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Mail Lists Moved To New Easier Mailman.

Page Below Is Half Obsolete ie where it refer to majordomo, but
basic list conduct rules etc still relevant, & need to be moved to mailman page, example: No Auto Responders

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Other Languages,
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Majordomo [Un]Subscriptions &
Mail Lists On Berklix Servers

This is: http://www.berklix.org/help/majordomo/
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Do Not Annoy Yourself Wasting Your Time Asking Us To [Un]Subscribe You!
Such requests are automatically, silently discarded unseen, unanswered.
Organisers have No time for you & hundreds of others to waste.
Do Your Work Yourself: Use The robot !

INDEX - How To Use Majordomo & Lists

No German Translation / Keine Deutsch Uebersetzung

Do Not mail Majordomo or its various ListName-request@mailman.berklix.org aliases human requests. Majordomo is a robot that only obeys simple exact commands you must choose, including subscribe & unsubscribe & lists & help etc.

  1. Set Up Your Mailer To Send Plain Text Format

    Do that first, before you [un]subscribe. Many mailer tools embed semi invisible excrement that confuses Majordomo.
    1. DO MAIL ONLY Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi) format, (Not HTML which normally needs Content-type: multipart/alternative)
    2. Set Your Mailer To Send Plain Text (Ascii/Ansi) (without MIME enclosures)
    3. How To Set Your Mailer To Send Plain Text (Ascii/Ansi)
    4. Do Not mail in quoted-printable format
    5. Do Not mail HTML format or MIME enclosures
    6. Do Not mail 'Rich Text' format (which corrupts to junk )
    7. Do Not mail Content-type: multipart/

  2. Subscribing & Unsubscribing

    1. Short Cuts (By Email)
    2. What Is Majordomo ?
    3. Why Use Majordomo ?
    4. No Web Interface
    5. No Web Forums
    6. How To Use Majordomo
    7. Anonymous Subscription ? No.
    8. Organisers Lists
    9. To Unsubscribe An Unknown / Unrecognised Address
    10. Manual (Documentation)
    11. Bored Reading ? - Give Majordomo A Try Now !

  3. If You Get Stuck

  4.   After You Have Subscribed

    1. You May / Probably Will Be Un-subscribed Without Warning If You Breach Requirements
    2. You Will Be Un-subscribed If A Spammer Repeatedly Fakes Your Address
      (Maybe Mailman might later get a Discard_Sender Binary flag ?)
    3. Format: Post in Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi) if you can.
    4. Do Not Send Bulky Large posts (Big Pictures)
    5. Do Not Cross Subscribe Lists
    6. Do Not Cross Post Multiple Lists
    7. Do Not Send .Doc etc enclosures with non portable format
    8. Do Not Send Virus Alerts
    9. Do Not Send From An Un-subscribed Address
    10. Do not CC an owner-*@berklix address
    11. Delete list footer before replying.
    12. Umlauts (German) & other national alphabetic extensions
    13. Protect Our List Address From Spam Address Harvesters
    14. Avoid Bounces
      1. Failed address
      2. Unsubscribe Dead Address
      3. Avoid Automatic Responder "Mailbox Full"
      4. Avoid Automatic Responder "I'm Away"
      5. Avoid MX loops
      6. Avoid Grey Listing, else White List berklix.org
      7. Avoid Recipient not allowing
    15. Keep To Remit Of List
    16. Keep To Subject.
    17. Do Not Send Abuse & Flames
    18. Criticism Of Organisers
    19. Avoid Time Wasting
    20. Please Help The Clueless
    21. Digests
    22. Archives
    23. Spam
    24. Forgeries
    25. Test list

  5. Server Issues - Not For Most Users, Technical Stuff !

    1. Server Configuration Options
      1. General
      2. Reply-To: header, potential Duplicate Copies & Automatic Removal
      3. Subject: Prefixes
      4. restrict_post: A Majordomo config option restricting to Members Only -
      5. Headers In Body
      6. R-DNS - Reverse Domain Name Service (Anti Spam)
    2. Server Bugs
      1. Terminal Mime Boundary

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Short Cuts (By Email)

Here's a few short cuts to send some common commands to Majordomo for a few common lists.
If you are reading a German (or other human language) translation from the original English version of this page:
Realise you must Not use German (or other language) translation of English Commands, You must Only use the un-translated original English version of command words with the robot.
The robot does Not understand German key / command words (though Author did append a bit of German text to the Help command). :
----
Command Where To Contents Of Reply Mail
lists majordomo@ List of mail lists.
< href= "mailto:majordomo@berklix.org?body=help">help majordomo@ Commands you can send to majordomo
info bg-request@ Information about Beer Gardeners List
subscribe bg-request@ Auth. key you return to subscribe.
unsubscribe bg-request@ Auth. key you return to unsubscribe.
info bike-request@ Information about Bike List
subscribe bike-request@ Auth. key you return to subscribe.
unsubscribe bike-request@ Auth. key you return to unsubscribe.
info mecc-request@ Information about MECC Computer Contractors List
subscribe mecc-request@ Auth. key you return to subscribe.
unsubscribe mecc-request@ Auth. key you return to unsubscribe.
info ski-request@ Information about Ski List
subscribe ski-request@ Auth. key you return to subscribe.
unsubscribe ski-request@ Auth. key you return to unsubscribe.
info walk-request@ Information about Walk list
subscribe walk-request@ Auth. key you return to subscribe.
unsubscribe walk-request@ Auth. key you return to unsubscribe.
  • There are Many Other Lists that this majordomo@berklix.org supports. There are also other options, eg to get Majordomo to send an invite to a friend to subscribe or unsubscribe a list (friend has to send back authorisation to Majordomo, before Majordomo will [un]subscribe).
    Example:
    To: majordomo@berklix.org

    unsubscribe walk
    subscribe ski
    lists
    unsubscribe bg old-address@old-co.de
    subscribe bg "John Smith" <new-address@new-co.com>

    or use your intelligence to string 3 words together for Majordomo, eg:
  • Don't be misled just because short cuts to those are not given here.
  • Many other lists are for people more technically competent than social group subscribers, many of whom fail to learn the 2 or 3 words to [un]subscribe via Majordomo
  • Short cuts will not always work, in certain sender's circumstances, so it's better to understand how to use Majordomo properly, rather than ignorantly click & pray on short cuts.
  • The number of lists is increasing. This robot owner does not have time to waste to copy in & keep the list of lists manually in sync on this page. Instead if & when time permits I'll add a web interface tool later.

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Subscribing & Unsubscribing

What Is Majordomo ?

One of the Internet's most frequently encountered & classic mail list robots (eg FreeBSD used to use it. Debian Linux uses it at 2013-03-14, NetBSD uses it at 2013-03-14 Worth the small effort to learn: many of the basic concepts apply equally to other list robots. (There's also a web interface called Majorcool, which is in FreeBSD-9.1/ports but is not in FreeBSD-current at 2013-03-14.

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Why Use Majordomo ?

It's Majordomo that manages lists on the Berklix hosts. If you want to subscribe or unsubscribe a list you need to use Majordomo, List owner can't do it for anyone manually any more, he's got no more free time for administrative trivia for hundreds of subscribers.

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  No Web Interface

Email your instruction to the free Majordomo [un]subscribe robot.

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  No Web Forums

There are archives),
But No web forums because:
  • Web forums needs more complex software that can break, requiring more maintenance work, needing funding, which tends on other sites to be paid by carrying adverts, &/or domain then sold, (as with toytown).
  • Forums, particularly if anonymous, get infested with nutters & trolls that end up needing "moderation".
  • Moderators need to be paid (see above) or may be selfless or egotistic. They all claim to be good, some may even be believe it, but that does not preclude egotism ... "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?"
  • Other domains gave up forums for similar manpower reasons that Berklix never hosted them; (New Scientist perhaps among others ? )
  • This robot owner as a user on other domains has seen censors (who style themselves moderators) abuse their position.
  • This robot owner loathes censorship & has no wish to be a censor, or appoint censors, or allow them. Where possible lists are still open to all users to post. (These tend to be lists for technically competent people). Where too many incompetents have in the past abused entire lists with dumb posts such as personal subscription change requests, (or where robot owner thinks a new list will have similar incompetent users, those lists are now Only writable by all event organisers. Event organisers are of course Not "moderated" aka censored.
  • The robot owner was only driven in desperation to preserve hist time, to restrict some lists, but in some of those cases he split some lists, creating 2 parallel lists: One announce only by organisers, & One writable to all on lists. More such dual splitting is available if required.

