![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8fee14b8352b9685a4cc6408e77a7acd.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Team:
I have some issues with my mailing list.
I have users subscribe to a list but yet I always have to approve their posts for some reason. And when I do have it accept this address for future posts, it still emails me to apporove it. Any ideas???
Thanks,
LDB
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/b3e20b1bfed7ea0d640318123a5a73c6.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
I seemed to finally get a decent backup for mailman going.
It's not super slick or anything but seems to work pretty decently, but you can never be too sure or ask enough questions when it comes to stuff like this....so any feed back would be appreciated.
We are running two linux debian servers, one in City1 and the other in City2. Each night I copy over any CHANGED files in the /var/lib/mailman directory. I do NOT copy /usr/lib/mailman.
This works fairly well it seems. We did a test and moved our mailman website to the other server (the website has been made redundant in city2) and everything seemed to line up just fine.
I wasn't able to send test messages to all the lists (we can have this!). So my tests are conclusive. But all the unprocessed messages came over with it and were released from the queue on the redundant server.
Does anyone see problems with this method backing up mailman? We'll be doing a full systems test in the spring and I need to know my mailman server isn't going to break this way and if it does, what I'll need to do to make it work once we switch to the other server.
Thanks in advance,
Aaron ~
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/746f7519ba02fb0d815e59f305c53fa2.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
I have users subscribe to a list but yet I always have to approve their posts for some reason.
For what reason? Every hold has a reason, what is this one?
And when I do have it accept this address for future posts, it still emails me to apporove it. Any ideas???
The check box to accept future posts only applies to non-members.
I'm guessing that your new members are moderated because Privacy options...->Sender filters->default_member_moderation is set to Yes. If this is not what you want, set it to No and then on Membership Management...->Membership List under Additional Member Tasks - "Set everyone's moderation bit, including those members not currently visible", select "No" and click "Set".
-- Mark Sapiro <msapiro@value.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/2df207df60d132b0a58fa9a26fcaf55e.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
I saw it today on a list for one person out of a thousand subscribers. I *think*, but I'm not 100% sure, that this subscriber was pending subscription approval during the upgrade from MM 2.1.5m to 2.1.6. I'm pretty sure the upgrade notes recommend clearing all admin approvals before upgrading, however on my system a few issues slipped through during the upgrade window.
On your system is is more like one or two users or more like 90%?
Just curious,
-Jim P.
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8fee14b8352b9685a4cc6408e77a7acd.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Mark Sapiro wrote:
The next time someone posts I can give you that reason. :) So hang a while, please.
In the meantime, I have data in /var/lib/mailman/data/ starting with heldmsg-*. Most of it, if not all is SPAM. I can safely get rid of it without adversely affecting the lists, right?
Thanks,
LDB
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/3bbfca2993fbd43cb7bf3e76497215de.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
Betcha he's not subscribed with the *exact* same address as he's sending the post from. A common problem of this type is when someone subscribed with an email address of user@domain.com and then posts to the list from user@subdomain.domain.com, or visa versa.
Complete headers would help, as would verifying the *exact* email address the member is subscribed with.
jc
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/746f7519ba02fb0d815e59f305c53fa2.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
What is the subscribed address?
What are the following headers in the message
From: Reply-To: Sender: Return-Path: and the From_ separator in a mailbox file if any.
And have you made any changes to the default
SENDER_HEADERS = ('from', None, 'reply-to', 'sender')
(above from Defaults.py)
-- Mark Sapiro <msapiro@value.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8fee14b8352b9685a4cc6408e77a7acd.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Mark Sapiro wrote:
Here are my settings .. USE_ENVELOPE_SENDER description is seemingly the problem I am having. But I have it set to, "No". ... Maybe I am interpreting it wrong ..
# When allowing only members to post to a mailing list, how is the sender of # the message determined? If this variable is set to Yes, then first the # message's envelope sender is used, with a fallback to the sender if there is # no envelope sender. Set this variable to No to always use the sender. # # The envelope sender is set by the SMTP delivery and is thus less easily # spoofed than the sender, which is typically just taken from the From: header # and thus easily spoofed by the end-user. However, sometimes the envelope # sender isn't set correctly and this will manifest itself by postings being # held for approval even if they appear to come from a list member. If you # are having this problem, set this variable to No, but understand that some # spoofed messages may get through. USE_ENVELOPE_SENDER = No
# Membership tests for posting purposes are usually performed by looking at a # set of headers, passing the test if any of their values match a member of # the list. Headers are checked in the order given in this variable. The # value None means use the From_ (envelope sender) header. Field names are # case insensitive. SENDER_HEADERS = ('from', None, 'reply-to', 'sender')
LDB
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/746f7519ba02fb0d815e59f305c53fa2.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
I forgot to mention that the posts are coming from the local servers on the network within the same domain.
