver Management

Transcription

1 Information Technology Services Quick Start Guide for Listserver Management

2 Quick Start Guide Sections: Accessing the ListServer... 2 Promoting Your List... 2 Usage... 2 Creating a List... 3 General Options... 6 Passwords Language Options Membership Management Mass Subscriptions Mass Removal Non Digest Options Digest Options Privacy Options Subscriber Rules Privacy Options Sender Filters Privacy Options Recipient Filters Privacy Options Spam Filters Bounce Processing Archiving Options Mail< >News Options Auto Responder Options Content Filtering Topics Moderation The ListInfo Page Viewing Archives Ownership of Existing Listserv Deleting a Listserv For More Information... 35

3 Accessing the ListServer Navigate to: Promoting Your List The UDM community may subscribe and unsubscribe by going to: where mylist is your list name. The address for your list is: where mylist is your list name. Usage The University of Detroit Mercy Listserver is for UDM related activities only. Ownership of lists on listserver.udmercy.edu is restricted to UDM faculty, staff, registered student organizations, and current members of the student body. Terms of Use as well as Policies and Procedures regarding the Listserver are located at It is recommended that you review and familiarize yourself with them. 2

4 Creating a List On click on Create a list. Click Proceed. You will be prompted to authenticate with your UDM TitanConnect credentials. 3

5 Enter a List name, password, and the address of the person who will manage it. Click Submit List. 4

6 You will receive a confirmation of listserv creation within an hour. Please submit a helpdesk ticket at if you do not receive a confirmation . 5

7 General Options The real_name option controls the public name of the list, but only allows for case changes. For instance, your list can be listed here as my_list, My_List, or MY_LIST. The owner option determines who has owner/administrator access to the list. You may add additional addresses (either alternate addresses for yourself or other person's addresses). Only one address should be listed on each line. The moderator option determines who has moderator access to the list. Add a moderator if you want someone to have the ability to approve messages for a moderated mailing list without having full access to the configuration of the list. The description option is a short phrase about the list. It is displayed alongside the list name on the list of advertised lists ( and click on Public Lists) and as a header on the listinfo page for your list. The info option is added to the top of the listinfo page for you list. Mailman will allow html to be used here but treats a carriage return as paragraph end. The subject_prefix option allows you to set a prefix to be added to every message sent to the list for the purpose of identifying the list in the subject. For instance, if you had a 6

8 subject_prefix of 'MyDepartment' and someone sends mail with a subject of 'Meeting', the message would be sent with the subject '[MyDepartment] Meeting'. The anonymous_list option allows you to hide the sender of messages. If this is set to yes, the from, sender, and reply to fields will be stripped and from will be listed as the list address. The first_strip_reply_to option will strip any existing reply to for any messages sent to the list if set to yes. The reply_goes_to_list option controls how Mailman will handle the reply to header for all message sent through the list. If set to Poster, Mailman will leave the reply to header as is. If set to This list, Mailman will add the list address as the reply to. If set to Explicit address, Mailman will add whatever is listed in the reply_to_address option as the reply to. The reply_to_address option is needed only if Explicit address is set for the reply_goes_to_list option. You must include a full address (name@udmercy.edu). The umbrella_list option changes how Mailman handles mailing out passwords. You would use this option if you had cascading lists (multiple mailing lists with some of the lists subscribed to some of the other lists). In that case, if you set the send_reminders option to yes, you would also want to set the umbrella_list option to yes to prevent passwords being delivered to the wrong people. The umbrella_member_suffix option would only be used if you set the umbrella_list option to yes. Again, this would only be used if you were sending monthly password reminders by setting send_reminders to yes. 7

