ELS Mailing Lists: FAQ
We use Mailman to manage our mailing lists. Mailman is one of the most popular mailing list management programs. You can learn more about it at its home page: http://www.list.org. One of the strengths of Mailman is that list administrators and list members can control most aspects of Mailman via a web interface. To access the ELS mailman system, visit:
This page is a first attempt at a Mailman FAQ. Please let us know if you have questions about Mailman at ELS.
Contents
Admin: How do I subscribe my students to a list?
To add students (or any new member) to an email list, do the following:
1) Visit els42.law.emory.edu/mailman/admin/
2) Locate your list.
3) Click on the link.
4) Supply the admin password, which you'll need to get from the ELS help desk if you've forgotten it.
5) This will bring you to a web page labeled with your list name and "General Options Section"
6) The fourth link down on the left is "Membership Management". Click on it.
7) This will pop open a sub-menu. There are three options that now appear under "Membership Management".
8) Click on the second option, "Mass Subscription".
9) This will bring up a new screen with two boxes. The first box is labeled "Enter one address per line below..."
10) Enter the email address(es) of the student(s) you wish to subscribe.
11) Click the button labeled "Submit Your Changes".
That's it. The student will now be added to the list. They should receive an email with their subscription information, including a randomly generated password.
Admin: Why are my posts are still being held for moderation?
Your posts are being held for moderation because your list limits posts to members of the list and you are not subscribed to the list. This limitation applies to everyone, including owners/administrators and moderators. This is to prevent someone from just forging the owner's email address as a way to spam the list.
If you find this annoying, just subscribe to the list.
Admin: I would like my assistant to manage the list
- Adding additional administrators or moderators
That's easy to do. Log in to the administrative interface. Then add your assistant's email address to either the administrator or moderator boxes on the general page.
Admin: Administering Held Messages
- Discarding messages
Mailman attempts to control unwanted postings by "moderating" them. That means that the messages are placed in a moderation queue for review by the administrator or moderator of the list. You, as the administrator, will receive messages from mailman advising you that there are messages in the queue that should be reviewed.
To manage these messages, do the following:
- click on the link in the moderation message from mailman
- log in using your administrative password
- for messages that are spam, do the following:
- click "discard" for the action to take
- add the sender address to the list of messages to be automatically discarded in the future
- check the box that will prevent this address from ever subscribing to your mailing list
- for messages that are not spam, click on "approve" and they will be posted to the list.
- Don't forget to click the Submit All Data button
Admin: What's my admin password?
Unfortunately, if you wear two hats and are both a subscriber and an administrator of a mailman list, the two passwords are not synchronized. You change your mailman administrator password by clicking on the link for your list on the admin page at
http://els42.law.emory.edu/mailman/admin/
If you don't know your administrative password, you'll need to call 7-5321 and we'll reset it for you. To maintain your subscriber password, see the subscriber password documentation on this page.
Admin: What is an implicit destination and why are my messages being held?
You cannot put the name of the mailing list into the BCC field of your email. If you do, mailman will hold or reject the message. Just put the name of the list in the TO or CC field and you should be fine.
Alternatively, you can follow the instructions in the attached screenshot to disable this feature.
Admin: How do I force immediate delivery of a digest?
On the org-announce list, many members are digest subscribers. That means that they will receive a message at 9:00am and 4:00pm every day with all of the org-announce messages batched into one email. If you are an administrator and you have a particularly important message and you want to force it to be delivered to digest users right away, you can do this by following these steps:
- Log in to the admin interface.
- Click on the link for "Digest Options"
- Locate the line that says "Should Mailman send the next digest right now, if it is not empty?"
- Select the "Yes" checkbox
- Click the "Submit Your Changes" button
Any pending messages will be immediately delivered to digest subscribers. Of course, if you abuse this, your digest users may complain. This should be reserved for times when it seems critical to you to send out an immediate notice to all members of the list.
User: Is there a user manual for Mailman?
See GNU Mailman - List Member Manual, written by Terri Oda. This gives you all sorts of good information. Most of the FAQs on our page are just edited excerpts from the Oda manual.
User: What is this 'Mailman password'? How do I find my password?
The mailman subscriber password is set automatically for each list when you are subscribed to the list. Unfortunately, it is unique for each list. The password was included in the first email you got from the list (if the 'welcome' feature was turned on). We often turn off the welcome feature when we are mass-subscribing hundreds of students at a time to class lists, so you may not receive a password reminder until the first of the next month after creating the list.
If you don't know or never received your password, you can always get a reminder through the web interface:
- Go to the list information page for the list from which you wish to get your password. Navigate to the list info page at: http://els42.law.emory.edu/mailman/listinfo/
- Choose your list and click on the link to it.
- Look for the section marked "LISTNAME subscribers'', where LISTNAME is replaced by the name of your list. This section is usually found near the bottom of the page and you may have to scroll down to see it.
- There will be a button marked "Unsubscribe or edit options." Enter your email address in the box to the left of this button and press the button.
- You should be brought to a new page which has a "Password Reminder'' section. Press the ``Remind'' button to have your password emailed to you.
If you do not receive the password reminder email after doing this, make sure that you typed your email address correctly and that the address you used is, indeed, actually subscribed to that list. For security reasons, Mailman generates the same member options page regardless of whether the address entered is subscribed or not. This means that people cannot use this part of the web interface to find out if someone is subscribed to the list, but it also means that it's hard to tell if you just made a typo.
