On Mon, Jul 11, 2011 at 5:40 PM, Barry Warsaw <barry@list.org> wrote:
I've thought about this on and off over the years and still think it's a good idea. No, MM3 does not have such a thing yet. ... Yep
Ok, great.
but I'd like to understand the semantics first. Do messages to the list get bounced, and if so, by Mailman or the MTA? Currently, deleting a list does remove its configuration, but (by default) retains its archives, which can be deleted later. A disabled list would always have its archives available I think.
With our current setup the disabled (or "graveyarded") list is removed from the /var/lib/mailman/lists dir and the aliases regenerated, so the MTA bounces messages to it and the admin interface for it cannot be logged into. Disabled lists are listed in a separate page in the web interface to the normal listinfo page. Some disabled lists might get their archives removed and some not.
I think bouncing at the MTA is slightly sub-optimal and that mailman could generate a more informative bounce indicating how to contact the server admin to get the list revived. Probably in the web interface there could be a "disabled lists" category. Server admins would probably want to be able to login to the disabled lists in the web interface, but maybe not the list admins.
I think the core feature would not be too hard to implement, but some specifics would depend on answering the main question above. Here's an outline of what you'd probably need to touch:
Thanks for the pointers, I will try that this week.
-- bye, pabs