9 The send_reminders option allows you to tell Mailman to send passwords to your list members every month. The welcome_msg option allows you to create a message that will be appended to the top of the default welcome message (which contains information on the listinfo page and unsubscribing and related information). You might add special rules or etiquette policies here. NOTE: By default the welcome message starts off with a welcoming line and the welcome_msg you set will follow after it. The default welcome reads: "Welcome to the (list_address) mailing list!" The send_welcome_msg option must be set to yes for the welcome_msg option to work. The goodbye_msg option allows you to create a message that will be sent to anyone unsubscribing from the list. The send_goodbye_msg option must be set to yes for the goodbye_msg option to work. The admin_immed_notify option controls if moderators get a notice for each new request needing approval in addition to the daily collections of notices. Setting this to no means that you will only receive daily collections of requests needing moderation. The admin_notify_mchanges option controls if owners will be notified every time someone subscribes or unsubscribes from the list. The respond_to_post_requests option will send mail to mail senders when their mail is held for approval for reasons other than standard moderation or triggering the spam filters. For instance, if a message is held because the attachment is too large and this is 8

10 set to yes, then Mailman will notify the sender that their mail has been held for approval. The emergency option is your stop all actions option. Set this to yes if you have a flame war or run away postings on your list. This will make Mailman hold all mail sent to the list for approval. Set it back to no when the problem has been resolved. The new_member_options option controls the default settings for members when they subscribe. o Conceal the member's address will hide the member's address on the list of subscribers. o Acknowledge the member's posting will force Mailman to send a 'I got it' message whenever someone mails the list. o Do not send a copy of a member's own post will prevent someone from receiving a copy of a message they sent to the list. o Filter out duplicate messages to list members (if possible) will attempt to prevent doubles of messages from being sent to someone. The administrivia option attempts to catch mail intended for the Mailman administrator (such as unsubscribe requests) so they don't go out to the list if the mail was sent to the list. The max_message_size allows you to change the max size message that can be sent on your list. The admin_member_chunksize allows you to set the number of members shown per page on the Membership List page. 9

11 The host_name option should not be changed from listserver.udmercy.edu. Your list will fail if you change this. The include_rfc2369_headers option allows you to disable RFC_2369 headers. These headers aid end users who use standards compliant mail readers, but older, noncompliant mail readers will add these to the message's body, which may cause some annoyance to end users. Mailman suggests assisting these users in finding ways to hide these messages in their mail clients and suggests disabling these headers only as a last resort. The include_list_post_header adds a header with the list's address. For announce only lists, you may wish to set this to no since your members will not be able to post to such a list. The Employees' list_post_header looks like this: List Post: < employees@listserver.udmercy.edu > The max_days_to_hold option allows you to set the number of days held messages will wait for moderator approval before being automatically discarded. Setting this to 0 will disable automatic discarding. More information regarding moderating the list is located on the Moderation page of this tutorial. 10

12 Passwords The passwords section allows you to set new passwords for Administrators and Moderators. You must enter the password twice to confirm the new password. This will change the password for all Administrators or Moderators and will not notify them of the change. If you change it, you must notify the other Administrators and Moderators or they will not be able to configure or moderate the list. Language Options Any language checked in the available_languages option, below, can be chosen as the preferred_language. You will need to select an additional language below and then submit the change before you will be able to change the preferred_language option. Mailman cannot translate languages, this option only allows other character sets to be viewable. If you have changed your preferred_language to a non ASCII character set (such as hiragana), you may wish to set this to Always if you have added a subject_prefix (in the General Options) to your Mailman list. If your list can receive encoded (non ASCII) and unencoded (ASCII), you may wish to set this to As needed. 11

13 Membership Management The search function uses regular expressions to allow you to search for a member. You can attempt to search by name or by address, or by part of an address. The Membership Management section allows you to control individual settings for each member of your list. From this screen you may unsubscribe a member (unsub), change moderation for a member (mod), hide their address from the list of members (hide), turn off delivery of mail (nomail), acknowledge mail sent to the list (ack), prevent the user from seeing their own posts (not metoo), prevent duplications of the same mail from being delivered (no dupes), set delivery option to digest mode (digest), and set if those digests should be sent in plain text (plain). You may also set the language (language). The nomail column will display the reason the member is not receiving mail. U means delivery was disabled by the user, A means delivery was disabled by an administrator, B means it was disabled by the bounce processing, and? means Mailman could not determine a reason (usually because mail was disabled in a previous version of Mailman). The moderation bit option allows you to change all members of the list's moderation option at once. This is useful if you change from a moderated list to an unmoderated one or vice versa. When the moderation bit is set to On, any posts by the subscriber(s) selected will require approval from a moderator before being sent to the listserv. You will want to switch the setting of the default_member_moderation option in Privacy Sender filters also if you change your moderation rules. This will change the default setting for all new subscribers. 12

