[Mailman-Users] New Mailman Administrator Questions

[Mike Lyne]

Hi,

I will shortly become the List Admin for 11 mailing lists being
transferred from Majordomo to Mailman all at the same time (the big bang
approach).  I've read the manuals and understand a lot of the admin
functions but have some areas that I am not clear about and am looking
for some guidance please.

The current Mailing Lists are made up of 1 public list (no problems), 3
for Members only of a large organisation (>100,000 members but only
about 500 on each of the three Mailing Lists), and the remaining 7 are
all small (restricted numbers, typically <10) discussion lists for
various admin functions of the Organisation.

The questions I have are as follows:-

I need to be able to verify a Membership Number for applicants for the
3 Members only Lists before approving their addition to the appropriate
List - Mailman allows an (optional) Name to be submitted through the web
interface for joining but that is not enough.  We currently gather
Names, Membership Number, and email addresses through a Webmail form and
then add them (after verification) by email to the appropriate List
through Majordomo.

First of all, I will need to transfer several hundred email addresses
from Majordomo to Mailman for a couple of the Mailing Lists.

Question 1 - Is there a way to add large numbers of email addresses as
List members to Mailman easily and quickly in one, or a few, simple
actions?

Question 2 - Can email addresses be added singly (as Members of the
List, not using the nonmember options in the List Administration area)
to the Mailman List by an Administrator by email as per majordomo?

Question 3 - Could a Membership Number Field be added to the Mailman
Web Sign up form?  If so, would it show up in the List Admin or
Moderator Approval system if subscribe_policy is set to approval?

Last of all, we already have a "Members Only" section of our website
which needs the Members to "log in" using username and password so this
automatically validates their Membership and their right to be there.

Question 4 - Can the Web Interface for signing up for the various Lists
be customised so that a Members Only Mailing List sign-up web page is
only accessible in a Members Only directory/area of the website yet the
Public List is in a (different) Public directory/area of the Website?

Thanks in advance for any help - it will be much appreciated - I
haven't got access to a set-up copy of Mailman yet that I can play with
the Admin functions so am learning by studying the manuals.

Regards

Mike Lyne
UK