Making unsubscribes easier
As with many mailing lists, we get a lot of mail about subscribes and unsubscribes. Perhaps we should make it easier for people to get off the list, or at least find out where the list maintainer really is. Some possible approaches: 1) Add a header line to all the postings saying something like X-Send-Subscription-Requests-To: cypherpunks-request@toad.com 2) Add a dummy subscriber to the list that greps for "subscribe" in Subject lines and uses the vacation-mailer to reply. Some untested code that should work: #!/bin/sh # Subscription-Request-Bouncer # Set your .forward file to read # | subscription-bouncer # and activate by running vacation -I # and putting a useful message in $HOME/.vacation.msg # cat $* > /tmp/msg.$$ if egrep -i 'Subject:.*subscri' /tmp/msg.$$ then /usr/ucb/vacation -t1d cypherpunks-info < /tmp/msg.$$ fi rm /tmp/msg.$$ # You may be able to make this work with the username # in the vacation command set to cypherpunks-request 3) One problem with standard listserv and majordomo software is that it tends to believe addresses as given, without munging anXXXXX into naXXXXX or other subtleties for subscription (though it can at least forward requests from different addresses to a moderator, etc.) - can they handle this, or at least be given the job of unsubscribing people? - do they have any forgery-detection capability? Otherwise some rude person could try unsubscribing lots of people. The austin-cypherpunks listserv sent me a password for use with the listserv; is this code available? Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart NCR Corp, 6870 Koll Center Parkway, Pleasanton CA, 94566 # Voice/Beeper 510-224-7043, Phone 510-484-6204 # email bill.stewart@pleasantonca.ncr.com billstewart@attmail.com # ViaCrypt PGP Key IDs 384/C2AFCD 1024/9D6465
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- I know that Majordom will allow you to create a private list. The list admin must add new subscriptions, but users are able to remove themselves without admin intervention. Of course, MD has the problem in that if the person requests unsubscription from a different address than they are at, it will choke with a 'Subscription not found'. Also, you can set the list to be completely closed so that persons who aren't subscribed cannot post, but that does eliminate remailers from contributing. I don't know off-hand what type of software this list is based on, so this is probably all irrelevant. ____ Robert A. Hayden <=> hayden@krypton.mankato.msus.edu \ /__ -=-=-=-=- <=> -=-=-=-=- \/ / Finger for Geek Code Info <=> To flame me, log on to ICBMnet and \/ Finger for PGP 2.3a Public Key <=> target 44 09' 49" N x 93 59' 57" W - -=-=-=-=-=-=-=- (GEEK CODE 1.0.1) GAT d- -p+(---) c++(++++) l++ u++ e+/* m++(*)@ s-/++ n-(---) h+(*) f+ g+ w++ t++ r++ y+(*) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.3a iQCVAgUBLUNgL53BsrEqkf9NAQEo1AP/S/rIcV7aYEUkbO+tuB2l2sRagxuPQeGG aMsV9lTp0jLvt+ENbluTrqlulxCrxL4dp2uH+F8fb09gtwqjkNF+yQTlxK95My03 UULdgMG5nDHT0nJxWpUKpXDyuAK96c6HBDHaFZkeHUMi6p2dZ7IprPLkk8Q2u46R ngFrESx8w7I= =WyjJ -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
On Sun, 23 Jan 1994 wcs@anchor.ho.att.com wrote:
As with many mailing lists, we get a lot of mail about subscribes and unsubscribes. Perhaps we should make it easier for people to get off the list, or at least find out where the list maintainer really is. Some possible approaches:
1) Add a header line to all the postings saying something like X-Send-Subscription-Requests-To: cypherpunks-request@toad.com
Wouldn't it just be easier to make it so you post to cypherpunks-requests@toad.com and unsub and all that to cypherpunks@toad.com? I don't mind just hitting the 'd' key either way... ;)
participants (3)
-
Colin Chandler -
Robert A. Hayden -
wcs@anchor.ho.att.com