14 Mass Subscriptions These options control how Mailman will handle any addresses entered into the text box below. The first allows you to decide if these addresses will be immediately subscribed or only invited to subscribe. The second option allows you to send welcome messages to those you subscribe in the text box below. ( No is selected below for the second option; however, feel free to select Yes to send a welcome message to new subscribes.) The third option will allow you to send a list of the new addresses you subscribe in the text box below. Each address added to this text box will be subscribed or invited (as chosen in the first option above). Each address must be on its own line. If you wish to also add real names, the proper format is: o user1@udmercy.edu (FirstName LastName) o user2@udmercy.edu (FirstName LastName) You can also upload a text file with a list of addresses and names using the browse button. This list must be in plain text format and must be in the same format as above. This textbox allows you to add any special text you want to have sent in addition to a welcome message, if you chose to send one in option 2 above. When you submit your addresses, the page will reload with a list at the top of the page displaying those addresses just subscribed. It will also display any addresses it didn't understand because of a formatting issue and inform you those addresses were not added. 13

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16 Mass Removal The first option controls whether you will notify the user that you have unsubscribed them. The second option controls whether all the Mailman list owners will be notified of the user removals. The textbox works the same way as that in the Mass Subscription page. Only one address can be listed per line. You do not need to add real names even if you added them when an address was subscribed. You can also upload a text file with a list of addresses using the browse button. This list must be in plain text format. When you submit your addresses, the page will reload with a list at the top of the page displaying those addresses just subscribed. It will also display any addresses it didn't understand because of a formatting issue and inform you those addresses were not added. 15

17 Non Digest Options The nondigestable option allows you to disable immediate sending of messages for your list. Set this to No if you wish to allow digest delivery only, which will compile multiple messages to be sent out in a single digest as governed by the Digest Options. The msg_header and msg_footer options allow you to add a header or footer (or both) to each message sent out. By default, messages have the Mailman list's name (real_name), the address of the list, and a link to the listinfo page for the list are added to the bottom of every message. The scrub_nondigest option will store file attachments in the list's archive and a link to the file's location is sent in the message. The regular_exclude_lists and regular_include_lists options are known as sibling list options. These options are useful when multiple lists are receiving some or all of the same posts. The first option, regular_exclude_lists, allows you to add mailing list addresses whose members will be excluded from receiving a regular (non digest) delivery if the list name is in the To: or Cc: header. This will prevent duplicate messages from being sent to addresses on multiple lists. The regular_include_lists, allows you to add lists whose members will receive posts even if their list is not in the To: or Cc: header field. This allows you to incorporate another list's membership with your own for the purpose of sending messages. If you wish for the sibling list's members to be able to post to your list you may consider adding the list address to the accept_these_nonmembers option described in Privacy Sender Filters. 16

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19 Digest Options The Digest options allow you to determine if, and how, Mailman will control batcheddelivery options for your list. The digestable option controls whether users can choose to receive your mail in digest (collected batches of messages) as opposed to immediate delivery of each message. The digest_is_default option controls if Digest or Regular delivery is the default delivery method. The mime_is_default_digest controls whether a plain text format or one that allows other MIME types is the default format sent. MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) is an Internet standard that extends the format of to support non ascii characters, multi part attachments, and non text attachments. The digest_size_threshold tells Mailman how large it should allow a digest to get before sending it out. The digest_send_periodic tells Mailman whether or not it should send the collected messages each day even if it hasn't reached the size listed in digest_size_threshold. The digest_header and digest_footer options allow you to add a header or footer (or both) to each digest sent out. By default, digests have the Mailman list's name (real_name), the address of the list, and a link to the listinfo page for the list are added to the bottom of every digest. The digest_volume_frequency option controls how often a new volume should be started. When a new digest volume is started, the volume number is increased by one and the issue number is reset to one. A list with a monthly digest_volume_frequency would change to Volume 2, Issue 1 with the first digest sent in its second month. 18

