Mailman - trouble creating a second list at an existing virtual host
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I have a Virtual Alias error problem on my Mac running OSX Server 10.4.6. I realize that is not a completely typical Mailman install, but I think the problem is Postfix to Mailman related more on the Postfix side.
I have a Mailman list working (for months) ... discuss at lists.MLDfamily.org. I've just created a new list ... discuss-adults at lists.MLDfamily.org. The web interface works fine for the new list and it shows lists.MLDfamily.org as its host_name. http://lists.mldfamily.org/mailman/admin/discuss-adults
Both lists show up when I run the following command: /usr/share/mailman/bin/list_lists -V lists.MLDfamily.org
But deliveries to the Postfix mail server nets me this error on my local server (i.e. the email is making it fine to my server): Nov 28 11:44:11 darcee postfix/smtpd11450 <http://discussions.apple.com/> : NOQUEUE: reject: RCPT from mail-pv0-f170.google.comhttp://74.125.83.170: 550 5.1.1 <discuss-adults@lists.mldfamily.org>: Recipient address rejected: User unknown in virtual alias table; from=<deansuhr@deansuhr.us> to=<discuss-adults@lists.mldfamily.org> proto=ESMTP helo=<mail-pv0-f170.google.com>
Deliveries to the initial discuss list at this virtual domain continue to work but discuss-adults give the virtual alias table error.
What do I need to do to get this new list into the virtual domain table? I am thinking I am overlooking the obvious - your help is appreciated.
I will respond with more config info if it¹s necessary.
Thanks in advance, Dean
--
FWIW, this is the process I used to create the list: (did not need to create the virtual domain since it already existed) Stopped the mail server using server admin sudo /usr/share/mailman/bin/rmlist -a discuss-adults (to remove all residual old list stuff) sudo /usr/share/mailman/bin/newlist discuss-adults sudo /usr/share/mailman/bin/list_lists new list showed up sudo /usr/share/mailman/bin/list_lists -V lists.MLDfamily.org new list did not show up sudo /usr/share/mailman/bin/withlist -l -r fix_url discuss-adults -u lists.MLDfamily.org sudo /usr/share/mailman/bin/list_lists -V lists.MLDfamily.org new list now shows up at the proper virtual domain sudo /usr/share/mailman/bin/genaliases sudo postfix reload failed since mail server was stopped started mail server using server admin
To confirm the updates of the virtual alias table I did the following: ls -l /var/mailman/data aliases, aliases.db, virtual-mailman, & virtual-mailman.db all were time stamped the last few minutes Looking inside aliases and virtual-mailman conformed the proper entries. Aliases and virtual-mailman both contained the following stanzas (in addition to others):
~~ # STANZA START: discuss # CREATED: Sun Nov 28 11:39:09 2010 discuss: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman post discuss" discuss-admin: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman admin discuss" discuss-bounces: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman bounces discuss" discuss-confirm: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman confirm discuss" discuss-join: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman join discuss" discuss-leave: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman leave discuss" discuss-owner: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman owner discuss" discuss-request: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman request discuss" discuss-subscribe: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman subscribe discuss" discuss-unsubscribe: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman unsubscribe discuss" # STANZA END: discuss ~~ # STANZA START: discuss-adults # CREATED: Sun Nov 28 11:39:10 2010 discuss-adults: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman post discuss-adults" discuss-adults-admin: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman admin discuss-adults" discuss-adults-bounces: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman bounces discuss-adults" discuss-adults-confirm: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman confirm discuss-adults" discuss-adults-join: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman join discuss-adults" discuss-adults-leave: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman leave discuss-adults" discuss-adults-owner: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman owner discuss-adults" discuss-adults-request: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman request discuss-adults" discuss-adults-subscribe: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman subscribe discuss-adults" discuss-adults-unsubscribe: "|/usr/share/mailman/mail/mailman unsubscribe discuss-adults" # STANZA END: discuss-adults
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Dean Suhr wrote:
It isn't necessary to stop the Postfix or Mailman
which creates the list in the DEFAULT_URL_HOST domain.
This creates the list in the DEFAULT_URL_HOST domain
and fix_url "fixed" it , but didn't update virtual-mailman.
sudo /usr/share/mailman/bin/genaliases
but the above did, but the fix_url and genaliases could have been avoided by just specifying '-u lists.mldfamily.org' to newlist.
sudo postfix reload failed since mail server was stopped started mail server using server admin
It is not necessary to stop/start or reload Postfix when you make table changes. This is only needed if you make configuration changes such as changing main.cf or master.cf.
You show the aliases. The virtual-mailman entries should be different. E.g., entries like
discuss@lists.mldfamily.org discuss discuss-admin@lists.mldfamily.org discuss-admin etc., and
discuss-adults@lists.mldfamily.org discuss-adults discuss-admin-adults@lists.mldfamily.org discuss-admin-adults etc.
Are all the entries in virtual-mailman? if not, there may be case sensitivity issues if the values in POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS are not all lower case.
