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Hello,
since a few days I have the following problem:
The qrunner locks up (strace output repeats and repeats as if the process is caught in an endless loop) and uses 100% of my CPU. The lock-files are dated in the future (but I have a ntp synched clock). The only qrunner log file (which is not dated in the future) keeps saying "Could not acquire qrunner lock".
What could be the problem?
I have two lists with a relatively large amount of messages in the moderation queue (800+ and 1100+). Maybe the queue runner needs more and more time to process these? The messages are all spam and can be thrown away, but I just can't delete them by the browser admin interface. This would take too much time. Is there another way to do such mass moderation? I tried to move away the files in the data/ directory but then Mailman complains about missing them, so I guess I have to do it the "Mailman way" to keep everything consistent. Maybe with the "withlist" tool?
In the archives I found this message: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/mailman-users/2000-January/003419.html but the link there points to the Mailman documentation which does not have such a script (anymore).
I run Mailman 2.0.13 and Python 2.1.1. Yes, I know this is a pretty old setup but I can't upgrade right now.
Cheers, Stephan -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.2.2 (GNU/Linux)
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"Stephan" == Stephan Uhlmann <su@su2.info> writes:
Stephan> Is there another way to do such mass moderation? I tried
Stephan> to move away the files in the data/ directory but then
Stephan> Mailman complains about missing them, so I guess I have
Stephan> to do it the "Mailman way" to keep everything consistent.
I've seen this done a couple of times on a 2.0.13 installation with nothing being the worse for wear. Delete the spam messages, get the page, which will still take a lot of time because Mailman looks for them all and builds up a 1000-message long page, each of which says "couldn't find the message file", pling any new spam that has come in while you were fooling around, and Mailman will decide that all the spam got thrown in a black hole, and reset itself. I've actually lost spam messages (once) because of a race with a co-moderator; odds are it happens once a day somewhere on the planet, so I'm sure Mailman knows how to deal.
Probably you'll get a better answer, and there's no rush, really. But if you _have_ to do that, I'm pretty sure it will work without harm to anything except the spam. :-)
-- Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp University of Tsukuba Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN Ask not how you can "do" free software business; ask what your business can "do for" free software.
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Just as a followup to my post explaining how I solved the problem.
The lockup didn't have something to do with the overfull moderation queue.
There was a 8 MB big file in the qfiles/ directory. The size was not that unusual and Mailman normally has no problems dealing with that, but it had the following strange content:
This is an automated response. **** Command 'this' not recognized.
There were problems with the email commands you sent to Mailman via **** Command 'there' not recognized. the administrative address **** Command 'the' not recognized. <list-request@someserver.tld>. **** Command '<list-request@someserver.tld>.' not recognized.
To obtain instructions on valid Mailman email commands, send email to **** Command 'to' not recognized. <list-request@someserver.tld> with the word **** Command '<list-request@someserver.tld>' not recognized. "help" in the subject line or in the body of the message. **** Command '"help"' not recognized.
... and so on and so on. (email address of the list removed to protect the innocent and avoiding spam). This was a reply from a wronggoing majordomo to a mailman request address. I guess Mailman had problems with all these special characters and commands and locked up while parsing everything.
I removed the qfile and everything was running smooth again. If somebody wants the file for debugging purposes, just email me in private and I can send it to you.
Anyway. While searching through the web I also found a solution to the mass moderation problem via "withlist". Stephen J. Turnbull suggested to just delete the files in the data/ directory, then start the mailman web interface again and mailman will reinitialize everything. This will probably work too, but the follwing seems to be a more elegant way:
As user mailman execute:
python -i bin/withlist listname
Then type:
m.Lock() from Mailman import mm_cfg h = m.GetHeldMessageIds() for i in h: m.HandleRequest(i,mm_cfg.DISCARD) <return> m.Save() <ctrl-d>
I found it here: http://mm.tkikuchi.net/pipermail/mmjp-users/2001-November/000154.html It's in japanese but even without understanding the mail, the script a good hint. There is even a python script which deletes all mails older than x days from the queue (or that's what I think what it does). I didn't try it yet, but it seems to be a nice way to get rid of all the spam in moderation queues via an automatic cronjob.
Cheers, Stephan -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.2.2 (GNU/Linux)
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participants (2)
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Stephan Uhlmann
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Stephen J. Turnbull