20 The new_volume option instructs Mailman to immediately start a new volume. This may be handy if you wish to end a volume right before a long break so any messages sent during the break would go into a new volume. This option doesn't change a permanent setting, but performs an immediate action instead. This option will not affect the delivery of a digest. The send_digest_now option instructs Mailman to immediately send a digest of all collected messages. This option is allows you to force out a digest (instead of waiting for the daily or size limit based sending). This is very handy if important information needs to be sent out in a timelier manner. This option doesn't change a permanent setting, but performs an immediate action instead. This option will not affect the volume of a digest (although it will affect the issue number). 19

21 Privacy Options Subscriber Rules The advertised option controls whether this list is displayed when someone visits The subscribe_policy controls what steps are needed to subscribe. This is one of the seven pieces of information required on the new list request form. o Confirm means that subscribers will have to respond to an Mailman will send them. o Requires approval means the Administrator will get an from Mailman asking the Administrator to deny or approve the subscribers. o Confirm and approve means the subscriber will have to confirm their and Mailman will request approval from the Administrator. The unsubscribe_policy option allows you to require moderator approval before someone may unsubscribe from a list. The ban_list option allows you to ban specific addresses from joining your list. The private_roster options controls who may view the list of subscribers. The options are Anyone, List Members, or List Administrators. Anyone is not recommended. The obscure_addresses option alters the appearance of addresses on the list web pages. The address myaddress@udmercy.edu becomes myaddress at udmercy.edu in the hopes of thwarting spammers. 20

22 Privacy Options Sender Filters The default_member_moderation option controls whether new members are moderated by default. If you change this setting, all new (future) members will use the new setting, but all existing members will not be changed. If you decide to change from an open list to a moderated list, you will need to set this to yes and also change all existing members (this can be done on the Membership Management page). The member_moderation_action option determines what Mailman should do with messages from moderated members. o Hold will hold the message and notify moderators that a message is pending for approval o Reject will reject the message and send a rejection notice (set by the member_moderation_notice option, just below) o Discard will reject the message without sending any notice. The member_moderation_notice option allows you to set a rejection notice to be sent to anyone whose messages are Rejected. The accept_these_nonmembers option allows you to add specific addresses that Mailman should allow to post to the list automatically even though they are not subscribed. This is particularly useful if you have several addresses you may post from, but only have one subscribed. It can also be useful for announce only lists where none of the subscribers may post but a few trusted people can send announcements without having to receive those announcements. 21

23 The hold_these_nonmembers option allows you to add specific addresses whose postings should be held for moderation. Messages from the listed addresses will be immediately held for moderation. The sender will receive a notification message which will allow them to cancel their held message. The reject_these_nonmembers option allows you to add specific addresses whose postings should be rejected and sent a rejection notice. The discard_these_nonmembers option allows you to add specific addresses whose postings postings should be discarded (and sent no notice). The generic_nonmember_action controls how Mailman should handle mail from nonmembers not explicitly listed in the handle_these_nonmembers options above. The forward_auto_discards option allows you to have all discarded messages sent to moderators. 22

24 The nonmember_rejection_notice allows you to set a custom rejection notice which will be sent to non members attempting to post to the list. If your list is configured to reject non members then they will receive a default notifying them they are not permitted to post to the list in reply to any attempts made to post. This option permits you to customize that message. The rejection notice is the key difference between rejecting a message and simply discarding it. 23

25 Privacy Options Recipient Filters The require_explicit_destination sets whether the list name must be in the destination field (to or cc) for Mailman to forward the message to the list. Since this is one of Mailman's spam controlling options, it is recommended this be set to yes. The acceptable_aliases option allows you to set other addresses Mailman will accept as well as the list name. This can be of use if the list is a member of another list. For instance, if Student_Council was a member of Students, adding that list name to the acceptable aliases here would let Mailman know to accept those messages as though they had been directly addressed to Student_Council. The max_num_recipients option allows you to set a maximum number of recipients Mailman will accept. Any amount exceeding this number will cause the mail to be held for moderation. This is another spam controlling option, as spammers often will have a large list of recipients to an . 24