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How To Use Majordomo

  •   Set Your Mailer To Send Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi)
    No HTML, No MIME enclosures, No signature, No quoted-printable, No Rich Text
    (Avoiding HTML & MIME enclosures is no longer strictly necessary but still best).
    • If you mail HTML:
      Majordomo will usually (**) not understand your HTML format, & will reject each line back to you, with error message "command not recognized".
      If by chance you also mail a complete good command line to majordomo, such as
      unsubscribe you@your-company.com
      Then Majordomo will obey your command.
      ( (**) It is possible to embed useful plain text (Ascii/ Ansi) strings of Majordomo commands within HTML, & so long as one avoids all HTML junk on those lines, those lines will work, though errors will appear from HTML lines adjacent; however, that's something for computer computer people, Normal people should simply Not Send HTML. Set your mailer to send Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi), or if you can't set it, switch to using different mailer software that can.
      Majordomo does Not forward your HTML junk to its human owner, to sort out your failure. Do not waste time sending HTML. Mail in Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi) !
      No Signature/ Footers
      If you send a signature footer (corporate disclaimer etc) to Majordomo, Majordomo will reject those lines back to you, complaining it cannot execute those commands. Majordomo will however execute any commands that precede them. To avoid Majordomo complaining about your signature you can put a single word "end" on a line on it own, after your last command to Majordomo before your signature .

      If your mailer sends mail in multiple parts using MIME formatted enclosures, probably sending duplicates in Ascii & HTML:

      Majordomo will obey the Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi), but also reply with error messages on the HTML. The Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi) will work though, (if your commands to Majordomo are correct).
       

      Ensure the part containing your instructions is set to eg charset="US-ASCII" not UTF:

      • Example of something OK
        - --part.1234.boundary
        Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
        Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
      • Example of UTF that will most probably fail:
        - --part.1234.boundary
        Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
        Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
        Content-Language: en
      Hints
      • If your mailer breaks lines up (as seen from quoted-printable junk format, (also used by UTF), inserting spurious "=20" sequences, unseen by sender, but seen by Majordomo & visible in eg programmers editors : Turn quoted-printable Off. It will stop Majordomo understanding you
      • Avoid quoted-printable junk format It damages command lines for Majordomo before it leaves your computer, so Majordomo can't work. quoted-printable format inserts spurious line feeds & other junk in mid line.
        Here is an example of quoted-printable junk format someone sent to Majordomo, that Majordomo rejected as junk, that the human then forwarded to Majordomo owner, further mangling his mail with more quoted-printable junk.
        >>>> auth 0bd37b64858e488ee32c5f0d50c783c3 unsubscribe walk W______ K___=
        el
        **** The address you supplied=2C W______ K___el
        **** does not seem to be a legal Internet address. You may have supplied
        **** your full name instead of your address=2C or you may have included y=
        our
        **** name along with your address in a manner that does not comply with
        **** Internet standards for addresses.
        **** It is also possible that you are using a mailer that wraps long line=
        s
        **** and the end of your request ended up on the following line. If the
        **** latter is true=2C try using backslashes to split long lines. (Split=
        the
        **** line between words=2C then put a backslash at the end of all but the
        **** last line.)
        >=20
        **** unsubscribe: invalid address 'W______ K___el'
        >>>> wk___el@hot____.com
        **** Command 'wk___el@hot____.com' not recognized.
        If you read above, Majordomo even guessed the problem, But the person didn't think. The person was told more explicitly by the Majordomo owner: Mail Majordomo with Plain Text + Do Not to send quoted-printable junk format, then Majordomo worked fine.

        One way to recognise if your mailer sends quoted-printable junk is: send any normal (non subscription mail to any friend who has a programmers' editor, ask them to look at it & reply. If you are sending junk quoted-printable format, you'r likely to receive replies with lots of spurious '=' at the end of your quoted lines, & some '=' in the middle too. ... but only when they quote the lines your sent them, not in text they type to reply to you, ie all the quoted-printable '=' junk is coming from your mailer.. & corrupting the commands you are also sending to Majordomo .. so it won't work.

      • If you use a mailer that sends both HTML And Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi) (eg AOL):
        although Majordomo will spew error messages for every HTML line & the lines of the MIME separator, eg
        --part1_25d.80f9a3c.313f078f_boundary
        Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
        Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
        It still will honour the Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi) subscribe instructions. (though you may have a had job finding the confirmation text string (password) to return & confirm your request, buried among all the error messages Majordomo will also emit, for each line of HTML & separator in your first mail.
      • If your character set displays German Umlauts / Deutsche Umlauten properly, it's likely (but not necessarily) no good for sending the necessary Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi). If you don't understand what character sets are about, & want to understand, ask for a computer lesson over a beer, else simply do what you'r told, & switch to Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi) when sending to Majordomo.
      Mail Majordomo only plain text (Ascii/ Ansi). Do not mail HTML, or use Mime, or Word etc.
  • Mail Majordomo commands only in the body of an email, not in the subject line.
  • Mail Majordomo commands such as
    lists
    help
    end
    & you will receive a list of mail Lists you can subscribe to.
  • Normally commands such as
    info bg
    subscribe bg
    unsubscribe bg
    are sufficient, but you can also look at your headers, then specify eg:
    unsubscribe bg old-forwarded-name@old-co.de
    subscribe bg new-name@new-co.de
  • If you want a list called bg@, & you send a mail to bg-request@ with the single world subscribe or unsubscribe, that should be sufficient, assuming you are at your normal address, & your computers &/or company gateways do not different addresses for external mail.
  • If you mail from a temporary different address, trying to subscribe your normal address, try eg:
    subscribe bg "Jack at Normal Address" <jack@normal.com>

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Human Names Do Not Help Majordomo When Unsubscribing

Majordomo has no use for your human name, only your email address. Mis spell your human name, & it won't care, misspell your email address, & Majordomo will certainly fail to work as you want. If you accidentally scramble your name & address, putting in line breaks or screwing up "quote marks" or <brackets> etc, Majordomo may search to delete your human name instead of your email address, & will fail to find your address. If you don't understand mail name & address punctuation, simply omit your human name, & just give your email address without any surrounding punctuation, keeping any unsubscribe as plain as you can, EG
unsubscribe bg john@my-old-domain.com
W hen you subscribe your new address (eg to a list called bg), it's safe to give your full human name & email address, EG
subscribe bg "John Smith" <john@my-new-domain.com>
A gain, the human name is not essential, but it's nicer to have it: It helps the list owner & mail recipient sort things out manually if something goes wrong either end.

If you have problems, use just your email address, & omit your human name. As some people don't know the difference between their human name & their email address (yes really !) Here's some examples. Bear in mind that when mailers send both human & email address, they put the human name in "Quotes" and the email address in <less and greater than signs>.

Human Name Internet Address
"John Smith, Micro Stuff js@msv.com" <John_Smith@msv.com>
John Smith, Micro Stuff js@msv.com <John_Smith@msv.com>
"John Smith, Micro Stuff js@msv.com"   John_Smith@msv.com
  <John_Smith@msv.com>
    John_Smith@msv.com
Your irrelevant human name, (that might confuse Majordomo, that you can if you wish omit) is in this case John Smith, Micro Stuff js@msv.com, The email address you must include is John_Smith@msv.com

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Anonymous Subscription ? No.

Do not send an anonymous request such as
subscribe bg 123456789012-0001@t-offline.com
B est send eg:
subscribe bg "John Smith" <123456789012-0001@t-offline.de>
A t least send:
subscribe bg John.Smith@t-offline.de
W hy:
Some lists need authorisation from a human owner before you can subscribe. (Spam avoidance, annoyance avoidance whatever). If you make your subscription anonymous, list owners will likely ignore it, not authorise it, & not waste their time mailing you back to ask if you are genuine & have some friends in or knowledge of the list you wanted to join. They'll probably assume you're just another spammer or an occasional loon, yes we get a few occasionally, no we're not an advert sponsored site paid to put up with that. Give a human name too.

Organisers Lists

A number of activity lists have 2 lists, eg ski@ & ski-org@. While you are welcome to just subscribe yourself to the event announcement list, if you want to also become an organiser & announce events, you should first introduce yourself to other organisers before then using majordomo@berklix.org to send a subscribe request for the matching *-org@ list.

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  • Bored Reading ? - Give Majordomo A Try Now !

    Mail "Help" To: majordomo@berklix.org
    Example Web Page: majordomo@berklix.org

    Tip: Give it a go, having read this page, you may well get it right first time; if not just consider what the robot replies, change your command to the robot & try again. The robot is infinitely patient, no one scores you for how quickly you succeed.
    (Do Not ask robot owner to do your [un]subscribe work fro you. Automatic filters silently discard lazy noise).

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After You Have Subscribed

You May Be Un-subscribed Without Warning If You Breach Requirements:

Format: Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi) is the preferred & reccomended Format.

