Mailman - The GNU Mailing List Management System
Copyright (C) 1998-2004 by the Free Software Foundation, Inc.
59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA
INTRODUCTION
This is GNU Mailman, a mailing list management system distributed under
the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL). The name of this
software is spelled "Mailman" with a leading capital `M' but with a lower
case second `m'. Any other spelling is incorrect.
Mailman is written primarily in Python, a free object-oriented scripting
language. There is some ANSI C code for security purposes.
Mailman was originally developed by John Viega. Subsequent development
(through version 1.0b3) was by Ken Manheimer. Further work towards the
1.0 final release was a group effort, with the core contributors being:
Barry Warsaw, Ken Manheimer, Scott Cotton, Harald Meland, and John Viega.
Version 1.0 and beyond have been primarily maintained by Barry Warsaw with
contributions from many; see the ACKNOWLEDGMENTS file for details. Jeremy
Hylton helped considerably with the Pipermail code in Mailman 2.0.
The Mailman home page is:
http://www.list.org
with mirrors at:
http://www.gnu.org/software/mailman
http://mailman.sf.net
Mailman 2.1 requires Python 2.1.3 or greater, which can be downloaded from:
http://www.python.org
It is recommended that you use Python 2.3.3, the latest release as of this
writing (31-Dec-2003). Update: 15-May-2004, the Python 2.3.4 release is
imminent, see:
http://www.python.org/2.3.4
Mailman will work with Python 2.2.3 as well, which is the latest release
on the Python 2.2 branch. Mailman 2.1 is not compatible with Python 2.0
or any earlier version.
You will also need an ANSI C compiler to build both Python and Mailman;
gcc (the GNU C compiler) works just fine. Mailman currently works only on
GNU/Linux and other Unix-like operating systems (e.g. Solaris, *BSD,
MacOSX, etc.). It does not run on Windows, although web and mail clients
on any platform should be able to interact with Mailman just fine.
See the INSTALL file for installation instructions. If you are upgrading
from a previous version of Mailman, you need to read the UPGRADING file
for important information.
FEATURES
Read the NEWS file for a list of changes since version 0.9. Read the TODO
file for our (extensive) wish list. You can see Mailman 2.1 in action at:
http://mail.python.org/mailman-21/listinfo
Mailman has most of the standard features you'd expect in a mailing list
manager, and more:
- Web based list administration for nearly all tasks. Web based
subscriptions and user configuration management. A customizable "home
page" for each mailing list.
- Privacy features such as moderation, open and closed list subscription
policies, private membership rosters, and sender-based filters.
- Automatic web based archiving built-in with support for private and
public archives, and hooks for external archivers.
- Per-user configuration optional digest delivery for either
MIME-compliant or RFC 1153 style "plain text" digests.
- Integrated mail/Usenet gateways.
- Integrated auto-replies.
- Majordomo-style email based commands.
- Integrated bounce detection within an extensible framework.
- Integrated spam detection, and MIME-based content filtering.
- An extensible mail delivery pipeline.
- Support for virtual domains.
REQUIREMENTS
The default mail delivery mechanism uses a direct SMTP connection to
whatever mail transport agent you have running on port 25. You can thus
use Mailman with any such MTA, however with certain MTAs (e.g. Exim and
Postfix), Mailman will support thru-the-web creation and removal of
mailing lists.
Mailman works with any web server that supports CGI/1.1. The HTML it
generates is quite pedestrian and stingy on the graphics so it should be
friendly to most web browsers and network connections.
You will need root access on the machine hosting your Mailman installation
in order to complete some of the configuration steps. See the INSTALL
file for details.
Mailman's web and email user interface should be compatible with just
about any mail reader or web browser, although a mail reader that is MIME
aware will be a big help. You do not need Java, JavaScript, or any other
fancy plugins.
CREATE YOUR FIRST LIST
These instructions assume that you've installed and configured Mailman
according to the instructions in the INSTALL file. To create and test
your first list, try the following:
- First, initialize the site administrator's password by cd'ing to the
install directory (by default /usr/local/mailman) and typing
% bin/mmsitepass
New site password: [yourpassword]
Again to confirm password: [yourpassword]
Password changed.
- Visit the url:
http://my.dom.ain/mailman/create
Fill out the form as described in the on-screen instructions, and in the
"List creator's password" field, type the password you entered above.
Type your own email address for the "Initial list owner address", and
select "Yes" to notify the list administrator.
- Hit "Create List"
- Check your email for a message from Mailman informing you that your new
mailing list was created.
- NOTE: You should consult the README for the specific MTA you are using.
Most can be set up to provide through-the-web creation of mailing lists,
but each configuration is different.
- Now visit the list's admin page (either by following the link on the web
page or entering the link from the email Mailman just sent you).
Typically the url will be something like
http://my.dom.ain/mailman/admin/mysitelist
Type in the list's password and click on "Let me in..."
- Click on "Membership Management" and then on "Mass Subscription".
- Enter your email address in the big text field, and click on "Submit
Your Changes"
- Now go to your email and send a message to yourlist@my.dom.ain. Within
a minute or two you should see your message reflected back to you via
Mailman.
Congratulations! You've just set up and tested your first Mailman mailing
list. If you had any problems along the way, please see the section below
on FOR MORE INFORMATION.
FOR MORE INFORMATION
The online documentation can be found in
file:admin/www/index.html
in the directory in which you unpacked Mailman.
Chris Kolar has made a list owner-oriented manual available from
the following URL
http://www.imsa.edu/~ckolar/mailman/
There are also several mailing lists that can be used as resources
to help you get going with Mailman.
Mailman-Users
An list for users of Mailman, for posting questions or problems
related to installation, use, etc. We'll try to keep the deep
technical discussions off this list.
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/mailman-users
Listowners
This mailing list with a non-technical focus, specifically for
discussions from the perspective of listowners and moderators who do
not have "shell access" to the mailing list server where the Mailman
software runs.
http://listowner.org
Mailman-Announce
A read-only list for release announcements an other important news.
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/mailman-announce
Mailman-Developers
A list for those of you interested in helping develop Mailman 2's
future direction. This list will contain in-depth technical
discussions.
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/mailman-developers
Mailman3-Dev
Get involved now in the development of Mailman 3!
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/mailman3-dev
Mailman-I18N
A list for the discussion of the Mailman internationalization
effort. Mailman 2.1 is fully multi-lingual.
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/mailman-i18n
Mailman-Checkins
A read-only list which is an adjunct to the public anonymous CVS
repository. You can stay on the bleeding edge of Mailman development
by subscribing to this list.
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/mailman-checkins
The Mailman project is coordinated on SourceForge at
http://sf.net/projects/mailman
You should use SourceForge to report bugs and to upload patches.
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