26 Privacy Options Spam Filters The header_filter_rules set a list of filters for Mailman to check. Those matching will be Held, Rejected, Discarded, or Accepted as set for the rule. Defer turns off a filter rule until you again select either Hold, Reject, Discard, or Accept. The bounce_matching_headers allows you to set specific regular expressions that Mailman will search for in message headers and then hold that message for moderation. For example, the 'from:.*@uplinkpro.com' line in the image instructs Mailman to hold any message from any address that ends 25

27 Bounce Processing The bounce_processing option controls whether Mailman will perform bounce processing. The bounce_score_threshold controls how high a bounce score must be before Mailman takes action to disable a member s subscription. The bounce_info_stale_after option tells Mailman how many days with no bounces must pass before Mailman will discard the bounce information for a member. In the default, Mailman will discard bounce information for any member it does not receive a bounce from in a week. The bounce_you_are_disabled_warnings option controls how many warnings Mailman will send before completely removing the member from a list. The bounce_you_are_disabled_warnings_interval option tells Mailman how many days it should wait between each Your Membership Is Disabled warning. The bounce_unrecognized_goes_to_list_owner controls if Mailman sends bounce messages it cannot understand to the owners. The bounce_notify_owner_on_disable and bounce_notify_owner_on_removal controls if Mailman will notify the owner(s) when users are disable or removed from the mailing list. 26

28 Archiving Options The archive option controls whether Mailman will create archives. This archive_private option controls whether the list's archives will be available for everyone to see or only list members. NOTE: The default setting is public ; however, ITS recommends setting this option to private to prevent nonsubscribers from viewing the listserv archives. The archive_volume_frequency controls how often a new archive should be started. Mail< >News Options This function allows a gateway between a Usenet group and your Mailman list. This means that Mailman can attempt to gather messages from and deliver messages to a Usenet group. Mailman has no control over the Usenet group, it must be properly configured to allow your list access. 27

29 Auto Responder Options The autorespond_postings option controls if Mailman should send an to mailing list posters. The autoresponse_postings_text is the message that will be sent by the autorespond_postings option. You may also upload a plain text file to use. The autorespond_admin option controls if Mailman should send an in response to s sent to the owner address. The autoresponse_admin_text is the message that will be sent by the autorespond_admin option. You may also upload a plain text file to use. The autorespond_request option controls if Mailman should send an in response to s sent to the owner address. The autoresponse_request_text is the message that will be sent by the autorespond_request option. You may also upload a plain text file to use. 28

30 The autoresponse_graceperiod controls how often Mailman will sent auto responses to the same address. If set to zero, Mailman will respond to every message a user sends. 29

31 Content Filtering The filter_content option controls if Mailman will filter messages send to the mailing list. The filter_mime_types option is compared to all incoming messages by Mailman. Matches are stripped from messages. The pass_mime_types option does another check of the attachments. However this time anything that does not match is stripped from messages. The filter_filename_extensions will remove attachments with extensions matching any on the list. One extension may be added per line. The pass_filename_extensions option works in a similar way as the filter_filename_extensions explained above, but instead of blocking it will permit only the extensions that match while stripping those that do not match. 30

32 The collapse_alternatives option will collapse MIME type multipart/alternative parts to its first subpart. This MIME type refers to messages that contain multiple variations of the same message. For example, many messages of type multipart/alternative contain both text/plain and text/html for viewing the same message in multiple formats. This allows individuals using older clients that do not support HTML to see a text/plain message while newer clients are able to read the HTML version. If the subparts of the message are text/plain and text/html with text/plain being the first part then having this option set to yes will 'collapse' the message to text/plain and the text/html part will be discarded. Having this option set to no will preserve the multipart/alternative subparts. NOTE: If you set this option to 'no' you will likely want to change the convert_html_to_plaintext option to also be set 'no' or HTML parts of the message will still be converted to text/plain. The convert_html_to_plaintxt option tells Mailman to strip all HTML from the message and deliver it as plain text. The filter_action option tells Mailman what to do if filter matching above causes the message to not be sent to the list. Discard simply discards the message, Reject discards it and sends a notice to the message sender, Forward to List Owner forwards it to the owner for review, and Preserve places the message into a queue directory for the Site Administrator to view but is otherwise discarded. While the Preserve option is enabled, maintenance of a Mailman list is the responsibilities of the owners. 31

