GNU's 'Mailman' DeliversGNU's 'Mailman' Delivers

If your clients are running Linux in-house, it's likely they're using the Linux platform to host a mail server. Applications such as Sendmail move e-mail around the Internet at the lowest cost per message due to the open-source nature of both the operating system and Sendmail. A frequent use of outbound mail is to coordinate communication among groups. For example, a company's internal IT group may want to send mail to a distribution list and maintain the list on the mail server—easy enough using Sendmail's aliases feature. But what if it were required to maintain this distribution list off the mail server, hide the membership from recipients or archive each message?

The folks at the GNU Project have a solution: the Mailman mailing list. Mailman integrates seamlessly with Sendmail and other mail servers to redirect mail sent to a single e-mail address to any number of internal or external users. Additionally, Mailman can archive each message sent to the list on a monthly, quarterly or yearly basis and make it available publicly or in a secured manner.

Solution providers often face the task of administering mail servers for their least technical clients. By installing Mailman in the client's environment, configuration and management of mailing lists is accomplished more easily and with more powerful results than what most mail servers can offer. Many organizations, especially nonprofits, need to communicate with their membership in an effective and cost-efficient manner, but don't want any of the details to get in the way of actually sending an outbound message. Environments such as these are great gaps that solution providers can fill with a service based on open-source software like Mailman.

Mailman is easy to get up and running, but requires planning. Because the app requires both a mail server and a Web server, knowing the details of your client's environment is important. That includes the locations of the Web server configuration file, the mail server aliases file and the group IDs of both your mail and Apache user.

By using the sequence of configure, make, make install and adding a directory alias to your httpd.conf file, you can have access to the Mailman interface in less than an hour. The administrative user interface allows for the creation of new lists, management of existing lists and pending administrative requests, and more. When a new list is created, myriad options can be configured depending on how the list is to be used. The list creator should, at a minimum, complete the following: list name, list owner, list moderator (if any), initial list members, public/private archives and archive frequency.

Another key feature of a Mailman mailing list is an integrated spam filter that is easily configurable by the list administrator. By adding regular expressions to a configuration setting, e-mail can be rejected, discarded or forwarded to the list moderator prior to being mailed to list members and posted in the archive. n

More On Mailman

Key features:

Scalable, high-performance mail delivery Virtual domain support International support Web-based and e-mail-based subscribing and unsubscribing Web-based administration for most tasks, including configuration and moderation Privacy features, such as closed-lists, private archives and spam filters Integrated bounce detection Integrated Usenet and auto-reply functionality Majordomo-style e-mail based commands Ability to "emergency" moderate a list (ensures all postings are first sent to the list moderator or owner)
What you need to have on hand before installing Mailman: List name List owner List moderator (if any) Initial list members Public/private archives Archive frequency Spam filter settings User/group IDs for users that Apache and Sendmail run as Location of mail server aliases file and Web-server configuration file Membership Management For many lists, the ability to have a closely moderated list, or to restrict list posting to a handful of individuals, is important. My local soccer club uses Mailman to keep its members informed of upcoming events through a list that is only accessible to a single individual. All replies to the list or attempts to e-mail the list originating from an invalid e-mail address are simply dropped. Also, the archives are publicly available through the Web site. Kevin Carlson ([email protected]) is with Waltham, Mass.-based Watchfire, a business-management software and services provider.