(Taken from Terri Oda's guide.)
User: How do I change my Mailman password?
From the web interface:
- Log in to your member options page by going to
http://els42.law.emory.edu/mailman/listinfo/ Locate the list for which you want to change your password and click the link. - Scroll down to the bottom of the page and enter your email address into the box to the left of the button labeled "Unsubscribe or Change Options". Click on the button.
- This will take you to the list options page. Enter your password. (If you don't know your Mailman password for this list, retrieve your password by following these instructions)
- Look for the password changing boxes on the right-hand side of the page and enter your new password in the appropriate boxes.
- Check the box labeled "Change Globally", and then press the button marked "Change My Password.''
By checking the "Change Globally" box, you will set your mailman password for all lists to which you are subscribed.We recommend that you set your Mailman password to be the same for all lists.
User: How do I change the digest mode for org-announce or other lists?
- Changing options for org-announce
- Changing digest mode
Digests are collections of email messages sent from a list once or twice a day. We have reset the org-announce list to be a non-digested list after experimenting with digests last semester. You can change the setting back to digest mode if you would like. Here's how:
- Click on the link for your mailing list on the listinfo page:
- Go to http://els42.law.emory.edu/mailman/listinfo/
- Locate your mailing list and click on the link for it.
- Once you've clicked on the link for the list, go to the bottom of the page and locate the line that says " To unsubscribe from Org-announce, get a password reminder, or change your subscription options enter your subscription email address:"
- Enter your address and click the button that says "Unsubscribe or edit options"
- You'll be brought to a login page where you will be prompted for a password. If you know your list password, enter it here.
- If you don't know your password, click on the link that says "Remind". You should receive a password reminder almost instantly. Paste that password into the password field and click the button that says "Log in".
- Now that you're logged in, you can do a couple of things. First, change your password to something that will be easy to remember. Make sure that the "Change globally" box is checked and click on "Change My Password".
- This will change your password for all your ELS lists.
- Now, scroll down and click on "Set Digest Mode" and switch to whatever setting you prefer. Scroll on down to the bottom of the page and click on "Submit My Changes"
That's it. You've now successfully reset your digest settings.
User: What lists am I subscribed to? I don't think I'm in the right lists
Follow the instructions in the change password section to get to the options page for one of the lists to which you are subscribed. Once you're on the options page, locate the button labeled "List My Other Subscriptions". Click the button and you'll get a list of the lists to which you are subscribed.
If you are not subscribed to a list to which you should be subscribed, follow the subscription instructions. If you need to unsubscribe from a list, follow the unsubscription instructions.
User: How do I unsubscribe from a list?
Go to the list options page by visiting http://els42.law.emory.edu/mailman/listinfo
- Click on the name of the list that you want to unsubscribe from. Scroll to the bottom of the page and enter your email address into the box to the left of the button labeled "Unsubscribe or edit options".
- Click the button.
- Locate the button labeled "Unsubscribe". Click the button and respond to the email that you receive.
- That's it. You are now unsubscribed.
Caveat: Some lists are so important that we don't allow you to unsubscribe unless you are leaving the law school community. If you receive a message to that effect, it's up to you to contact the person supervising the list to find out what steps are required in order for you to unsubscribe.
User: How do I see the list archives?
One of the more valuable features of mailing list management software is the ability to create web-accessible archives of prior postings to the list.
If your list is being archived, you can access the list archive by visiting http://els42.law.emory.edu/mailman/listinfo/ and clicking on the archives link. You must have your email and Mailman password in order to acces almost all ELS Mailman archives. Some lists are not archived at all.
User: How do I change the email address for all my subscriptions?
It's important for you and Mailman to agree as to what address you are posting from. If you are subscribed under one address, but post from another, your message will be held for moderator approval or even rejected outright.
Let's say that you used to be subscribed to all the lists as bchapman(at)law.emory.edu, but now you want to be subscribed as ben.chapman@emory.edu. It's easy to change your email address in Mailman:
- Make sure you know the password for a list to which you are subscribed.
- Go to els42.law.emory.edu/mailman/listinfo/
- Locate the list and click on the link.
- Scroll to the bottom of the page. Look for the box next to the button that says "Unsubscribe or edit options".
- Enter your old email address in the box and click the "Unsubscribe or edit options" button.
- You will be prompted to enter your Mailman password. Enter the password.
- Enter the new email address in the two boxes provided.
- Make sure to check the box to make this a global change
- Then click the button.
That's it. Now you are subscribed to your lists under your new email address.
- Click to view full-size.
User: How do I subscribe to a list?
1) Visit els42.law.emory.edu/mailman/listinfo/
2) Click on the link for the list to which you wish to subscribe.
3) This will bring up a new web-page with subscription information.
3) Follow the instructions in the section under "Subscribing to <LISTNAME>"
Basically, you'll need to supply your email address and your name, as well as a password that you would like to use for the list. This password is used to give you access to list features such as list archives, etc. It should not be the same as your Novell password or any other significant password because it will be mailed to you periodically in an unencrypted format.
That's all there is to it. If you have questions, please contact the help desk line at 7-5321.