  • Send Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi) where you can.
  • Do Not Send HTML. It's spammers format. Not all mail readers support like or want HTML. & HTML is superfluous. HTML also uses MIME.
  • Avoid posting MIME Enclosures (usually for HTML): It used to cause footers to become invisible (footer contains the important "How To Unsubscribe" etc), so MIME enclosures were forbidden.

    MIME was Not Allowed on lists up to 2011_09_11, & mails containing them were automatically rejected to the list owner

      Majordomo & the Lists now (as of 2011_09_12) also filter posts to Lists , & subscriptions & un subscriptions, automatically converting HTML to plain text (Ascii/ Ansi) text.

    This is done with a filter (currently demime, will change later perhaps to Emil.

    • This makes subscribes & un-subscribes & posting easier for technically clueless people who don't know or want to know:
    • MIME enclosures (such as HTML) now get forced to plain text (Ascii/ Ansi), so HTML posts will no longer get discarded to list owners, but should go to list.
    • Technical details & explanations, not for most list subscribers, just for a few (berklix servers have a range of mail lists with subscribers ranging from computer unskilled to highly skilled).
  • Avoid mass excretia from Microsoft Outlook (new name Entourage) at top, eg: PADDING-RIGHT, MARGIN, etc.
  • Avoid appearing like spam, eg: colour, underlining, fonts, surplus spacing.
  • Do Not Send MS-Word format etc Never send proprietary non publicly defined formats (EG Microsoft's Word, Power Point Excel, & most or all formats that start ms-*, etc).
    Posting monopolist proprietary formats or fonts etc to a berklix public list, would fly in the face of all the berklix servers are for & based on, inc. public open standards software, admin work committed, hardware donated, & hosting resources provided.
  • Acceptable where & if necessary (but see note about MIME above): Publicly defined formats such as .gif .jpg .tiff .pdf .ps etc are acceptable if not avoidable. But we don't waste list bandwidth sending surplus big pictures to many who won't use them or need them. Just send an http:// or ftp:// URL (web ref.) to your original, for those few who want it. . Some mail lists have hundreds of people, but maybe only 10 may attend an event, so hundreds don't want bulk map graphics in a post, a web ref is better!
  • Best Avoid: Public formats that need monstrous applications EG Open Document Format for Open/Libre Office.
    Why not Open/Libre Office format:
    • burdensomely enormous as a tool merely to read mail.
    • Needs 4 Gig of source to build, (or needs you to trust others to build binaries - defeating one of the major benefits of open source - security of not using imported un examinable binaries)
    • Needs manual fetching of some sources (deliberately crippled by Sun, for their licence reasons.
    • Depends on other web sites that break
    • Depend on too much other stuff that tends to break.
    • Depends on java (more pain - versions etc)
    • That even as a binary (if you'r prepared to trust & run foreign binaries (& some are not!), needs mammoth resources, & won't run on old or light weight &/or portable hardware.
  • Do Not Send PC (i386,4,5,686 Pentium etc) architecture dependent formats. Formats (eg flash) that need applications that only run on eg Intel i386, but not AMD64, Vax or Sparc etc are bad news.
Stick to Plain Text (Ascii/ Ansi). It's minimal light & painless.

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Do NOT Send headers with Content-type: multipart/ ie No HTML


(Some mail providers foolishly set Content-type: multipart/alternative as their default (to also send HTML). Some mailers set Content-type: multipart/mixed to support sending signature/disclaimer block as a seperate MIME enclosure. You need to change that as Content-type: multipart/ is automatically Rejected to prevent So You Need To: multipart/alternative wastes about 70% of mail disc space & server time in repeated HTML bloat. (Imagine every small car in the world, pointlessly towing a big colourful Pakistani style ornamented truck behind it ! - That's about what HTML added to Internet mail)

Microsoft users, click "Format" then click (If English) "Plain text" or if German: "Nur-Text" You do Not want: "Rich-Text Or HTML".

Do Not Send Bulky Large posts (eg big pictures)

Do not send bulk - EG big pictures :
  • Posts if too big get automatically rejected.
  • Some lists have well over 300 members. If you attempt to send such lists eg 2 big pictures & a map, the mail system adds protective wrapping, tries to send 6 Meg x 300 = 1.8 Giga Byte & rejects you instead.
  • If the announcement is for an imminent event, First send just your text announcement, to ensure the server sends it out to all in time. Then if the map of where to go is bulky, send it as a seperate email posting (if that list allows enclosures).
  • Unless pictures are really necessary, to show where to go, omit them.
  • Most lists now reject any pictures, & many MIME enclosures etc. Best stick your picture on a web site, & just send the URL (= Uniform Resource Locator = Web Reference)
  • Recipients providers (ISP) also give low priority to receiving your bulk).
  • Shrink your picture before sending. Shrink to half by half size frame & you shrink data by 4 ! Reduce JPEG quality 25%, down to 75% & its hard to see the difference, but you shrink data by a factor of 10. Do both & you achieve massive savings.
  • Bulk creates a pointless peak load, as not all people need the pictures, especially they don't need them at exactly the same time.
  • It delays other mail on the server
  • Peak traffic during business hours, & wasted telecom traffic costs can make us unpopular with sites that support / subsidise our servers.
  • Not all recipients have fast DSL download, some have slow modems (or corporate gateways), & some complain to sender or list owner. Don't be cause of complaints.
  • Some recipients have low quotas on their mailboxes
  • Your unexpected bulk pictures will overflows numerous recipient mailboxes, leaving no room for more important mail.
  • Some receive list mail at work, their boss may also complain to them about irrelevant pictures.
  • Those mailboxes automatically complain to list owner, wasting his/her time while he/she checks the error report type.
Put pictures on yours or some other person's web site, & just announce to list the URL (Uniform Resource Locator = web ref.) If you don't have web space, just announce they're available, & you'll private mail, or ask some friend to web host them for you (Not the over worked unpaid mail lists owner though please).

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DO Not Cross Subscribe Lists - Do Not provoke a mail storm !
  • Never give our list addresses to other robots!
  • Never cross subscribe Lists On Berklix with other lists !
  • Never give third party commercial web sites (such as LinkedIn etc) our list addresses to send their "Invitations" (to connect to `you' but via their sites).
  • It is Dangerous to have other robots connecting to our lists run by our robot majordomo@berklix.org ! Dangers of deadly mutual embrace, mail flood, work for mail list owner, & if owner travelling, & not present to quickly solve problems, risk of prolonged mail flood to all on list.
  • majordomo@berklix.org has some filters to discard junk invites from linkedin but it's near impossible to have a complete set of filter rules, without interfering with genuine traffic, so we require responsibility & caution:
  • This is not censorship, as:
    • You are free to post to lists to invite people to give you their personal addresses, so you can send them individual "Invites", Not via this list, from robots you use, if you & they both want.
    • Ensure anything you send to our lists is Really from your personal mail address, using your personal mail client software, Not merely from some 3rd party robot claiming to be "From: you" (the tell-tale truth shows in headers).
    • To do a test run & inspect your headers, you could send a test post to our test list. Note even there what you want to risk could be dangerous, but at least less people would be affected by a mail flood there, & more skilled subscribers may offer You advice how to stop
      any mail flood You will be held responsible for !
  • Deliberate cross subscribing to flood would be severely punished !

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DO Not Cross Post To Multiple Lists
Or, At least keep the number very low, & clearly mark all but one of the lists with bcc in header so we don't risk receiving a storm of replies from other lists. ( If very occasionally a cross post is appropriate, Please post clearly to One list only, Use a BCC to the other list, & make a clear statement in body of mail, to direct all follow up discussion to one list only. )

To clarify, as "Cross Post" is a new non self evident term to some people new to mail lists, Assume:

  • General & Beer garden list bg@ doesn't need walk detail, as walkers are on walk@
  • General & beer garden list bg@ doesn't need ski detail, as skiers are on ski@
  • General lists don't need ski detail, as skiers are on ski@
  • ski@ doesn't need beer garden or walk announcements etc.
  • "Walks to beergardens": If it's a long walk with proper boots, post detail to walk@, else to bg@.

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Do Not Send .Doc etc enclosures with non portable format
Posts with enclosures in certain formats are automatically blocked, eg:
Content-Type: application/msword;
Content-Type: application/vnd.ms-powerpoint;
Content-Type: application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document;
These formats deprecated as bloated, proprietary, risky, & not open to all, Please use a different public format eg PDF or something else. For more background:

Do Not Send Virus Alerts

If you want virus alerts, subscribe a virus alert list. If you don't want viruses, either buy a virus filter, or dump your inferior virus prone commercial software, & use higher quality free software such as FreeBSD that doesn't suffer from viruses. or Linux that also generally doesn't suffer from viruses. (Both BSD & Linux have the capability to avoid viruses totally, but as Linux has more users & some of them have markedly lower skills, it's potentially more exposed if ignorant users choose to run systems insecurely. This is Not a technical fault of Linux but a problem of user skill/ education).

