Hosted LISTSERV lists contain data from the dataset. They can also have their own data fields that are not shared among lists in the dataset, but belong exclusively to the list. Lists that have their own fields will also have their own Web subscription forms generated when the list is created. All the fields that appear in the dataset and in a particular list can be used as merged fields for messages sent to that list.
To create a new hosted LISTSERV recipient list, select the dataset the list will be added to from the Recipient Datasets screen. The Recipient Dataset Details screen opens. From the Toolbar, click
Dataset >
Create >
Create Hosted LISTSERV List.
When LISTSERV Maestro creates a LISTSERV list, it is assembling a “list header” that is made up of “keywords.” These keywords define the settings in the list, such as who may send mail to the list, who administers the list, how are bounces handled, and many other settings. Once the keywords are defined and written to the list header, the LISTSERV list can collect subscriptions.
LISTSERV Maestro provides a wizard that can create three different types of LISTSERV list, providing unique ways for subscribers to manage their settings and communicate. The three types of LISTSERV lists available are:
|
•
|
Announcement List – This type of list is used for announcements and newsletters. Communication with subscribers is one-way, stemming from the LISTSERV Maestro sender and going to the subscribers. Subscribers are not allowed to post back to the list. See Section 7.1 Creating LISTSERV Announcement Lists for more information.
|
|
•
|
Unmoderated Discussion List – This type of list is used for open discussion among list subscribers and any LISTSERV Maestro senders. Communication is two-way, originating from both subscribers and LISTSERV Maestro senders. Postings go directly to the list without being reviewed or edited. See Section 7.2 Creating LISTSERV Unmoderated Discussion Lists for more information.
|
|
•
|
Moderated Discussion List – This type of list is used for a controlled discussion among subscribers and any LISTSERV Maestro senders. Postings sent to the list from subscribers are reviewed by a moderator who can approve the message for distribution to the rest of the list or reject the posting so it is not sent on to the rest of the list subscribers. Messages originating from LISTSERV Maestro are not subject to moderation. See Section 7.3 Creating LISTSERV Moderated Discussion Lists for more information.
|
|
•
|
User Defined Discussion List – This type of list lets you define your own list type. This is an advanced feature that requires knowledge of LISTSERV list headers and list header keywords; therefore, it is most suited for experienced LISTSERV users. The behavior of this list type depends entirely on the value that you supply for the Send keyword. While the three predefined types (Announcement, Unmoderated, and Moderated) have predefined values for the Send keyword, the User Defined list lets you define this keyword. Click on the Edit link to define it. See Section 7.4 Creating LISTSERV User Defined Lists for more information.
|
Note: Once the list is created in the Hosted Recipient List wizard, it can be edited outside of LISTSERV Maestro using LISTSERV. This is an advanced skill for those administrators familiar with LISTSERV, but it must be exercised with caution as it has the potential to break the functioning of the list if certain keywords are modified in a way that is incompatible with LISTSERV Maestro. In particular, you must
never change the
DBMS= or
Topics= keywords outside of Maestro or change the Maestro list ID, and certain keywords have restrictions that must be observed, especially
Subscription=,
Owner=,
Validate=, and
Misc-Options=. If any changes to the list header are made outside of LISTSERV Maestro, the wizard cannot be used again on the same list without losing all of the changes.
Similar to creating a dataset and creating a hosted recipient list, creating a hosted LISTSERV list is accomplished by using a wizard that guides you through all of the steps for designing the list and the accompanying web subscription form. The Hosted LISTSERV List Definition wizard is comprised of eight main screens – General, Profile Fields, Profile Field Details, List Type, List Options, Posting Restrictions, LISTSERV List Topic, and Summary. The settings available in the wizard vary depending on the type of LISTSERV list that is created.
A LISTSERV announcement list permits communication to run in one direction, from the sender of the message to the subscribers. Subscribers are not allowed to post back to the list, although they can send mail back to the sender of the message. Subscribers are, however, allowed to manage their own subscription settings based on the features of the list itself.
|
•
|
Name – The name of the mailing list. Subscribers will see this name of the list on the web form when they subscribe. Data administrators will see the list name in the dataset tree and if they create a target group from a classic LISTSERV list (see Section 14 Classic LISTSERV List Target Groups for details). LISTSERV Maestro users will see the list name if they are allowed to define recipients for a job by sending to an existing LISTSERV list.
|
|
•
|
Internal Description – The internal description is seen by users working within the Maestro User Interface.
|
|
•
|
Public Description – The public description of the list appears on the subscription web form. If subscribers are permitted to select the lists they want to join and can view and change their subscription settings, having accurate descriptions will help them accomplish those tasks.
|
The Profile Fields screen lists all of the fields in the dataset. Other fields can be added to the list. Any added list fields will
not be shared among the other lists in the dataset. To add a new field, click the
Add Field link.
|
•
|
Name – The name of the field as it will be used internally by the system for mail merging and querying. Field names can only use upper and lower case letters A-Z and a-z, the numbers 0 – 9 and the underscore “_”. Spaces and other special characters are not allowed.
|
|
•
|
Display Name – The label that identifies the blank field on the web form. The display name will be seen by anyone accessing the list’s public subscription page on the Web. All alphanumeric characters are permitted, as well as spaces and special characters allowed by the encoding scheme of the dataset.
