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LISTSERV Guide
SHSU Technology Tutorials | LISTSERV Guide
LISTSERV Guide
General Information
What is LISTSERV?
Electronic mailing lists provide a system for Internet users to participate in discussions or to receive information. The software responsible for the management and distribution of these mailing lists to subscribers is commonly called a "list server". LISTSERV is a mailing list that automatically distributes an e-mail message from one member of a list to all other members on that list. LISTSERV is an effective way to create, manage and control electronic mailing lists. It is a great way to make announcements. This guide will show you how to set up and personalize your mailing list on LISTSERV.
LISTSERV mailing list administration
General Options Section
This section contains the basic list characteristics, including descriptive info and basic behaviors. The description of the section is in the gray area on the left. Make your choices/changes in the boxes on the right, and then submit them using the Submit Your Changes button below. Additional information can be found in the (details) link.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished. 
Passwords
Administrators and moderators have separate duties so you must set a separate moderator password in the fields below:
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Language options
Choose your preferred language.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Membership management
This area is where you manage your list addresses, Mass Subscriptions and Unsubscriptions. Enter email address and member name.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Mass Subscriptions
Enter one address per line in the first box. In the second box enter additional text that you want added to the top of your invitation or subscription notice. Include at least one blank line at the end.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Non-digest options
This section let you choose whether mail is delivered immediately rather than in batches.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Digest options
This option keeps the clutter down in your inbox by delivering your messages all at once.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Configuration Categories
Privacy options
Subscription rules
This section allows you to configure subscription and membership exposure policy. This section is also where you control whether this list is public or not. See also the Archival Options section for separate archive-related privacy settings.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Sender filters
This section contains controls for member and non-member postings. The message goes through a series of steps to decide whether the moderator must approve the message first. In the text boxes, add one address per line and start the line with a ^ (shift 6), when entering backslashes (\), just enter a single one.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Recipient filters
This filter is based on the recipient and makes sure that the posts have the list name in destination (to, cc) field in order to be accepted to cut down on spam. Click on Details for more information.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Spam filters
Another section that allows you to reduce spam.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Bounce processing
If an email cannot be delivered, it is returned to the sender, or "bounced". Email can bounce for any number of reasons, and the failure may be permanent or temporary. The most common reason for bounces is an invalid address for the intended recipient. Mailman can be set up to intercept bounces and try to automatically process them. In addition, list owners can customize what happened when too many bounces occur. These are the options available on the Bounce Processing Screen. Click these links to learn more details.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Archiving options
This section allows you to edit the list traffic archives.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Mail<-> News gateways
Mailman has a sophisticated mail-to-news gateway feature. It can independently gate messages from news to mail and vice versa, and can even be used to manage moderated newsgroups.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Auto-responder
This is a type of list that simply responds with a pre-defined message when it receives e-mail. This can be useful for service messages, upgrade availability, or to simply send back a standardized message such as informing the user that LISTSERV would be down.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Content filtering
Filter policies concerning the content of list traffic.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Topics
LISTSERV allows the list owner to specify topics that can be set by individual subscribers. Topics make it possible to "fine-tune" the mail you get from the list. Topics can be enabled or disabled.
Click on Submit Your Changes when you have finished.
Other Administrative Activities
This section allows you to:
- Tend to pending moderator requests
- Go to the general list information page
- Edit the public HTML pages
- Go to list archives
Tend to Moderator Requests
This section allows you to tend to pending moderator requests. These are messages that did not make it through the sender filters. The moderator is then responsible for reviewing the post and editing the post if necessary before releasing the post to the list. The moderator also has the ability to reject a post and return it to the sender.
General List Information Page
This page instructs how to post messages to all the list members, how to subscribe or change your existing subscription. Fill out the form to subscribe and pick out a password.
Choose your digest option and click Subscribe.
To unsubscribe or get a password reminder you can either enter you subscription email or click on the View subscriber list and choose your email there.
Edit the public HTML pages
This section allows you to edit the html on the general list information page, subscribe results page and the user specific options page.
Go to list archives
The list archive consists of all of the notebook logs for your list.
When you have finished setting up your mailing list on LISTSERV, click on Logout.
Your group is now ready to suscribe.
Subscription process
To subscribe you must send an email to the LISTSERV that you wish to join. Send an email message from the email account that you wish to receive LISTSERV messages at. Send an email to: (list would be the name of the LISTSERV you wish to join)
list@shsu.edu
Type subscribe in the subject line and in the body of the message type: subscribe list John Doe (list would be the name of the LISTSERV you wish to join)
To unsubscribe, send an email to the LISTSERV typing unsubscribe into the subject line and unsubscribe list.
Send an email to: list@shsu.edu
Type unsubscribe in the subject line and in the body of the message type: unsubscribe list (list would be the name of the LISTSERV you wish to join)(your name is not necessary to unsubscribe)
Sending messages
After subscribing to a listserv and you wish to send a message to the group, send you message directly to the group. The email address is: list@shsu.edu
An example would be: mathclub@shsu.edu
You are now ready to communicate with members of your group!