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Do Not Send From An Un subscribed Address

Many people have multiple email addresses. They subscribe one address, Receive list posts to it, Then later post to the list from a second address. As they haven't subscribed the new address, majordomo@berklix.org doesn't know they're not a spammer. Such posts may get silently dumped, or may be forwarded to a list owner, who is Not paid to waste time on it. This robot owner owns many lists on berklix.org. He/she is too busy to waste time approving such mail. If he/she has enough time to do more than just delete it, he rejects it back to sender with this standard reply, to make both sender & others who sender may complain to, realise he/she won't do their work of maintaining their own subscribed address. Note
  • majordomo@berklix.org will of course allow you to subscribe multiple addresses. S
    • Some mailer tools allow automatic reduction of duplicate received mail.
      • Future list manager I intend to install will allow a more sophisticated approach.

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Do not CC an owner-*@berklix address

Those addresses are Only for reporting genuine mail system server errors. If your mailer wrongly includes a list name and an owner-* then Majordomo will discard your post.

Technical Info

Example headers:

  • Errors-To: announce-bounces @@ *.ixsystems.com
  • Errors-To: gnupg-users-bounces @@ gnupg.org
  • Errors-To: gpsdrive-bounces @@ lists.gpsdrivers.org
  • Errors-To: mailman-bounces @@ lists.netexpress.com
  • Errors-To: mailman-bounces @@ mail.ixsystems.com
  • Errors-To: mailman-bounces+YOUR_ADDRESS @@ lists.alioth.debian.org
  • Errors-To: owner-freebsd-announce @@ freebsd.org
  • Errors-to: owner-test @@ berklix.org
  • Sender: netbsd-users-owner @@ NetBSD.org
  • Sender: owner-freebsd-announce @@ freebsd.org
  • Sender: owner-test @@ lists.berklix.org
Sender: Definition: Errors-To: Definition:

Delete old list footer from previous posts before replying.

Majordomo automatically appends a fresh correct footer; don't leave the old footer from last post. It looks incompetent, & if your mailer mangles it, looks even worse.

Umlauts (German) & other national alphabetic extensions.

Various Sending Solutions
  • Either Use German convention of typing Ä as AE
    Ö as OE, Ü as UE, ä as ae, ö as oe, ü as ue, ß as ss, (for typewriters & printers without Umlauts, & corresponding with foreigners who have no idea what umlauts are, & where keyboards & software have not been Germanised from the international default American that eg PC Bios-es etc start with)
  • Or Use pre HTML, German special single bytes
    to represent Umlauts as extensions to Ascii/Ansi table (often but not always, high (parity) bit was set). Byte values are detailed at end of umlauts.rof.
    It will work, if all of your recipients' software uses the same Umlaut convention, and if also every mail server on the Internet that SMTP relays your mail to the list server, & list server to recipients, are All configured for 8 bit transfer (a few old Internet mail relays can still use 7 bit, they would damage Umlauts). (If you want to know what mail servers your mail goes through on route, recipients need to send you back the headers on mail they receive from you via the list server (not direct mail as that will often take a different route) , then look at each "Received: " line. )
  • Or Use HTML, BUT Before you do, BE WARNED:,
  • If You Send HTML With Umlauts, You Should Configure your mail sender to send _Without_ putting HTML in a MIME enclosure,
    • (That might not the default for your mailer, which might unless told, put HTML inside MIME, but Internet mail & Berklix allows HTML without MIME, so explore your mailer). If you want, send a test post with some umlauts to our test list.
    • This method was seen successful 11 Sep 2013, (in both Subject line & body of mail, umlauts showed OK. A copy is in the archive of list pcs . Extract of headers (to helps other senders to other lists)
      Subject: PCS-Treffen heute ab ca. 17:30 - im
      =?iso-8859-1?q?Hofbr=E4ukeller?=
      User-Agent: KMail/1.13.6 (Linux/2.6.37.6-0.11-desktop; KDE/4.6.0; i686;
      ; )
      X-KMail-Markup: true
      MIME-Version: 1.0
      Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
      Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
      X-Converted-To-Plain-Text: from multipart/alternative by demime 1.01d
      X-Converted-To-Plain-Text: Alternative section used was text/plain
      List-id: pcs

Protect Our List Address From Spam Address Harvesters

Never include our list address on any Internet scannable resource. We do not want web crawler robots harvesting our mail address to be sold to spammers.

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Avoid Bounces

Berklix mail list policy forbids all automatic response to list mail.

Avoid mail bounces & noise back to the Majordomo owner, list owner, or list etc. Bounces might be for many reasons, but Please spare the list owner work to deal with your problems, eg:

Failing Address
Some computer en route to you may fail periodically. Perhaps not your fault but even less is it the fault or concern of the Majordomo or list owner, so unsubscribe any problematic address, & subscribe a less troublesome more reliable address.

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Failure To Unsubscribe An Addresses Scheduled To Later Expire
Unsubscribe old addresses Before they are due to expire:
Unsubscribing may need a confirmation password returned to your old address. You can't receive it after your address has expired.

If you cancelled your address with your ISP or company, but forgot or didn't realise you should unsubscribe first, apologise to the list owner for wasting their time, & ask for manual intervention. (You may be liable to pay the beer or charity charge for wasting Majordomo or list owner's time, as mentioned elsewhere.) If you are too lazy to un-subscribe, you deliberately waste the list site's bandwidth, & waste the list owner's time when he/she realises they need to manually remove a dead address.

If you just leave, & let your mailbox at your paid ISP (Internet Service Provider) or ex employer overflow or bounce back to consume the time of the Majordomo & list owners (volunteers, not paid to waste time!). You will force them to waste their time trying to figure out if the bounces are a temporary net failure to be ignored, or a permanent change to be dealt with.

If you deliberately waste Majordomo or list owner's time or bandwidth. expect a hostile reaction: Any such address or new replacement address may be published. The list owner &/or Majordomo owner may refuse to authorise your later subscription from a new address

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Avoid Automatic Responder "Mailbox Full" Responses.
Don't trouble Majordomo & list owners with your problems ! Configure your mailbox Not to bleat to mail lists. The list mechanism is certainly NOT going to "Please try sending again later." ! Look at the berklix mail list identification headers available, & particularly the Sender: string, examine the options your ISP provides, & configure your mailbox, not to bleat repeatedly to mail lists or mail list owners, or buy a bigger mailbox & subscribe that instead !

Avoid More Info Here.

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Avoid Automatic Responder "I'm Away On Business/ Holiday/ Sick" Responders
Such automatic responses may be fine for individuals humans, but are annoying to list recipients, list owners & Majordomo owner. (Auto repliers should not keep replying to every message, they should probably reply just once per combination of recipient absent period & sender first post after beginning of absence).
Don't trouble us with your noise ! Either teach your mailer program not to bleat to lists (as per "Mailbox Full"above), or Subscribe some better or 2nd address that does not send such noise. For every post sent to the list, the list owner personally sees your auto responder bleat for every message. He/she gets repeat notifications when many people are on holiday or away on business ! A tedious flood that announces clueless incompetence. Noise he/she does Not want.

A good auto responder should recognise list mail, & should Not respond to every post from mail lists you are subscribed to.

Look at your auto responder, & see if it's set to the right preferences, (even if its not currently in use). Look at the fields set in this list mail header, such as eg

Sender: owner-list-name@berklix
Precedence: bulk
Can you configure your auto responder Not to respond to mail with those headers & or footers ?

Do not mail Majordomo or list owner asking eg: "I use Micro Stuff Version 1.2.3, After I click on "Viruses Are Us" and `Display All Elephants In Pink' button, in "I Have No Clue What My Mail Tool Is Called" what do I do next ?"
It is Your responsibility to control Your auto responder not to emit Noise. It is Not the responsibility of Majordomo &/or list owner to do your work for you. You must solve it yourself. Just like if you buy a car, trigger the alarm, & annoy the neighbourhood, You must solve Your problem Yourself

The Majordomo & list owner specialises in Unix, & free software with source code ), & does not use anything running on Microsoft, & does not know the settings for most of the many MS mailers on the market, if Microsoft was your or your employer's choice it's Your responsibility to learn how to use it, it's not the Majordomo or list owner's choice. If you can't control your mailer program, use another one, or take lessons, or turn off the responder, or leave the list, or be removed from list by list owner.

majordomo@berklix.org?body=lists If you have a solution for others such as "For Micro Stuff v 1..2.3, click in this order to set your auto responder properly" then please mail your advice to majordomo-owner@

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Avoid MX loops
If you create your own new domain, try testing mail delivery, (perhaps by subscribing to & sending messages to a test list test@ list on this Majordomo) before subscribing a live list with real people.

