[Mailman-Users] Bounce Processing -- Disable/Removal Notification

[Mark Sapiro]

Greg Sims wrote:

>We have a newsletter type list that has been running for almost two years
>now.  The list currently has 1,100 members who receive one email each
>morning.  The Bounce Configuration page for this list is configured as
>follows: Yes, 5.0, 30, 2, 7, Yes, Yes, Yes which I believe may be the
>defaults.  The system is running under RedHat V4.


These may be the mm_cfg.py defaults for ne lists at your site, but the
Defaults.py defaults are Yes, 5.0, 7, 3, 7, Yes, Yes, Yes, but that
doesn't really affect the rest of your question.


>I ran the following command: grep 'score' /var/log/mailman/bounce and
>received a list of 28 users that have records containing "(score 5.0 >=
>5.0)".  I can see one duplicate email address in this list of 28 - most of
>the records appear to be unique email addresses.  The dates on the records
>cover a period of one week.  


Do these entries say "sending listname list probe to: user at example.com
(score 5.0 >= 5.0)"?

Is VERP_PROBES = Yes in mm_cfg.py (or is this Mailman 2.1.5 where VERP
probes was unconditionally on)?

If so, do you see in the bounce log that a probe was sent but didn't
bounce? If so, it is likely that your MTA doesn't recognize the '+'
delimiter to separate the VERP probe token from the local part of an
address and can't deliver the bounce.



>It appears there are a number of candidates that could have their
>subscriptions Disabled and/or Removed from the list.  I have been the list
>admin for two years now and I have never received an email saying a list
>member has been Disabled or Removed.  This seems odd based on what I am
>seeing in the logs.  I do receive emails for bounce messages that fail
>detection regularly.


With the settings you have, you should receive disabled notices.


>Is it possible to see in a log (or through the online interface) when a user
>is placed in Disabled status?  I would like to be able to grep this log and
>see if anyone is being Disabled or Removed - this may confirm if there is
>actually a problem or not.  Let's say looking at the logs reveals that list
>members are not ever being Disabled or Removed - what is the next step to
>debugging this problem?

'Disabling' entries will appear in the bounce log if members are
actually disabled.

bin/list_members --nomail=bybounce listname

will list all the disabled by bounce members.

If there aren't any, and I suspect there aren't, I suspect that
examination of the bounce log will show "sending listname list probe
to: user at example.com (score 5.0 >= 5.0)" entries, but no "listname:
user at example.com disabling due to probe bounce received" entries.

If this is the case, I suspect it is because the MTA does not know how
to deliver mail addressed to listname-bounces+xxxxxx at listdomain or at
least doesn't pipe it to the wrapper as it does for mail to
listname-bounces at listdomain.

-- 
Mark Sapiro <msapiro at value.net>       The highway is for gamblers,
San Francisco Bay Area, California    better use your sense - B. Dylan