Administrative Settings for Mailman Lists

There are hundreds of administrative settings in each mailing list.  This document covers especially cool features (listed in black text) and makes recommendations for which settings to change (listed in red text).  If a feature is not mentioned, it simply means that we recommend keeping the default list setting.

You may print this page if you feel the need, but we will be updating it as needed so the online copy will always be most up-to-date.

Table of Contents for this document:

• General Options
  • "The list administrator email addresses..."
  • "The list moderator email addresses..."
  • "A terse phrase identifying this list/An introductory description"
  • "Where are replies to list messages directed?"
  • "List-specific text prepended to new-subscriber welcome message"
  • "Emergency moderation of all list traffic."
  • "Maximum length in kilobytes..."
  • The "Submit Your Changes" button
• Passwords
• "Membership Management..."
  • "[Membership List]"
  • "[Mass Subscription]"
  • "[Mass Removal]"
• "Privacy options..."
  • "[Sender filters]"
    • List of non-member addresses whose postings should be automatically accepted.
    • Action to take for postings from non-members for which no explicit action is defined.
  • "[Recipient filters]"
    • Ceiling on acceptable number of recipients for a posting.
• "Archiving Options"
  • Is archive file source for public or private archival?
• "Tend to pending moderator requests"
• "Digest Options"
  • "How often should a new digest volume be started?"
  • "How big in Kb should a digest be before it gets sent out?"
• To get a full list of your list members

This outline is organized according to the links at the top of your mailing list, administrative interface.