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Avoid Grey Listing - else White list berklix.org
Automatic responses not allowed.
If your email provider configures his/her mail system to enable "Grey Listing", so that for example: "Grey list rejected," or "Grey listing in action, please come back in ..." emails get sent to the owner of berklix.org lists: This is not allowed. Deliberate errors causing extra automatic junk mail breaches your subscription. Your subscription will be terminated if you do not quickly fix Your problem.
Grey listing is a problematic anti spam method:
Grey listing may save you some spam. It may also save your mail provider some staff costs resolving spam issues. BUT it works by automatically bouncing errors back to the innocent volunteer unpaid berklix.org list owner's mail box. Grey listing is thus often an incompetently initiated & badly configured & irresponsible dirty trick by selfish providers, to dump their problem on someone else, unpaid. It is not acceptable.

How Grey Listing Works: Automatically rejects first mail transmissions, relying on non spammer senders to automatically retry, whereas spammers turn off retry to maximise throughput), The error mails penalise innocent senders (unless white listed). Bad enough for 1 to 1 mail, grey listing becomes itself mass spam when loads of list subscribers each grey list excrete individually, back to a list owner, who receives bulk excrement from grey listers, in response to each valid post.

Text for Periodic posting from list-owner to list
Subject: Subscriptions terminate if providers grey list Berklix.org.

Reminder: If your mail provider add "Grey Listing" you must personally ensure they also "White List" Berklix.org, else your subscription terminates. Addresses currently breaking the rule will be sent a private mail warning. Grey listing is an unwelcome & problematic anti spam method. http://www.berklix.org/help/majordomo/#grey_listing

Text for periodic private mail from list-owner to individuals with grey listing providers:
Subject: Un-subscription if your provider does not white list berklix.org.

Warning: Your mail provider has enabled grey listing. This contravenes terms of berklix.org list subscription. Tell them to now quickly either A) Add Berklix.org to your white list, or B) Turn Off irresponsible grey listing, or C) You will be forcibly un-subscribed.

It's your responsibility to force your provider to fix problems he/she caused. If they fail to fix your problem, unsubscribe your address (if you haven't already been forcibly un-subscribed), & subscribe yourself from a better address with a different domain.

Sorry, but list owners at berklix.org have not created your problem, do not know or want to know your issues, & have neither time nor paid to help on the many issues of many different list subscribers. All that is either the responsibility of your employer, your home mail provider, your software vendor, or yourself personally.

More info: http://www.berklix.org/help/majordomo/#grey_listing

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Recipient not allowing attachments or embedded images:
Your problem, don't shove your problem back on list owner, get a better mail account, or be forcibly un-subscribed !

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Keep To Remit Of List
Keep posts relevant to the remit of the particular mail list you are on.

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Keep To Subject
Else change the subject header.

Also Do not allow your mailer to screw up "Subject:" with a wild Germanic non compliant mess of eg

"Re: Bzw: Re: Bzw: Original subject"
I f your mailer fails to recognise "Re." & appends spurious "Bzw" & if you don't know how to fix the Bzw default, then you owe it to list readers to edit the Subject line back to a single "Re." manually yourself. Other readers have mailers that sort by subject, which fails if your Germanic software fails.

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Do Not Send Abuse & Flames
If you must be offensive/ critical &/or flame other list members etc, take it off list as soon as possible to private mail. Keep it off list from the beginning if you can.
Criticism Of Organisers
  • Positive criticism (as in "If we do it this way we could improve ... ") may be useful. Negative personal public criticism from non contributors may often be just the carping of hollow vessels.
  • Clubs (& list servers) are built & maintained by the regular donation of time from activist unpaid volunteers, organising events & or background services.
  • Clubs supported on berklix servers are free. Organisers are not paid anything. Organisers are not required to tolerate or waste time refuting or correcting un truths, distortions, or delusions etc.
  • Critics who mouth off but don't contribute, are worthless & disposable.
  • Any large group may contain a few people who'd prefer things a different way, their noise may well be out of proportion to the silent majority.
  • Opinions that count most are from those who regularly donate time to arranging events & support services for benefit of members. So if you want to criticise, first Work organising some Events
  • Normal list members who correct factually incorrect assertions are particularly appreciated.

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Avoid Time Wasting
Majordomo is infinitely patient if you get things wrong. You are encouraged to think, then try again. Wasting the time of the human Majordomo &/or list owners is highly inadvisable: he/she is unpaid, too busy, & has no reason to tolerate waste of his/her time.

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Please Help The Clueless !
Majordomo & list owners only have time to maintain & improve the list servers & infrastructure, not to hand hold list members. The Berklix servers support mail list for an eclectic mix of different types of people. Some lists are composed largely of highly competent people. Some other lists have a high percentage of clueless people, some of whom are brave enough to admit the fact, (& some are perhaps incompetent but don't admit it ;-) ... When you see someone blundering, or if you know of some clueless friend or acquaintance, please help them with their subscription problems, perhaps private mail them some advice, off list, or help over a beer or coffee or cake that the clueless person should provide you (point them to this section in justification of your expected reward smiley face icon

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You Will Be Un-Subscribed If A Spammer Repeatedly Fakes Your From Address

Protect your PC from viruses that harvest your address book, else we Will protect ourselves by deleting you.

  • We aim to protect the many people on our many lists as fast as possible.
  • We aim to waste as little of our time as possible doing that.
  • It is policy Not to censor & delay lists by "moderating".
  • Subscribed addresses are trusted to post to discussion lists (except announcement-only lists).
  • We have no free time to waste "moderating".
  • Our lists owners & admins are unpaid volunteers, no time to waste !.
  • We do not tolerate lame ducks to continue with stolen addresses.
  • List owners & server administrators are paid nothing.
  • List members pay nothing, & are entitled to No Free Time To Waste.
  • We have no free time to waste vetting if mail from an abused address is spam.
  • We have no time or responsibility to help hand hold thousands of clueless subscribers on many+ lists.
  • Members who carelessly let their PC address books be harvested by viruses etc & then fail to respond, are not tolerated, & must solve their problems themselves.
    • Create a new email address with a provider, & subscribe new address to our lists.
    • Get educated: Take night classes or read books or manuals or on line forums on how to secure your PC.
    • Reward a friend , colleague or consultant with money, beer, food, whatever to secure your PC
    • Usually viruses etc are Microsoft based. Consider changing to free source code based software

Yes, you can't easily stop spammers discovering your address
No, that's not a particular problem for us, (just for you), But You Can & MUST stop viruses stealing your address book for spammers! - Else we will throw you off lists

  • Yes spammers discover your address, Yes that's probably not your fault:
    • The source of spammers address lists is careless & clueless Microsoft users, & web sites.
    • This Author was never spammed in the early days of the net, when he & correspondents all used Unix, users were competent, & there were no viruses.
    • Then unskilled Microsoft users swamped the net, & viruses proliferated, & even in the skilled Unix world we too received spam - our addresses harvested from insecure Microsoft PCs of incompetent users we had mailed.
    • (As an operator of non technical mail lists, this Author was particularly early & heavily impacted, compared with other Unix using friends who didnt communicate with many Microsoft PCs - despite he ran secure Unix, most of the people on those lists were Microsoft users with little or no clue about security, & they periodically caught viruses & had address books harvested/ stolen.)
    • Addresses are also harvested from other web sites, & even extracted from OCR of JPGs & paper flyers, business cards, & hijacked servers, stolen archives etc.
    • Agreed,: you can't easily avoid your address being harvested from some other person's PC,
    But that's No Excuse Not to protect your PC & address book !
    If your address book is stolen. Spammers will masquerade as you & spam our list, & we Will throw you off our lists to protect our lists.
  • Usually no problem for us if spammers who have bought lists of addresses harvested at random from the net, just spam at random, faking sender names, sometime including our list names. They don't normally know your address is trusted by our lists.
  • If Your address book gets stolen, & they know you receive mail from our lists, then they spam our lists, we trust your address, we get spammed, & then we delete you to protect our lists.

Yes Mail System & Servers & Clients Could Do More Checking, But ...

But it's a complex area, well beyond scope of this page. The supposedly simple solutions are not simple & good; & are disputed. Its riven by different competing quasi monopoly promoting non standards. It's abused by large American providers who want to impose systems that would reduce their admin costs, & dump work on others. This unpaid volunteer admin has antipathy for certain USA scum providers who try to waste his unpaid time to help their profit margins. (Rule of thumb to identify scum providers: Those who withdrew RFC mandated abuse@ mail addresses, who only offer web forms etc. )

Could List Owners Set Moderated Bit For Members Who Don't Want To Post ?

