[Mailman-Users] My first time setting up mailman, some misc questions/comments

[Mark Sapiro]

On 04/15/2016 12:12 PM, Sean McBride wrote:
> Hi again,
> 
> Another comment and question if I may:
> 
> 1) The mailman-install.pdf has text like this:
> 
> ------------
> Add this to the bottom of the ‘$prefix/Mailman/mm cfg.py’ file:
>   MTA = ’Postfix’
> ------------
> 
> It would be nice to be able to copy-paste that exactly, but alas the pdf use smart quotes, which is of course not what Python wants.


This is a function of the software (pdflatex) that creates the pdf from
the Tex input file. The actual source is

      \begin{verbatim}
        MTA = 'Postfix'
      \end{verbatim}

with apostrophes. Both the mailman-install.txt file in the tarball and
the HTML in the tarball and online at, e.g.
<http://www.list.org/mailman-install/postfix-integration.html> have
ascii apostrophes


> 2) Does postfix need to be on the same host as Mailman?


Not necessarily. The outgoing MTA is specified by the
Defaults.py/mm_cfg.py settings SMTPHOST and SMTPPORT and can be
anywhere. There are patches available, e.g.,
<https://bugs.launchpad.net/mailman/+bug/558281> to enable Mailman to do
authentication if required.

The incoming MTA is more problematic. It needs to put the incoming mail
somewhere where a process on the Mailman host (e.g., fetchmail) can
retrieve it and deliver to Mailman. See <http://wiki.list.org/x/17891892>.

IMO, a better solution if possible, i.e., if you can control the 'main'
MTA, is to run an MTA on the Mailman host whose sole job is to deliver
to Mailman the list mail relayed from the 'main' MTA and to relay
outgoing mail back.

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