• General Options (click on the General Options link (top of the page) to see these settings)
  • "The list administrator email addresses..." (2nd option in the "General list personality" area)
    • You are allowed to have multiple administrators for your list.  These are the people who are allowed to use the admin interface to manage the list.
    • All your list administrators share the same password.  If you change it for you, it is changed for everyone.  Mailing list passwords are not the same as your campus network password.
    • Administrators must also be listed in the Membership Management area to be allowed to post freely to their own list; be sure they are listed in the Membership Management area.
  • "The list moderator email addresses..." (3rd option in the "General list personality" area)
    • You are allowed to have multiple moderators for your list.  These are the people who may help the list administrators "Tend to pending moderator requests."
    • All your list moderators share the same password.  If one changes it, it is changed for everyone.  Mailing list passwords are not the same as campus network passwords.
    • Moderators must also be listed in the Membership Management area to be allowed to post freely to their own list; be sure they are listed in the Membership Management area.
  • "A terse phrase identifying this list/An introductory description" (4th and 5th options in the "General list personality" area)
    • These options allow you to publicize information about your list to non-members.  The short phrase appears next to your list name on our list of campus lists page.  The introductory description appears on your list's information page in the "About [listname]" area (to view your list's information page, click your list name on the list of campus lists page).
  • "Where are replies to list messages directed?"  (2nd option in the "Reply-To: header munging" area)
    • Many mailing lists send replies to member posts to the entire list.  By default, Mailman lists send replies to the sender only.  You may want to set this option to "This list" so that your list mails replies to the whole group, like most lists do.
  • "List-specific text prepended to new-subscriber welcome message" (2nd option in the "Notifications" area)
    • When a user subscribes (or is subscribed) to your list, they are sent an email giving them the technical information on how to use the list (including a password to set their personal settings).  This option allows you to add additional information about joining the list, like what to expect for messages, how to behave, etc.
  • "Emergency moderation of all list traffic." (1st option in the "Additional settings" area)
    • If your list members start a flamewar, you can automatically set your list to hold all posts for the administrators'/moderators' approval.  This means a lot of work for you, approving posts; but it stops the angry messages from being automatically posted to your list to cause more discord.  When the angry posts subside, simply turn emergency moderation off.
  • "Maximum length in kilobytes..." (4th option in the "Additional settings" area)
    • This option limits the maximum size of all posts (and their attachments) to your list.  40KB is really small; a single-spaced, one page, Word document (with no images) is about 30KB by itself. The same Word document, expanded to 10 pages is about 65KB.
    • I strongly recommend you change this setting to a number between 200 and 800, depending on your list attachment needs.  This will allow all reasonably sized posts (and their attachments).
    • If a message from a member is over the size limit, it is not lost; it is simply held for the administrator/moderator approval.
  • The "Submit Your Changes" button (bottom of each admin page)
    • The most important thing to do after making changes to your list settings... submit them.
• Passwords (click on the Passwords link (top of the page) to see these settings)
  • This is the page that allows you to reset administrator and moderator passwords.
  • Remember all your list administrators share the same password (as do all list moderators).  If you change it for one, it is changed for all.  Mailing list passwords are not the same as your campus network password.
  • When you click "Submit Your Changes" you will not be notified of your success in changing a password (unless there was an error; errors are displayed at the top of the page).
• "Membership Management..." (click on the Membership Management... link (top of the page) to see these settings)
  • "[Membership List]"
    • For lists with around 30 members, this displays all members and their personal settings.  For longer lists, alphabetic navigation links are added to view members emails that start with a specific letter. 
    • You can change member setting by (un)clicking boxes and submitting your changes.  You may unsubscribe members by clicking the "unsub" boxes and submitting your changes.
  • "[Mass Subscription]"
    • To add one or many email addresses to your list of members.
    • You must only have one address per line (in the box)
    • Don't forget that the list administrators and moderators must be a members too!
  • "[Mass Removal]"
    • To remove one or many email addresses to your list of members.
    • You must only have one address per line (in the box)
• "Privacy options..." (click on the Privacy options... link (top of the page) to see these settings)
  • "[Sender filters]"  By default, all non-members' posts are held for administrator/moderator approval and members are allowed to post freely to the list.
    • List of non-member addresses whose postings should be automatically accepted.  (1st option in the "Non-member filters" area).  Add email addresses (one per line) of non-members whose posts you want to be automatically accepted.
    • Action to take for postings from non-members for which no explicit action is defined.  (2nd-to-last option on this page).  This very powerful setting allows you to automatically discard all non-member posts (unless another action is specified).  Combined with the last option on this admin page, you can block all non-user posts and never be bothered by them.  If you use this option to automatically delete all non-member posts, you may miss important posts and never know it.
  • "[Recipient filters]"
    • Ceiling on acceptable number of recipients for a posting. (last option on this page).  This is one reason messages to your list may be held for approval.  The stated reason for messages being held is "Too many recipients to the message."  If you set this field higher than 10 (or to unlimited) you may get more spam mailed to your list.
• "Archiving Options" (click on the Archiving Options link (top of the page) to see these settings)
  • Is archive file source for public or private archival? (2nd option in this area)
    • By default, Mailman makes monthly archives of all posts to your list.  These archives are public by default.
    • Depending on the purpose and privacy of your list, you may want to change this setting to private (so only list members may read the archived posts).
• "Tend to pending moderator requests" (click on the Tend to pending moderator requests link (top of the page) to see these settings)
  • This is where all messages are held for administrator/moderator approval.  Non-member posts are held here by default.  Member posts that exceed the maximum length in kilobytes for your list are held here too.
  • You can read the held post by clicking the number in square brackets, in front of its "Subject"
  • Most of the messages held here are spam.
  • For spam, I recommend you click the following boxes:
    • Action to take on all these held messages: click Discard.
    • Click the box in front of "Add sapmmer@spam.com to one of these sender filters:" and click Discards.
    • Click the "Submit All Data" when you are done evaluating all held posts.
• "Digest Options" (click on the Digest Options link (top of the page) to see these settings)
  • If a list member opts to receive a digest of messages, Mailman will not send each posting to the list to that user, as it comes in.  Instead Mailman will package all posts (for a specified time span: Yearly, Monthly, Quarterly, Weekly or Daily) and mail a single email to that user, that contains all the posts for the time span.
  • Picking a time span for digests is a function of how busy your list is.  I recommend picking a time span that will package between 10 - 20 posts in a single digest.  
    • "How often should a new digest volume be started?" If your list gets 15 posts a day, set this option to Daily.  If you get 15 posts a year; set this option to Yearly, etc.
  • By default, a message size is set for this digest (in addition to) the default span of time (Monthly).  I recommend you disable this feature (since most people want a time-based digest, not a size-based one).
    • "How big in Kb should a digest be before it gets sent out?"  I recommend you set this option to zero.  This will send a digest messages to users who chose this option, only when the time span for the digest has reached (regardless of the digest size).
• To get a full list of your list members
  • Member lists are available at: http://coyote.csusm.edu/mailman/roster/[list]
    Where [list] is the name of your mailing list.

This page http://www.csusm.edu/garrett/resources/mailman/AdminIntro.html
maintained by Garrett Collins (garrett@csusm.edu)
for Academic Technology Services, Web Application Support team

Last updated Thursday, January 25, 2007 10:44:26 AM

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