And does this affect the addresses in the headers?
I.e. if the subscription is for 'localuser@example.com', are the headers in the message perhaps calling this just 'localuser' or maybe 'localuser@localbox.example.com'?
-- Mark Sapiro <msapiro@value.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8fee14b8352b9685a4cc6408e77a7acd.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Mark Sapiro wrote:
username@domain.org is the subscribed address.
The headers are as follows:
From username@domain.org Fri Jan 27 19:25:04 2006 Return-Path: <username@domain.org> X-Original-To: listname@lists.domain.org Delivered-To: listname@lists.domain.org Received: from localhost (localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1]) by lists.domain.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 990FD6780B0 for <listname@lists.domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:04 -0800 (PST) Received: from lists.domain.org ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (lists.domain.org [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id 11514-08 for <listname@lists.domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:04 -0800 (PST) Received: by lists.domain.org (Postfix, from userid 1005) id 51999678112; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:04 -0800 (PST) Received: from mail.domain.org (mail.domain.org [216.93.165.132]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by lists.domain.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 395866780A9 for <listname@lists.domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:03 -0800 (PST) Received: by mail.domain.org (Postfix) id 1D7E0128004; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:03 -0800 (PST) Delivered-To: listname@domain.org Received: from localhost (localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1]) by mail.domain.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0F527850439 for <listname@domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:03 -0800 (PST) Received: from mail.domain.org ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (mail.domain.org [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id 11298-09 for <listname@domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:02 -0800 (PST) Received: by mail.domain.org (Postfix, from userid 1005) id ED9CE850E5C; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:02 -0800 (PST) Received: from base2.domain.org (gforge.domain.org [207.235.77.148]) by mail.domain.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 6EA40850439 for <listname@domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:01 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1] helo=base2.domain.org) by hostname.domain.org with esmtp (Exim 3.36 #1 (Debian)) id 1F2ghw-0001Qk-00 for <listname@domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 22:25:00 -0500 From: User Name <username@domain.org> To: listname@domain.org
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/746f7519ba02fb0d815e59f305c53fa2.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
It certainly looks as though that should have been accepted.
What is in Mailman's 'vette' log for this post? If that doesn't provide the answer, I would try the following:
In Mailman/Handlers/Moderate.py, find the following:
else:
sender = msg.get_sender()
# From here on out, we're dealing with non-members.
Change the this to:
else:
sender = msg.get_sender()
# From here on out, we're dealing with non-members.
syslog('vette',
'Non member post. get_senders() = %s get_sender() = %s',
str(msg.get_senders()), sender)
This will create an entry in the 'vette' log (preceding the normal held post entry) for every non-member post. which in addition to the 'sender' from get_sender() also contains the list of senders from get_senders(). It is this list that is validated for membership. The post is considered from a list member if any of the get_senders() addresses is a list member.
-- Mark Sapiro <msapiro@value.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8fee14b8352b9685a4cc6408e77a7acd.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Mark Sapiro wrote:
I have not tried the above but it is asking for confirmation because the posts are from legitimate automatic engines that send email. The list does not know how to distinguish between SPAM and a legitimate automatic post.
Any ideas on resolving this dilemma?
Thanks,
LDB
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/746f7519ba02fb0d815e59f305c53fa2.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie
Posts which are held because of being from a non-member are only held based on the calculated 'sender' of the message which in turn is based on only a few message headers which all looked OK in your sample message.
I can understand your reluctance to patch the code, but at least look in the 'vette' log and see what the entry there reports as the sender of the held post.
-- Mark Sapiro <msapiro@value.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/746f7519ba02fb0d815e59f305c53fa2.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
So the post is held because the list posting address is not in a To: or Cc: header of the post, not because daemon@mydomain.com is not a member. If you want these posts to go to the list without being held for moderator approval, here are your choices.
1)Arrange for the automated sender to put the list posting address in a To: or Cc: header in the message, or
2)go to the list's Privacy options...->Recipient filters page and either set require_explicit_destination to No or add the actual To: address of the message or a regular expression that matches it to acceptable_aliases.
-- Mark Sapiro <msapiro@value.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/2df207df60d132b0a58fa9a26fcaf55e.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
Try unsub'ing and resub'ing him. Alternatively try logging into MM as admin and mod'ing and unmod'ing his address. I think the mod'ing was sufficient for my case, but I never did really check the logs to see if the user sub/unsub'ed himself.