  • Yes it would be technically possible, No it is Not policy to do that.
  • It would require manual intervention by List Owner each time another spammer harvested another address book.
  • It would encourage list members to be lax-er, knowing list owner would waste his time to save list member spending time ensuring security of list members' own PC address book.
  • It would require list owners accepting requests to set & unset Moderated bit for all users of all lists any time they requested for various reasons we don't want to know
  • It would be a nightmare to remember which request to disable moderation bit should genuinely be denied.
    (The mailman Moderated bits (settable by list owner, not user) are currently just used to enforce announce- only lists.
  • Such list member requests would also attach sundry other comments & questions requiring personal reply from list owners, wasting more time - Author has seen that phenomena before! - Much better that list members interact just with robot, not wasting time of List owners.
  • It would require list owner to moderate ie censor. This Author loathes censored lists.
  • Postings if made would be delayed.
  • Moderation would fail when List owners or alternates away or busy.
  • Moderation would waste list owner's time; (Lists management @berklix has long consumed far too much time of this volunteer Author, all time unpaid.
  • Moderation would burden list owners with legal liability for having read & passed as OK/ not blocked potentially debatable/ litigious etc stuff better sent in name of real sender.

Possible Future Solutions

A possible automatic solution: similar to eg "Mail delivery" option in mailman . berklix . org / mailman / options / test
One could add a similar option "Discard [or bounce] List Member's Own Posts [Just Back to Subscriber]".
Subscriber=list member (not list owner) could Enable & Disable that himself whenever. No work for list owner/ admin. No legal & moral burdens of moderating/ censorship. List member sets his own preference. List member would be safe to retain an address a spammer starts faking with.

Author   suggested solution 2017-04-16 to the the Mailman development community at mail . python . org / mailman / listinfo / mailman-users

To Unsubscribe An Unknown / Unrecognised Address :

EG
  • Forwarded, so different from where Majordomo thinks you are.
  • Where you don't know what address you are subscribed as.
Look at the last list mail you received, scroll up past the beginning of the mail body, into the header. The header is in reverse order, as each computer the mail passed through on route to you inserted its "Received:" line at the top of the file Near the top, you should see the name you are subscribed as, probably near a line like this:
Received: from ****.berklix.com [194.221.32.**]
I f your employer's office or personal net provider is doing forwarding or address alias changing for you, Majordomo will not know that. It just knows where it sends your mail, it does not know to which name & where one of your employers or providers etc computers might forward it after. Any forwarding you/ your company/ provider arranges, is unknown to Majordomo, but should be visible in your mail header. Normally your last name, lower in the header, is the name Majordomo has you subscribed as.
Use that address to unsubscribe:
unsubscribe bg jill@the_address_she_long_ago_subscribed_as.com

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  Majordomo - Manual (Documentation)

  • This Majordomo manual is here for the interest of those on mail lists administered by a Majordomo Program, who don't have access to Unix systems manuals.
  • The Majordomo manual is not necessary to use the Majordomo service, which helps users by describing the right subscribe & unsubscribe commands. The manual is just here for interest & convenience.
  • The Majordomo manual is the Generic manual for a generic recent default installation. It has not been edited to show specifics of the berklix.org list configurations. (Too time consuming to periodically import generic versions & re-edit!) In particular, some commands such as `who' & maybe `which' have, & respectively may have not been enabled as easily abused.

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Other Mail List Robots

  • If you want to run public domain software on your own servers, to host your own mail lists, some alternatives for software are:
    • Listproc functional comparison
    • ListServ - Commercial & Free versions
    • Majordomo
    • Majordomo2
    • Ecartis, Formerly Listar)
    • FML

    •   Mailman

    • In FreeBSD Mail Wrappers.
      Mailman offers nicer functionality than Majordomo. One big user is freebsd.org Some time I'll likely migrate the mail lists to it, But:
      • Last twice Author tested Mailman server running on FreeBSD, Mailman had horribly dangerous defaults that paralysed a Berklix server !, so I'm cautious of other potential Mailman cavalier config options that might also lurk ready to bite. (It had a fatal "1 min. (5 min on 2nd time) crontab loop & try again & stack up python processes on news failure"
      • Ever more processes, loaded server so much there was no chance to ssh in to reboot or kill process (after phoning to request a host reset, by time I got mail acknowledging reset, it had saturated again, & access failed).
      • Author reported error.
      • Author didn't have more time then to risk more silly defaults, if any.
      • When I get time I plan to move to Mailman, but last I looked NetBSD & OpenBSD were still using Majordomo at 2016-02-21, (though FreeBSD has long used Mailman)
      • Berklix hosts already support many mail lists so I'll need time to carefully proceed & test before migration.
  • For local friends & technical associates of this robot owner, a free list on the Berklix servers may be available, but that is Not a world wide offer for random strangers. I would need to have previously known you quite well over a longish period before that's a possibility.
  • If instead you want to use free lists services run by commercial providers, paid for eg by advertising at you, or harvesting your contact addresses or profile or traffic etc, some list operators may include some of the companies that offer personal mail accounts eg among many others:

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Digest Lists

  • Subscribe the normal lists, not the digest lists;
  • Virtually no one tries to subscribe the digested lists, as none of the normal non digested lists are high traffic.
  • The full structure of one Digest list per normal list is implemented for all lists on berklix
  • I'm not interested in spending time to maintain the digested lists , eg the archives of the digest lists miss items posted between 2015-11-15 & 2015-11-20, for those use the non digested archives.
  • The Majordomo manual defines the mechanism for Digest lists.

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Archives

Yes Majordomo supports searchable archives.
  • For access archives of a berklix list, you must first subscribe to that list.
  • Some lists are public technical discussion lists, (eg for HP Network ScanJet 5 [& 6] Upgrade & Conversion), the archive for those is Enabled.
  • Some lists are public lists, some for announcements of events for social groups, some have had a few annoying weirdos, some have had list pirates, some still have incompetents, some of whom posted inappropriate noise, so some lists were converted to only carry announcements by event organisers, Some Archives are Off to protect list & individuals & organisers.
  • Some lists are not public, but for private business technical announcements, archives for those are closed.
  • EXAMPLES
    • Example: 1
      Mail:
      To: majordomo@berklix.org

      help
      lists
      subscribe test
      complete the subscription, Then mail:
      To: majordomo@berklix.org

      index test
      Wait for list of archives to arrive; Then mail:
      To: majordomo@berklix.org

      get test test.archive.0304
    • Example 2:
      If you are already subscribed to a list called faraday, Try sending Majordomo
      To: majordomo@berklix.org

      index faraday
      Then
      To: majordomo@berklix.org

      get faraday faraday.archive.1009
    • Example 3:
      If you are already subscribed to a list called pcs, which has a header line:
      List-archive: __
      Mail Either This:
      To: pcs-request@mailman.berklix.org

      index
      Or Alternately Mail This:
      To: majordomo@berklix.org

      index pcs
      With Result:
      -rw-r----- 1 majordom majordom 40911 Jun 28 2006 pcs.archive.0606
      ...
      -rw-rw-r-- 1 majordom majordom 12704 May 7 20:09 pcs.archive.1605
      Then mail either:
      To: pcs-request@mailman.berklix.org

      get pcs.archive.1605
      Or Alternately mail:
      To: majordomo@berklix.org

      get pcs pcs.archive.1605
      Both of which provide Result:
      >>>> get pcs.archive.1605
      List 'pcs' file 'pcs.archive.1605'
      is being sent as a separate message.
      Which duly arrives a bit later as a larger seperate email.
      Example of header & first few lines of body of a mailed archive below:
      (Useful so you can set up a .procmailrc filter to eg ~/mail/list/archive/ before the mail arrives).
      From: majordomo@berklix.org
      Subject: Majordomo file: list 'pcs' file 'pcs.archive.1605'
      Reply-To: majordomo@berklix.org

      --

      >From owner-pcs Sat May 7 15:38:37 2016
      Received: from lists.berklix.org (localhost [127.0.0.1])
      Tip: If you use an editor to remove header of mail, then edit the body, globally changing leading lines of each mail in archive, eg with ex / vi syntax:
      1,$ s/^>From owner-/From owner-/
      Then after that, the archive can be split with mailsplit -n , to make an NMH compliant set of mail files.

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Server Configuration Options

Almost no one should request any change of Server Configuration Options.
Server settings affect either all people on one list, or all lists. Sensible people try not to get involved. Unfortunately some few have had more of a whim for change, than sense or sufficient understanding ! Server global settings are Not lightly changed for personal whim, so before making a suggestion, please think it through carefully, how it will affect other readers, & on other lists than yours, & realise the lists on this server have a wildly eclectic mix of users, from a few gurus (part of membership of bim@), down through some who think they understand but don't, a majority who get by, a lot of lazy users resistant to thinking & learning, & some genuine incompetents, some self admitted. ... We can't afford to lightly destabilise that house of cards to suit people's personal whims, though very occasionally settings have been changed, after delay to consider possible repercussions.

