THIS LIST IS STUPID!! Was: Re: Sending multiple copies...

From: Jon N. Steiger (stei0302@penny.cs.fredonia.edu)
Date: Tue Feb 04 1997 - 12:24:08 EST


  HA! Now that I've got your attention, I take it back. ;)
  

>> There are some people who suscribed to this list who do not have valid
>> e-mail addresses any more, but they did not unsucribe, or didn't know how,
>> before their account was terminated. It is upto the administrator of this
>> list to clean up his "bot" list to correct this "Undeliverable Message".
>>
>i think this is it... hope someone can look into it.... this is ONLY
>email group that i get these messages on :)
>--
>###############
>
>Jules/MPI
>99 Tech Central
>Dodgeville, RAM USA
>

   You're right Jules.

   Here's the deal... As some of you already know, this mailing list
is running on software that I wrote myself. (Couldn't find good free
stuff at the time.) Its little more than a dirty hack. At first, it was
fine, because we only had 20, 30, 40 members. Right now, we have about
280 members. Frankly, I had no idea that it would become this popular. :)
(Who knows how big we'd be if we had decent software)

   I think its fairly safe to say that we are currently at a bandwidth
level where the undeliverable messages, subscribe/unsubscribe messages,
etc. are a major hassle. The signal/noise ratio has become unacceptable.

   Now, I know that I just changed the list address from the csclub0 machine
to the sseg machine, but do you think you could handle another change? :)

    We're running an NT machine here with extremely powerful mailing list
software that would give us a lot more options than we had before. It
would eliminate the undeliverable mail messages, which is my main reason
for wanting to switch. It can also give us protection against spammers,
stop people from posting huge binary files, allow only list members to
post, add headers for easy message filtering, add footers with unsubscribe
info, etc. I can also set the software to have your replies default to
the list, rather than to the sender. (No more header surgery!!) ;)

    I've received mail, and read mail on the list, from people who have
been (or will be) forced to unsubscribe as a result of the undeliverable
messages, etc. Our weak link is the mailing list software, and when it
would be so easy to switch, there's no reason for people to have to
unsubscribe. If I were to make this change, the new administrative
address would be listserv@ait.fredonia.edu, and the discussion list
would be dakota@ait.fredonia.edu. Like this list, a digest mode is
available. The administrative commands would definitely be different
than they are now.

   I still have to check to see wether its OK to use the server for
the Dakota list. I just wanted to send a message to the list letting you
know about this option. Is there any reason not to switch? The only
thing I can think of is that the transition might be confusing for
some people, though everyone handled the csclub0->sseg switch fine. Maybe
I've overlooked something though... (I have been known to do so.) ;)

  Let me know what you think...

                                              -Jon-

    Jon Steiger - Network Administrator, Academic Information Technologies.
    .- steiger@ait.fredonia.edu -- http://www.cs.fredonia.edu/~stei0302/ -.
    | DoD# 1038, EAA# 518210, NMA# 117376, USUA# A46209, KotWitDoDFAQ |
    | '96 Dodge Dakota SLT V8, '96 Kolb FireFly 447, '91 Yamaha FZR600R |
    `---------------------------------------------------------------------'
       - Unless otherwise stated, these opinions and views are my own. -
 



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