-Jim P.
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/b3e20b1bfed7ea0d640318123a5a73c6.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
I seemed to finally get a decent backup for mailman going.
It's not super slick or anything but seems to work pretty decently, but you can never be too sure or ask enough questions when it comes to stuff like this....so any feed back would be appreciated.
We are running two linux debian servers, one in City1 and the other in City2. Each night I copy over any CHANGED files in the /var/lib/mailman directory. I do NOT copy /usr/lib/mailman.
This works fairly well it seems. We did a test and moved our mailman website to the other server (the website has been made redundant in city2) and everything seemed to line up just fine.
I wasn't able to send test messages to all the lists (we can have this!). So my tests are conclusive. But all the unprocessed messages came over with it and were released from the queue on the redundant server.
Does anyone see problems with this method backing up mailman? We'll be doing a full systems test in the spring and I need to know my mailman server isn't going to break this way and if it does, what I'll need to do to make it work once we switch to the other server.
Thanks in advance,
Aaron ~
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/746f7519ba02fb0d815e59f305c53fa2.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
I have users subscribe to a list but yet I always have to approve their posts for some reason.
For what reason? Every hold has a reason, what is this one?
And when I do have it accept this address for future posts, it still emails me to apporove it. Any ideas???
The check box to accept future posts only applies to non-members.
I'm guessing that your new members are moderated because Privacy options...->Sender filters->default_member_moderation is set to Yes. If this is not what you want, set it to No and then on Membership Management...->Membership List under Additional Member Tasks - "Set everyone's moderation bit, including those members not currently visible", select "No" and click "Set".
-- Mark Sapiro <msapiro@value.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/2df207df60d132b0a58fa9a26fcaf55e.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
I saw it today on a list for one person out of a thousand subscribers. I *think*, but I'm not 100% sure, that this subscriber was pending subscription approval during the upgrade from MM 2.1.5m to 2.1.6. I'm pretty sure the upgrade notes recommend clearing all admin approvals before upgrading, however on my system a few issues slipped through during the upgrade window.
On your system is is more like one or two users or more like 90%?
Just curious,
-Jim P.
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8fee14b8352b9685a4cc6408e77a7acd.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Mark Sapiro wrote:
The next time someone posts I can give you that reason. :) So hang a while, please.
In the meantime, I have data in /var/lib/mailman/data/ starting with heldmsg-*. Most of it, if not all is SPAM. I can safely get rid of it without adversely affecting the lists, right?
Thanks,
LDB
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/3bbfca2993fbd43cb7bf3e76497215de.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
Betcha he's not subscribed with the *exact* same address as he's sending the post from. A common problem of this type is when someone subscribed with an email address of user@domain.com and then posts to the list from user@subdomain.domain.com, or visa versa.
Complete headers would help, as would verifying the *exact* email address the member is subscribed with.
jc
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/746f7519ba02fb0d815e59f305c53fa2.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
What is the subscribed address?
What are the following headers in the message
From: Reply-To: Sender: Return-Path: and the From_ separator in a mailbox file if any.
And have you made any changes to the default
SENDER_HEADERS = ('from', None, 'reply-to', 'sender')
(above from Defaults.py)
-- Mark Sapiro <msapiro@value.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8fee14b8352b9685a4cc6408e77a7acd.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Mark Sapiro wrote:
Here are my settings .. USE_ENVELOPE_SENDER description is seemingly the problem I am having. But I have it set to, "No". ... Maybe I am interpreting it wrong ..
# When allowing only members to post to a mailing list, how is the sender of # the message determined? If this variable is set to Yes, then first the # message's envelope sender is used, with a fallback to the sender if there is # no envelope sender. Set this variable to No to always use the sender. # # The envelope sender is set by the SMTP delivery and is thus less easily # spoofed than the sender, which is typically just taken from the From: header # and thus easily spoofed by the end-user. However, sometimes the envelope # sender isn't set correctly and this will manifest itself by postings being # held for approval even if they appear to come from a list member. If you # are having this problem, set this variable to No, but understand that some # spoofed messages may get through. USE_ENVELOPE_SENDER = No
# Membership tests for posting purposes are usually performed by looking at a # set of headers, passing the test if any of their values match a member of # the list. Headers are checked in the order given in this variable. The # value None means use the From_ (envelope sender) header. Field names are # case insensitive. SENDER_HEADERS = ('from', None, 'reply-to', 'sender')
LDB
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/746f7519ba02fb0d815e59f305c53fa2.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
I forgot to mention that the posts are coming from the local servers on the network within the same domain.
And does this affect the addresses in the headers?