General

  • The berklix mail lists servers are generally modelled after BSD ( http://www.freebsd.org, http://www.netbsd.org, http://www.openbsd.org ) mail server configurations, (though FreeBSD has moved to Mailman since).
  • I don't necessarily feel bound to configure everything BSD fashion though. I don't take, claim, nor blame BSD as the final arbiter of the perfect mail list.
  • Author belongs to many list, including some BSD, many non BSD, some berklix & many non berklix. I observe good & bad points on those many lists.
  • A few egotists occasionally act as if they have a personal right or God given insight to personally define how all mail lists should function in general, & how berklix mail lists should work in particular; often quoting a few lists they're on & I'm not, that operate in a different way. as if that's relevant or statistically significant, ... & if I don't agree I'm wrong & I Must change the servers according to their whim.
  • No one pays for Majordomo & list owner's time configuring & running berklix mail lists; None have the right to impose their unilateral demands on server owner while he works free, running servers & lists. He _Must_ do nothing, except in last resort, maybe chuck off egotists if they persist in really annoying & wasting Majordomo & list owners.
  • For any server option some feel should be changed, there's usually others of the opposite opinion, & Majordomo & list owners have got better things to do with their time usually, than get involved in debate.
  • A few suggestions have been useful, more have not, some were blinkered demands, EG "I'm used to something different than what you'r providing & I don't want to change""
  • Some configuration change suggestions might still be useful in future, keep it to a friendly Suggestion, not a Demand & you'll do us both a favour, rather than annoy us both, & waste time of both of us!
  • Some options below are Not open for further debate, you are discouraged from wasting time discussing those, Thanks !

Reply-To: header, potential Duplicate Copies & Automatic Removal

  • Standard Requests From List Members:
    • Please don't mail both my personal address and list, I get duplicates.
    • Please edit list header before replying to my list posts.
    • Please remove Reply-To: from automatic list header.
  • Standard Answers From Administrator:
    • Please use your a Delete key: It works much faster, & more reliably, than senders having to edit the header of a reply to your list post!
    • Please don't ask ask senders to remember your personal preference, & to waste their time repeatedly editing headers when replying to you.
    • Please Realise you can tell your mailer a list of the addresses you receive on, so your mailer will automatically discard unwanted duplicates.
    • Please don't expect senders to repeatedly waste time editing headers for you, when you should tell your computer your preference just once.
    • Please learn What Reply-To: is, & how & why it's used on lists such as @berklix.
  • Unskilled people who have all mail fall into one directory (MS name: folder), & may see little benefit to duplicates, so not realise some other more mail users may automatically sort mail into about 100 different directories, so routine list mail gets automatically archived & left to read later &/or quickly purged, but any thread marked with recipient's personal address also gets retained in personal Inbox for faster recognition & personal action.
  • If you consider asserting a personal preference Reply-To: in a post to a berklix list:
    • Most @berklix lists now automatically assert a Reply-To: field. It over rides whatever people might assert.
    • (The @berklix list servers used not to automatically assert a Reply-To: field (so individuals could assert or not as they wanted, but many subscribers were clueless of the meaning of Reply-To: in a mail header, others expected automatic assertion, & this robot owner lost time every time the un-skilled made mistakes replying to wrong addresses)).
  • Some people used to ask Why is Reply-To: asserted on a particular list ?
    Expectations of Reply-To: depend partly what you'r used to, what you like, what list is for:
    • What the nature of the list is (announce or discuss),
      • Example 1: bg-org@berklix list has as part of its automatic configuration:
        reply_to = $SENDER, "Beer Garden Organisers" <bg-org@berklix.org>
        So if any member of list bg@ writes to organisers list bg-org@, a reply from any organiser will (if organiser's mail tool honours Reply-to: field) automatically get copied to other organisers as well.
      • Example 2: bg@berklix list has as part of its automatic configuration:
        reply_to = $SENDER, "Beer Garden Organisers" <bg-org@berklix>
        some people on that & similar lists are self admitted incompetents, who mistakenly reply to announcement only list with noise not appropriate to hundreds of people on the list, that should go to all organisers (& not just the one organiser who announced an event).
    • Some people on some berklix lists are clueless about mail lists in general, (@berklix has a very wide spectrum of people on lists, from highly skilled computer specialist on some lists, to some self admitted incompetents on other lists).
    • Even among those who know what Reply-To: is & have an opinion/ expectations, the habitual domain[s] of lists people use varies, (examples inc freebsd.org apache.org & various linux etc lists), some have similar & differing expectations re. Reply-To:. Some people are only used to lists that do assert Reply-To:, some are only used to lists that do not, some (inc. robot owner) are on enough lists to experience list where with & without Reply-To:. are Both the expected norms on different lists. There is no One True Way, despite assertions of some with perhaps narrower experience ;-)
  • Not asserting Reply-To: did not please everyone, then when I turned it on for one list, that didn't please everyone on one @berklix list either. One can't please all the people all the time.
  • MUA (= Mailer User Agent - mailer tools )s vary in the way they honour or ignore incoming Reply-To: fields. - Send yourself a mail with it asserted, wait for it to return, Click Reply or Reply-All etc, & see where your Reply buttons would reply to.
  • Further Reading: What Is Reply-To:
    • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Email#Header_fields
    • http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5322#section-3.6.2
    • (This page (if quoting elsewhere: http://www.berklix.org/help/majordomo/#reply_to
    • The Majordomo source doc/FAQ reads:

      • 3.4 - How should one configure resend for Reply-To headers?
      • Whether you should have a "Reply-To:" or not depends on the charter of your list and the nature of its users. If the list is a discussion list and you generally want replies to go back to the list, you can include one. Some people don't like being told what to do, and prefer to be able to choose whether to send a private reply or a reply to the list just by using the right function on their mail agent. Take note that if you do use a "Reply-To:", then some mail agents make it much harder for a person on the list to send a private reply. The most important reason why Reply-To: to the list is bad is that it can cause mail loops if any of the members of your list are running fairly-common but broken software which doesn't know what an envelope address is. (Many Microsoft products, as well as many other PC-based non-SMTP/Internet mail systems which work through an SMTP gateway.)
      • You should read the following FAQ on why you shouldn't set the Reply-To: field. http://www.unicom.com/pw/reply-to-harmful.html

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Subject: Prefixes

Subject prefixing is spurious. Of the hundreds of subscribers on many berklix lists just two I recall have asked for this. I tried it on one list, & got numerous complaints. You won't get it on berklix.org lists.

If you want to filter mail lists into seperate mail sub-directories:

  • If you have the (Free!) luxury of working on a Unix system, then use Procmail, my example is here.
  • If you use Micro$oft, I'd suggest you dump it ! I don't know if Procmail will run on Micro$oft, but procmailrc is public source code, so go check their web, &/or pay a programmer to port it to MS if you want. If you won't dump MS, I can't advise you further, but if anyone else wants to provide a URL to a page of mail filter tools advice for MS, do so.

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  Members Only: Majordomo config option: restrict_post (& similar)

This is On, restricting lists to only accept posts from subscribed addresses. To help protect against spammers.

Occasionally someone receives on an old address, but posts from a new address. This get bounced to the list owner as potential spam, (as from an unlisted sender). If the list owner knows the human sender, the list owner may choose to forward the mail, embedding headers so the sending human can see which old address they sent from, so the human can unsubscribe, & subscribe their new current address. Headers In Body

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Headers In Body

Sometimes a list owner forwards a post with some headers in the body of the post, (which looks dead ugly): Why it's done is explained below:

Mostly the problem ia a regular list member who has failed to coordinate his/her sender address with his subscription receiving address.

Some subscribers do not react when list owners ask them to re-subscribe their proper sender's address. They ignore the requests & continue posting from a non subscribed addresses. That wastes list owner's time with repeat forwardings (& they & list would be inconvenienced if list owner was away & not available to manually keep forwarding on time).

Options then are to silently delete bad posts (as some list owners do), until sender learns he/she Must fix his/her wrong subscription address, or sometimes list owner may be a bit more lenient for a while, & waste his/her time manually forwarding with headers so senders realise:

  • Their posts are a mess,
  • They didn't get it right
  • They need to re-subscribe their sending address
  • They can see what their sender's address appears to be, so they can compare it with their receiving address in their incoming header, & then send off a correct pair of unsubscribe & subscribe commands to Majordomo (Sometimes people may find it particularly hard to know who they are subscribed as or apparently sending as, if eg masquerading is involved, & if they are incompetent &/or use crappy mailer tools that don't allow headers to be inspected.
In cases where list members are too incompetent to understand, other list members can see the headers to help them (Not all lists on this mail server are for technically competent people, some need help, & help is more easily offered from fellow list members, when the fellow list members can see the headers.