If the entries for the discuss-adults list are in virtual-mailman, please post the output from
sudo postconf -n
-- Mark Sapiro <mark@msapiro.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8bd771fe9b0ed16c4aa1907b52bcaf65.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
First, please excuse me if my original post from yesterday posted several times. It appears Google sees my outgoing message as the same ID as the returned list message and silently discards the incoming list message making me thing it was never sent out ... and they have no config option to change this behavior. Arghhh!
Mark - thank you for your detailed response. I must confess the obvious. I re-examined virtual-mailman and aliases files. To my surprise the alias entries were not in the virtual-mailman file - I could have sworn I checked that carefully - but my lack of efficiency wit the command line must have caught up with me. I manually created the entries in virtual-mailman and the list is now functioning (delivering) properly.
Will I always have to manually post entries into virtual-mailman or is that supposed to happen somewhere along the way? Is there a terminal command line I missed or could have run in addition to cause this to happen automatically?
Thanks again - Dean
On 11/29/10 8:15 AM, "Mark Sapiro" <mark@msapiro.net> wrote:
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/56f108518d7ee2544412cc80978e3182.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Dean Suhr wrote:
While all that is correct vis a vis Google, that wasn't the issue here. Your posts were held for moderation because you were a new list member. Your mod flag has now been cleared and your posts will now go directly to the list. If you want to confirm that your post has been received even though Google doesn't show you your post as received from the list, you can check the archives at <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/mailman-users/> or you can set your list option "Receive acknowledgement mail when you send mail to the list?" to Yes.
[...]
It should happen automatically. I suspect it didn't in your case because of certain case-sensitivities which are really bugs. If you make all your domain names in mm_cfg.py, i.e. DEFAULT_URL_HOST, DEFAULT_EMAIL_HOST, additional domains in add_virtualhost() and domains in POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS, all lower case and use all lower case in -u options to newlist or fix_url. Everything should work.
The underlying bug is that domains in add_virtualhost() directives are lower-cased by Mailman but are matched case-sensitively to POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS so if the POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS domains are mixed or upper case, they don't match.
If you make everything lower case and run fix_url with a lower case -u domain and then run genaliases, you should be OK.
Note that manually editing virtual-mailman is unsafe because if genaliases is ever run, your changes will be lost.
-- Mark Sapiro <mark@msapiro.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8bd771fe9b0ed16c4aa1907b52bcaf65.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
<snipped>
On 11/29/10 6:28 PM, "Mark Sapiro" <mark@msapiro.net> wrote:
Thanks again Mark.
Yes, I contributed to the problem because I like to use MLDfamily (mixed case) in the user viewable emails and tend to follow that behind the scenes.
Right now I have manually entered the aliases into virtual-mailman. You indicated this could be a problem with the next run of genaliases.
The original list and the new one are both at lists.MLDfamily.org. (note CAPS).
I ran genaliases and the list remained intact with entries updated in virtual-mailman. Should I stand down and assume my rickety path to functionality will hold up - or should I delete the list and start over?
If I start over I would not want to upset the apple cart on the original list at lists.MLDfamily.org so I would use that mixed case virtual host for the re-creation of the new list.
I promise if I ever add any new virtual domains everything will be lower case!
Thanks, Dean
-- Dean Suhr President MLD Foundation 21345 Miles Drive West Linn, OR 97068-2878 USA
1+503-656-4808 or 1-800-617-8387
Complete MLD information at: www.MLDfoundation.org
Celebrating our tenth year of serving families!
Please watch this awareness video and pass it along: http://mldfoundation.org/awareness-video.html
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/56f108518d7ee2544412cc80978e3182.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Dean Suhr wrote:
Yes, because genaliases will remove all entries from aliases and virtual-mailman and then rebuild aliases for all lists and virtual-mailman for only those lists whose host_name is found in POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS.
The above is the key here. If your domains are mixed case in add_virtualhost() and POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS, creating the list and possibly running fix_url will produce a list with its host_name attribute lower cased which will not match POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS and thus will not create virtual-mailman entries.
If however you then manually change host_name on the list admin General Options page (or via config_list) to match the case of the domain in POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS and run genaliases, that will create the virtual-mailman entries.
Presumably, you did what I suggest above, i.e., change the case of the list's host_name before running genaliases.
-- Mark Sapiro <mark@msapiro.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/56f108518d7ee2544412cc80978e3182.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Dean Suhr wrote:
It isn't necessary to stop the Postfix or Mailman
which creates the list in the DEFAULT_URL_HOST domain.
This creates the list in the DEFAULT_URL_HOST domain
and fix_url "fixed" it , but didn't update virtual-mailman.
sudo /usr/share/mailman/bin/genaliases
but the above did, but the fix_url and genaliases could have been avoided by just specifying '-u lists.mldfamily.org' to newlist.
sudo postfix reload failed since mail server was stopped started mail server using server admin
It is not necessary to stop/start or reload Postfix when you make table changes. This is only needed if you make configuration changes such as changing main.cf or master.cf.