I.e. if the subscription is for 'localuser@example.com', are the headers in the message perhaps calling this just 'localuser' or maybe 'localuser@localbox.example.com'?
-- Mark Sapiro <msapiro@value.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8fee14b8352b9685a4cc6408e77a7acd.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Mark Sapiro wrote:
username@domain.org is the subscribed address.
The headers are as follows:
From username@domain.org Fri Jan 27 19:25:04 2006 Return-Path: <username@domain.org> X-Original-To: listname@lists.domain.org Delivered-To: listname@lists.domain.org Received: from localhost (localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1]) by lists.domain.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 990FD6780B0 for <listname@lists.domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:04 -0800 (PST) Received: from lists.domain.org ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (lists.domain.org [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id 11514-08 for <listname@lists.domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:04 -0800 (PST) Received: by lists.domain.org (Postfix, from userid 1005) id 51999678112; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:04 -0800 (PST) Received: from mail.domain.org (mail.domain.org [216.93.165.132]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by lists.domain.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 395866780A9 for <listname@lists.domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:03 -0800 (PST) Received: by mail.domain.org (Postfix) id 1D7E0128004; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:03 -0800 (PST) Delivered-To: listname@domain.org Received: from localhost (localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1]) by mail.domain.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0F527850439 for <listname@domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:03 -0800 (PST) Received: from mail.domain.org ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (mail.domain.org [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id 11298-09 for <listname@domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:02 -0800 (PST) Received: by mail.domain.org (Postfix, from userid 1005) id ED9CE850E5C; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:02 -0800 (PST) Received: from base2.domain.org (gforge.domain.org [207.235.77.148]) by mail.domain.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 6EA40850439 for <listname@domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:25:01 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1] helo=base2.domain.org) by hostname.domain.org with esmtp (Exim 3.36 #1 (Debian)) id 1F2ghw-0001Qk-00 for <listname@domain.org>; Fri, 27 Jan 2006 22:25:00 -0500 From: User Name <username@domain.org> To: listname@domain.org
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/746f7519ba02fb0d815e59f305c53fa2.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
It certainly looks as though that should have been accepted.
What is in Mailman's 'vette' log for this post? If that doesn't provide the answer, I would try the following:
In Mailman/Handlers/Moderate.py, find the following:
else:
sender = msg.get_sender()
# From here on out, we're dealing with non-members.
Change the this to:
else:
sender = msg.get_sender()
# From here on out, we're dealing with non-members.
syslog('vette',
'Non member post. get_senders() = %s get_sender() = %s',
str(msg.get_senders()), sender)
This will create an entry in the 'vette' log (preceding the normal held post entry) for every non-member post. which in addition to the 'sender' from get_sender() also contains the list of senders from get_senders(). It is this list that is validated for membership. The post is considered from a list member if any of the get_senders() addresses is a list member.
-- Mark Sapiro <msapiro@value.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8fee14b8352b9685a4cc6408e77a7acd.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Mark Sapiro wrote:
I have not tried the above but it is asking for confirmation because the posts are from legitimate automatic engines that send email. The list does not know how to distinguish between SPAM and a legitimate automatic post.
Any ideas on resolving this dilemma?
Thanks,
LDB
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/746f7519ba02fb0d815e59f305c53fa2.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie
Posts which are held because of being from a non-member are only held based on the calculated 'sender' of the message which in turn is based on only a few message headers which all looked OK in your sample message.
I can understand your reluctance to patch the code, but at least look in the 'vette' log and see what the entry there reports as the sender of the held post.
-- Mark Sapiro <msapiro@value.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/746f7519ba02fb0d815e59f305c53fa2.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
So the post is held because the list posting address is not in a To: or Cc: header of the post, not because daemon@mydomain.com is not a member. If you want these posts to go to the list without being held for moderator approval, here are your choices.
1)Arrange for the automated sender to put the list posting address in a To: or Cc: header in the message, or
2)go to the list's Privacy options...->Recipient filters page and either set require_explicit_destination to No or add the actual To: address of the message or a regular expression that matches it to acceptable_aliases.
-- Mark Sapiro <msapiro@value.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/2df207df60d132b0a58fa9a26fcaf55e.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Lawrence Bowie wrote:
Try unsub'ing and resub'ing him. Alternatively try logging into MM as admin and mod'ing and unmod'ing his address. I think the mod'ing was sufficient for my case, but I never did really check the logs to see if the user sub/unsub'ed himself.
-Jim P.
participants (5)
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IT Purchases
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JC Dill
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Jim Popovitch
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Lawrence Bowie
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Mark Sapiro