List owners usually remember to strip the part of the header between the list server & their own private routing as irrelevant. List owners leave headers between wrongly subscribed list members & mail list server as relevant. Sometimes list owner might strip a bit more, but better to strip too little than too much: not removing too many clues for sender as to where they sent from & what they need to fix their end.

R-DNS - Reverse Domain Name Service (Anti Spam)

Some (later all) Berklix servers reject mail from non R-DNS compliant senders. (to reduce spam incoming). Senders to berklix addresses may need to configure their mailer to use their ISP's mail relay host for their outgoing mail. (This is the default for most major ISPs, but not for eg D-Telekom, who charge an extra 3 Euro/month. Any sender who runs mail servers at home, from behind dynamically allocated IPs that are not R-DNS compliant, who does not use a smart (relay) host with fixed IP with valid Reverse DNS (Domain Name Service) record will get bounced or lost. SASL is a method of authenticating a client to a remote smart host mail server. BSD users who have a login on Berklix servers, can ask for a SASL password.

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Server Bugs

  • No Terminal Mime Boundary

    Footers can accidentally become invisible if MIME Enclosures are allowed on lists : Some mail reader tools (MS-Outlook (new name Entourage) & Unix-Exmh) will not show the footer
    The next box will be deleted when/ if this issue is resolved/ debugged.
    If a MIME multi part is posted, & Majordomo processes it with a *.config with no blank line in footer specifier, ie
    message_footer << END
    Something appends "--" to the last MIME boundary line (with no intervening line feed). The boundary is then not recognised by EXMH-2.7.0 & MS-Outlook (new name Entourage), so list footer is not displayed (though is sent).
    Debug/ Analysis of 2 examples:
    • With a mail sent 2006.09 to bg@ via Majordomo@berklix, with header
      Content-Type: multipart/alternative;
          boundary="----_=_NextPart_001_01C6D7F5.98043CE4"
      That mail comprised 2 MIME enclosures: Content-Type: text/plain, + Content-Type: text/html, + a 3rd separator.
      Somewhere (@ S. or @ Majordomo ?) 2 minus characters got appended immediately to the final
      "------_=_NextPart_001_01C6D7F5.98043CE4"
      making
      "------_=_NextPart_001_01C6D7F5.98043CE4--"

      Which was then not recognised as a separator.
      (Perhaps S.'s mail client did not append a terminal line feed ?)
      (Not sure what inserted the "--" (once known where, we can try to prepend a line feed there ). The "--" is perhaps supposed per RFC to seperate mail body from signature line (if this is the same thing, that suggests S.'s end would need to insert the line feed, Perhaps it went wrong 'cos S. appeared not to have a signature, perhaps if he/she had one his/her mailer might append a line feed after the separator ? ).
      http://www.ietf.org internet-drafts draft-ietf-usefor-useage-01.txt says:
      Whenever a poster or posting agent appends such a signature to an article, it MUST be preceded with a delimiter line containing (only) two hyphens (US-ASCII 45) followed by one SP (US-ASCII 32).
      )
      After I manually inserted a line feed before the trailing "--" EXMH then displayed the footer, (but not the body which I could mouse select).
    • With a mail sent by lab@gta. com to freebsd-net@freebsd. org Thu, 14 Sep 2006 09:30:34 -0400 using
      Mime-Version: 1.0
      Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="NzB8fVQJ5HfG6fxh"
      Content-Disposition: inline
      User-Agent: Mutt/1.2.5i
      & of course routing through Mailman, not Majordomo, it displayed with EXMH OK, as the end of the mail was
      - --NzB8fVQJ5HfG6fxh Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
      MIME-Version: 1.0
      Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
      Content-Disposition: inline

      _______________________________________________
      freebsd-net@freebsd.org mailing list
      http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-net
      (So EXMH has by default displayed a post with legible text, several enclosures & a legible footer - it is possible).
    • I have asked on international majordomo support list but no solution found to repair MIME boundary.
    • If you are a Perl programmer willing to look at this, I am willing to work with you. URLs for Source Code etc:
    • You Could Pay For A Solution:
      You could pay a Perl programmer to fix majordomo. Offer money & I will find you a Perl programmer (No I don't mean me, I prefer programming in C not Perl, & I'm busy). That would help every user of every majordomo@ list that wants MIME, globally.
    • Newer Mail List Manager Software ? - Wait !
      New Features Come With New Bugs ! : I tried that, there was a problem: Mailman. This robot owner does not have time to revisit it currently. Wait till Author has time to test Mailman again - & then to reconfig for multiple servers, Will be a long wait.

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SPAM

We used to get some spam, as lists run as instant relay, not content moderated or slowed waiting for human approval. Many or all lists are now only open for members to post to. Numerous spammer domains are blocked, inevitably others not. We don't get much if any spam now, though in principle there are still vulnerabilities. If you are paying robot owner for internet consultancy I'll discuss spam prevention, domain black holing etc. If you'r a BSD person, discuss it on an freebsd.org or similar BSD lists, or at an BIM event or on bim@ mail list.

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Forgeries

Spammers & others regularly forge mail senders addresses. Internet designers are adding secure non forge-able mail, but it's not commonly available yet (& there are good technical Reasons Not to adopt some schemes). The openness stems from the way the Internet evolved: from an open trusting group of computer scientists & other academics exchanging technical info, to a net that was later adopted by business & general humanity including a full share of spammers criminals perverts lunatics & idiots etc. It's thus possible for the malign to forge instructions to, & responses from, Majordomo, you, I, or anyone else. Including instructions for subscription change commands etc, & forged responses. That's why Majordomo never trusts your first request, but always mails you back, with a confirmation password to be returned, to prove you are really you, & not some impostor, & that you still want whatever you previously asked for, actually to be done. Obviously, if you personally did Not ask for something to be done, you should Never send a reply quoting an authorisation password !

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Test List.

test@Berklix
This list is available for users to make their own tests with. Occasionally list owners & robot owner also make tests here.
Subscribe method is the same as for any other list.
You can also subscribe via test-request@ (an alias for majordomo@)

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How to examine your headers

  German/Deutsch Translation/Uebersetzung ?

Diese Seite & Welt Weit benutzter Doku. & Majordomo Program sind nur in English. Viel benutzer koennen English lesen, gut genug es zum benutzen.
Falls Sie wollen mehr - Entweder:
  • Lesen sie dieses web Seite mit Uebersetzungs hilfe ab, eg
  • Machen Sie selbst eine Uebersetzung, Oder
  • Bezahlen Sie selbst fuer Uebersetzung eines teils die Majordomo generische Doku.
    • (Ich kenne Uebersetzer dass bereit sind, falls sie zahlungs-bereit sind (ich habe keine Absicht an einem Gewinn, nur an einem Uebersetzung, sie können einem Uebersetzer Direkt bezahlen, entweder einen sie kennen, oder dass ich kenne, mir Egal)). Schreiben sie mir wass sie leisten wollen.
    • Give Author the translation with unrestricted copyright to further use. I will contribute common (non berklix specific) parts, back to Majordomo authors, for world wide public domain availability. Your name will be credited if you want).
  • Ja dieses koennte in besser Deutsch geschreiben sein, aber,
    es lohnt sich nicht fuer mich es zu tun. Machen _Sie_ Es !
    Es gibts viel mehr Leute koennten gutes Deutsch schreiben, &/oder eine Uebersetzung machen, als koennten computers konfigurieren. Es interessiert mich nicht, meine Freizeit an Fremd Grammatik zu verschwenden (+auch eine Mutter- sprachler schreibt besser als ein Fremde): stat Grammatik, arbeite ich mit die Technik. Bitte liefern SIE einem Deutsch Uebersetzung ! Machen Sie _Ihre_ beitrag an Welt Weit Frei Software. Liefern Sie besser Dokumentation/ Uebersetzungen !
  • Verschwende keine Zeit mit Schreiben an List Manager (in Deutsch oder English) - es wird als Spam automatisch erkannt & geloescht & nicht bei einem Mensch gesehen. Lernen sie sich selbst ihre eigene wunsch Subscribes & Unsubcribes zu erledigen, Sie habe Keine Andere Wahl!
  • Zu Faul oder Geizig ? Wollen um sonst Menschliche hilfe ?
    Vergiss es ! - Gibts Nicht ! Nicht Mechern - bringt Nichts ! Das robot betreiber hatte Absolut Kein Zeit um Sonst sie zu helfen ! Es gibts Kein Alternative fuer sie, als dass Um Sonst Uebersetzungen zu lesen, dass Um Sonst Majordomo zu nutzen & Selbst zu lernen ! Ausser vorerst Geld zu Zahlen zb an Rotes Kreuz

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Author

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