Guide for New Mailman List Owners

If you are new to Mailman list management, these pages are for you. It outlines those things you should know in order to get started.

Establish Your List

Do you even have a list to manage yet? If not, you can request one by submitting a request to servicedesk@pobox.une.edu.au (All we need is a name for the mailing list and the name of its administrator).

Review List Configuration

Once you have your list set up, you may want to see exactly how it is configured and what options are set. To review your list's configuration settings, go to

http://pobox.une.edu.au/mailman/admin/listname

where listname is replaced with the actual name of your list. For example, if the name of your list is unesports, you would go to
http://pobox.une.edu.au/mailman/admin/unesports
and log in with your list-adminstrator password (which we will sent to you once the list is set up). Once you are logged on to the administration site for your list, you should see the following configuration categories:

• General Options
• Membership Management
• Membership Management
• Privacy Options
• Non-Digest Options
• Digest Options
• Bounce Options
• Archiving Options
• Mail to News Gateways
• Auto-Responder

There are also some sub-categories for Membership Management and Privacy Options that can be accessed when you enter each of those categories. Browse through each of the available configuration screens to become familiar with the configuration options. Click on each option for more information. The Overview of List Configuration Options gives you additional information. Feel free to email servicedesk@une.edu.au or call us on x5000 if you have any questions.

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Get the List Ready for Use

Once you have familiarized yourself with your list's configuration and options, you will want to set up an info file, welcome message, and goodbye message. All of these options can be found in the General Options section of the administration pages.

Info file

The info file should be a brief introductory description about the list. It will be included at the top of your list's listinfo page at
http://pobox.une.edu.au/mailman/listinfo/listname
where listname is replaced with the actual name of your list.

Welcome message

The welcome message will be added to the generic welcome message from Mailman and will be sent to all new subscribers if you choose that option. See the welcome_msg and send_welcome_msg settings.

Subscribe Yourself

When you establish a Mailman list, you are not automatically added as a subscriber. This means that you must subscribe yourself if you want to receive messages that are posted to the list. To add yourself to your list, go to the Membership Management section of your list's administration pages and choose the Mass Subscription category. Now is a good time to test your welcome message so make sure that the "Send welcome messages to new subscribers" option is marked "Yes" and put your address in the box. Click on the "Submit Your Changes" button.

Of course, you do not need to subscribe yourself to your list if you do not want to. Keep in mind, however, that some lists are configured to only allow subscribers to post messages. If you are an owner of such a list and do not subscribe yourself, your posts will not be accepted by the list.

Get Subscribers

As you might imagine, mailing lists need subscribers to be worthwile. How you get them will depend on what your list is for. If it is for a class or small group of people, then you can probably tell people about the list in class, or email them, or even add them yourself. If your list is intended for a larger body of subscribers, you might want to post information about your list to other newsgroups, or mention it on a Web page.

Subscribers will generally want to know the following information:

• Name of the list
• Purpose of the list
• Restrictions on the use of the list
• How to subscribe
• How to unsubscribe

Subscribers have two ways of subscribing to the page. They can either go to the listinfo page of your list http://pobox.une.edu.au/mailman/listinfo/listname, fill in their email address in the "Your Email Address" field of the "Subscribing to <listname>"section, pick and click SUBMIT to subscribe.

Alternatively, they can send an email to listname-request@pobox.une.edu.au (where listname is replaced with the name of the list) with "subscribe" (without the quotes and with nothing else, no signatures or other formatted text) in the subject or the body of the message. Once you've done the above, that's pretty much it. The only times you'll really need to be active as a list owner are:

• If your list is a private or moderated list
• If and when you receive error messages
• If you have a problem subscriber or spammer

These subjects, as well as others, are all covered in the full Maintaining a Mailman List guide, that you can download from here. And if all else fails, you can of course contact us.

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