You show the aliases. The virtual-mailman entries should be different. E.g., entries like
discuss@lists.mldfamily.org discuss discuss-admin@lists.mldfamily.org discuss-admin etc., and
discuss-adults@lists.mldfamily.org discuss-adults discuss-admin-adults@lists.mldfamily.org discuss-admin-adults etc.
Are all the entries in virtual-mailman? if not, there may be case sensitivity issues if the values in POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS are not all lower case.
If the entries for the discuss-adults list are in virtual-mailman, please post the output from
sudo postconf -n
-- Mark Sapiro <mark@msapiro.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8bd771fe9b0ed16c4aa1907b52bcaf65.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
First, please excuse me if my original post from yesterday posted several times. It appears Google sees my outgoing message as the same ID as the returned list message and silently discards the incoming list message making me thing it was never sent out ... and they have no config option to change this behavior. Arghhh!
Mark - thank you for your detailed response. I must confess the obvious. I re-examined virtual-mailman and aliases files. To my surprise the alias entries were not in the virtual-mailman file - I could have sworn I checked that carefully - but my lack of efficiency wit the command line must have caught up with me. I manually created the entries in virtual-mailman and the list is now functioning (delivering) properly.
Will I always have to manually post entries into virtual-mailman or is that supposed to happen somewhere along the way? Is there a terminal command line I missed or could have run in addition to cause this to happen automatically?
Thanks again - Dean
On 11/29/10 8:15 AM, "Mark Sapiro" <mark@msapiro.net> wrote:
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/56f108518d7ee2544412cc80978e3182.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Dean Suhr wrote:
While all that is correct vis a vis Google, that wasn't the issue here. Your posts were held for moderation because you were a new list member. Your mod flag has now been cleared and your posts will now go directly to the list. If you want to confirm that your post has been received even though Google doesn't show you your post as received from the list, you can check the archives at <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/mailman-users/> or you can set your list option "Receive acknowledgement mail when you send mail to the list?" to Yes.
[...]
It should happen automatically. I suspect it didn't in your case because of certain case-sensitivities which are really bugs. If you make all your domain names in mm_cfg.py, i.e. DEFAULT_URL_HOST, DEFAULT_EMAIL_HOST, additional domains in add_virtualhost() and domains in POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS, all lower case and use all lower case in -u options to newlist or fix_url. Everything should work.
The underlying bug is that domains in add_virtualhost() directives are lower-cased by Mailman but are matched case-sensitively to POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS so if the POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS domains are mixed or upper case, they don't match.
If you make everything lower case and run fix_url with a lower case -u domain and then run genaliases, you should be OK.
Note that manually editing virtual-mailman is unsafe because if genaliases is ever run, your changes will be lost.
-- Mark Sapiro <mark@msapiro.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8bd771fe9b0ed16c4aa1907b52bcaf65.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
<snipped>
On 11/29/10 6:28 PM, "Mark Sapiro" <mark@msapiro.net> wrote:
Thanks again Mark.
Yes, I contributed to the problem because I like to use MLDfamily (mixed case) in the user viewable emails and tend to follow that behind the scenes.
Right now I have manually entered the aliases into virtual-mailman. You indicated this could be a problem with the next run of genaliases.
The original list and the new one are both at lists.MLDfamily.org. (note CAPS).
I ran genaliases and the list remained intact with entries updated in virtual-mailman. Should I stand down and assume my rickety path to functionality will hold up - or should I delete the list and start over?
If I start over I would not want to upset the apple cart on the original list at lists.MLDfamily.org so I would use that mixed case virtual host for the re-creation of the new list.
I promise if I ever add any new virtual domains everything will be lower case!
Thanks, Dean
-- Dean Suhr President MLD Foundation 21345 Miles Drive West Linn, OR 97068-2878 USA
1+503-656-4808 or 1-800-617-8387
Complete MLD information at: www.MLDfoundation.org
Celebrating our tenth year of serving families!
Please watch this awareness video and pass it along: http://mldfoundation.org/awareness-video.html
![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/56f108518d7ee2544412cc80978e3182.jpg?s=120&d=mm&r=g)
Dean Suhr wrote:
Yes, because genaliases will remove all entries from aliases and virtual-mailman and then rebuild aliases for all lists and virtual-mailman for only those lists whose host_name is found in POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS.
The above is the key here. If your domains are mixed case in add_virtualhost() and POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS, creating the list and possibly running fix_url will produce a list with its host_name attribute lower cased which will not match POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS and thus will not create virtual-mailman entries.
If however you then manually change host_name on the list admin General Options page (or via config_list) to match the case of the domain in POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS and run genaliases, that will create the virtual-mailman entries.
Presumably, you did what I suggest above, i.e., change the case of the list's host_name before running genaliases.
-- Mark Sapiro <mark@msapiro.net> The highway is for gamblers, San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
participants (2)
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Dean Suhr
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Mark Sapiro