33 Topics The Topics function allows moderators to set up what amounts to mini lists inside your mailing list. This may be useful if a large group or department uses a list for communication. Messages sent on such a list might include information on budgeting, meetings, projects, attendance, and more. For such a list, you could set up topics such as 'budget'. Mailman would then scan the body of the message for the word 'budget' and if found, would tag the message as a 'budget' topic message. Users could then decide to not receive message flagged as budget messages. The topics_enabled option controls whether Mailman should scan for topics in the body of incoming messages. The topics_bodylines_limit tells Mailman how many lines of the body it should scan for a match. The topics option allows you to add topics for Mailman to scan for in the bodies of messages sent to the list. You can have multiple topics. Mailman will tag a message with the first match it finds. For instance, if you have topics for both 'meeting' and 'budget' the message 'We will have a budget meeting' will be tagged by whichever is first in the list of topics. The topics option uses regular expressions to find its matches. While many departments choose to have separate mailing lists for sub topics such as this, this function may be useful if you'd prefer to have all department or group message be sent to one list so they are all archived together. 32

34 Moderation There are several options for each message. First you are given four delivery options: o Defer This means no decision has been made about the message yet. All messages waiting for approval will be set to Defer by default. o Accept This means the message will be forwarded to the Mailman list and distributed to its members. o Reject This means that the message will not be forwarded to the Mailman list and the message's sender will get a message telling them that it has been rejected. o Discard This means that the message will not be forwarded to the Mailman list. No mail will be sent to the message's sender. The next option is "Preserve messages for the site administrator." This option may be used if you thought the message contains something that you thought should be brought to the attention of the Mailman site administrators. The next option is "Forward messages (individually) to:" This option allows you to select what address to forward the message to. The text box will have the address of the owners of the Mailman mailing list by default. You must select the small checkbox to the left of this option (left of "Forward") to select this option. The last option on the left allows you to clear this members moderation flag. The right side displays the messages held for moderation. You also have the option to read the held messages by clicking on the number next to the Subject. You can also choose to see all messages from that sender. Discard all messages marked Defer allows you to discard all the messages marked Defer at once without having to select Discard for each one. Lastly, you must click the Submit All Data button to have your choices performed by mailman. 33

35 The ListInfo Page There is a List Information Page for each Mailman list (even those not listed publicly). The url for those pages is where mylist is your list name. This page contains information about the Mailman list. It includes an "About" section, a link to the Archives, if any exist, the address of the list, a form to allow you to subscribe, and a form that allows subscribers to edit their settings. You can edit the appearance of the List Information Page, the Subscribe results page (which displays when someone uses the subscribe form), and the User specific options page (if someone attempts to edit their settings). The pages are html based, with inserts of specific information from the list configuration pages. For example, the "About" section is taken from the info option on the General Options page. You can also edit the welcome message file. The default message contains useful information on how to subscribe and unsubscribe from your list. The default message will also provide the user with a link to the user specific options page as well as their member password which will be required to alter their options. The welcome message which was set on the General Options page (welcome_msg option) will be added after the first line which, by default, reads: "Welcome to the (list_address) mailing list!" 34

36 Viewing Archives If Archiving is turned on for your Mailman list, you can view them by going to the List Information Page for your list and clicking on the Archives link on that page. Mailman created new volumes based on the rules defined in the Archiving Options. The default option for Archive volumes is monthly. You can view each Archive volume by Thread, Subject, Author, or Date. Thread sorts them chronologically by date but gathers s in the same thread together, Subject sorts them alphabetically by Subject, Author sorts them by Author's name then date, and Date sorts them chronologically by date. Each volume can also be viewed in one long text file (allowing it to be downloaded and archived easily if needed). Ownership of Existing Listserv Ownership of a listserv may be reassigned to a new owner under General Options. If the current owner is no longer associated with the University, please submit a helpdesk ticket at helpdesk.udmercy.edu to have ownership transferred. Deleting a Listserv Submit a helpdesk ticket at helpdesk.udmercy.edu to have a listserv deleted. In the helpdesk ticket, please include whether you would like to retain or delete the archive. ITS sends a yearly inquiry to listserv owners to confirm if the listserv is still needed. For More Information Please see the Online Manuel: 35