[Mailman-Developers] bulk subscriber changes

[Ian Eiloart]

--On 29 June 2006 09:39:28 -0400 emf <i at mindlace.net> wrote:

> Ian Eiloart wrote:
>
>> Well, for some of our lists it's simply inappropriate for users to set
>> preferences.
>
> OK, I can see this. My query/issue is this: as I understand it,
> completely re-setting the list membership will also reset mailman's
> memory of who bounces, etc. So if any of the new members were old
> members with subscription issues, mailman goes through the same
> rigamarole.
>
> It still seems to me like "set the active membership of the list to this
> list of email addresses", with existing addresses being retained,
> non-existent addresses dropped/set nomail, and new ones added, would
> address your needs without breaking things in the case that other admins
> use the feature.
>
> Does that sound right/ok?

Yes, that sounds good. I'd be uploading a list of addresses to be synced 
with the current membership.

>> So, I could implement this another way, but Mailman also offers me
>> authentication and authorisation, and allows me to ensure proper footers
>> on the emails, and probably some other useful stuff too.
>
> What I hear you saying is you would like "one-off" lists; is it
> important that the list persists? It seems odd, but perhaps what you
> want, to have lists whose membership entirely changes every n mailings
> but retains the same email address.

Well, the list still retains knowledge of who is allowed to post. And - 
importantly - it handles the grunt work of actually getting the emails sent.

> Are there any regularities to the emails you add? e.g. might the set of
> emails you add after a delete be equivalent to some past set of emails?
>
> I'm just thinking that the example you gave - sending all enquiring
> students a registration-change notice - is a case where you might want
> to keep some knowledge of past email addresses to which you had sent
> notices.
>
> Not that I'm necessarily signing up to implement some "remember past
> emails" kind of thing, but the feature you want could be implemented by,
> for example, setting all the emails that don't occur in the most recent
> set to nomail, rather than just throwing them away.
>
> ~ethan

Erm, perhaps. It would still be nice to be able to delete all the members, 
though. For example, I can bulk subscribe a list of people. If I then 
notice that I've subscribed them to the wrong list, it's a pain to get them 
unsubscribed.

-- 
Ian Eiloart
IT Services, University of Sussex