[Mailman-Users] Some detail questions about migrating lists

[Frank Griffin]

Mark Sapiro wrote:
> Frank Griffin wrote:
>> According to the UPGRADE document, file formats have changed as have
>> actual files (some new, some gone). What triggers the 2.1 version to do
>> the necessary conversions ? Is it just finding files of the old version
>> and recognizing them as such ?
>
>
> Yes, as far as the old config.db to new config.pck conversion is
> concerned.
>
> As far as other files such as the pending database and qfiles are
> concerned, these will be converted by bin/update if you are upgrading
> an installation, but if you are simply moving lists from an old to a
> new installation, it is best to deal with pending requests and queued
> messages on the old system and blow off anything that is left. There
> is no automated way of converting these in the new installation.
>
>
>> Does the last_mailman_version in the
>> data directory trigger this ?
>
>
> No. last_mailman_version tells bin/update whether it needs to do
> anything. This comes into play when installing an upgrade, but when
> moving an old list's config.(db|pck) into an existing installation, it
> is the DATA_FILE_VERSION in the config file itself that triggers the
> update.
>
>
>> There are various minor concerns, such as file permissions, aliases,
>> redoing public archive symlinks, and so forth. This made me wonder if
>> it would be easier/possible to run bin/newlist for each existing 2.0
>> list in the 2.1.9 system, and *then* bring over the data, lists, and
>> archives/private directories. Advisable ?
>
>
> No. This is absolutely wrong. If you create the list on the new system
> first, Mailman will always see that list's config.pck and will never
> look at the config.db that you move over.
>
> My advice is:
>
> Do not create the lists on the new host.
>
> Do not move anything from the data/ directory.
>
> Move only the config.db from the lists/<listname>/ directories.
>
> Move the archives/private/ tree.
>
> Run bin/list_lists which will instantiate every list and convert every
> old config.db to a new config.pck.
>
> Run bin/genaliases to create/update aliases.
>
> After conversion, remove the config.db files as if you don't, a
> possible future problem in reading the config.pck and config.pck.last
> files could cause Mailman to fall back to the then outdated config.db.
>
> Public archive symlinks will be created automatically the first time a
> list's configuration is saved. The bin/list_lists accessing and
> converting of the config.db files won't do this, but a list post or
> accessing the admin web interface for a list will.
>


Mark,

Thanks for the reply.  I've recently gotten back to this and wanted to
post my results.

In addition to the steps you posted, I needed to run "withlist -a -l -r
fix_url".

However, I have one anomaly that still needs resolution:

All of the lists I moved had the option set to reply to the list (yes, I
know), and they show up this way when I display them in the admin UI. 
However, when I post to them, the post mails arrive with a reply-to of
the poster and the list description linked to an email address of the
list owner, e.g.

List-Id: WebData Project Discussion <webdata.ftgme2.griffin.selectbs.com>
List-Unsubscribe:
<http://ftgme2.griffin.selectbs.com/mailman/listinfo/webdata>,
    <mailto:webdata-request at ftgme2.griffin.selectbs.com?subject=unsubscribe>
List-Archive: <http://ftgme2.griffin.selectbs.com/pipermail/webdata>
List-Post: <mailto:webdata at ftgme2.griffin.selectbs.com>
List-Help: <mailto:webdata-request at ftgme2.griffin.selectbs.com?subject=help>
List-Subscribe:
<http://ftgme2.griffin.selectbs.com/mailman/listinfo/webdata>,
    <mailto:webdata-request at ftgme2.griffin.selectbs.com?subject=subscribe>
Reply-To: ftg at roadrunner.com,
              WebData Project Discussion <frank.griffin at selectbs.com>


In this case, the list owner is frank.griffin at selectbs.com and the
poster is ftg at roadrunner.com .  It seems to me that this ought to be
WebData Project Discussion <webdata at ftgme2.griffin.selectbs.com> .

Did I miss a step ?  What can I do to correct this ?