|
|
•
|
Data Type – Choose the type of data to be entered in the field from the drop-down menu. Three different classifications of data are available (selection lists are not available for hosted LISTSERV lists):
|
|
•
|
Text – Text fields can accept any type of text, including dates in specific formats such as dd/mm/yyy or mm.dd.yyyy.
|
|
•
|
Number – Number fields accept any whole integers.
|
|
•
|
Boolean – Boolean fields are based on two states – true or false.
|
|
•
|
Mandatory – Decide whether the data is mandatory for subscribers to enter into the web form or optional. Optional fields can be designated as hidden or read-only if the subscribers are not allowed to enter or change the data in those fields. Boolean fields cannot be optional due to the nature of the data type – the selection equates to either true or false. Boolean fields may be visible or hidden.
|
After list fields are created, they can be edited, removed, moved up, or moved down by using the corresponding links. Fields that are part of the dataset cannot be moved or edited from this screen.
The Profile Field Details screen lets you specify which LISTSERV fields are used to assemble the “Full Name” of the list subscriber. Hosted LISTSERV lists require a
Name Field to be defined. If a single name field exists for each subscriber, move that field from the
Profile Fields box to the
Name Fields box. If two (or more) fields are to be used to make up a full name, move each of the fields from the
Profile Fields box to the
Name Fields box. The second field is added after the first field, leaving a space in between. This makes it easy to combine a first name field with a last name field to produce a
Full Name field, for example. Use the
Move Up and
Move Down links to change the order of the name fields. The fields are not required to be mandatory; although, the existence of at least one name field is required, but it does not have to be filled in by every subscriber.
An Announcement List is used for announcements and newsletters. Communication with subscribers is one-way, stemming from the LISTSERV Maestro sender and going to the subscribers. Subscribers are not allowed to post back to the list.
Note: For this list type, if any
Allowed Sender Addresses are specified on the Allowed Sender Addresses tab of the Posting Restrictions screen, then the sender address of the job must be one of these addresses. If no specific
Allowed Sender Addresses have been supplied, then the sender address of the job must be one of the addresses listed as the List Administrator Addresses on the General Options tab of the List Options screen.
Important: This is an advanced feature that requires knowledge of and experience with LISTSERV list headers and list header keywords; therefore, it should only be used by experienced LISTSERV list administrators. For most standard list purposes, there is no need to edit the list header keywords on this tab directly, but you can instead use the controls that are provided on the following wizard pages (List Options, Posting Restrictions, and Topics).
This tab shows a tree with all available list header keywords, separated into seven groups (see the list of groups and keywords below). Click on the “+” icon to open a group or the “-” icon to close a group.
|
•
|
A red circle icon and bold black text: This keyword has been configured with a manually supplied value via the Edit link here on the Advanced Configuration tab and was included in the list header with the displayed value (or was omitted from the list header, if applicable). However, when the list header was transferred to LISTSERV, LISTSERV reported an error in the value of this keyword. To see the original LISTSERV error message for this keyword, select the keyword in the tree and click the Edit link.
|
To view the actual textual list header that is the result of the keyword input here in the keyword tree and in the user interface controls on the following wizard pages, and which thus defines this Hosted LISTSERV List, click on the
View Configuration as Plaintext link at the bottom of the tree.
To edit the value of a given keyword, select the keyword in the tree and click on the Edit link at the top right corner of the tree. Depending on the selected keyword, there are three possible edit situations:
|
•
|
Editing via wizard controls only – For keywords of this type, all possible values that the keywords can have can be configured via the user interface controls that the wizard offers on the following wizard pages. Therefore, there is no need to be able to input a keyword value manually. If you click the Edit link for such a keyword, then a message box will inform you that instead of editing the keyword value manually, please use the provided user interface controls on the specified wizard page.
|
|
•
|
Editing via wizard controls or manual input – For keywords of this type, user interface controls exist on the following wizard pages. However, those controls do not allow you to input the full range of possible values for this keyword (but only the most common values). You therefore have the choice of either using the user interface controls in the wizard or to supply a specific value for the keyword manually. If you choose to supply a value manually here in the keywords tree, then the corresponding user interface control on one of the following wizard pages will no longer be available. Instead a message will be displayed that informs you, that a custom value has been supplied for the corresponding keyword in the keywords tree. To make the user interface controls available again, go back to the keywords tree and remove the manually supplied value. If you click the Edit link for such a keyword, an input dialog will allow you to choose between using the user interface control in the wizard (this also includes an information about where to find the corresponding user interface control) or to supply your own customized value.
|
|
•
|
Editing via manual input only – For keywords of this type, there exists no dedicated user interface control on any of the following wizard pages. Therefore, the only way of changing these keywords is by supplying a customized value for the keyword manually, here in the keywords tree. Keywords of this type are keywords for very specific and advanced LISTSERV list features, which are seldom used. If you click the Edit link for such a keyword, an input dialog will allow you to supply the value for the keyword.
|
The List Options screen is divided into several tabs – General Options, Reply Behavior, Bounce Handling, List Archive, plus several with advance features – that can be accessed by clicking the drop-down arrow. The List Archive tab is optional and will not appear unless archives have been set up in the HUB. For more information on archives, see the LISTSERV Maestro Administrator’s Manual.
On the General Options tab, all list types require that a list administrator called a “list owner” be set. Enter at least one email address that will become the administrator (owner) of the LISTSERV list. Click the
Edit link to add a new address or edit the existing ones in the pop-up dialog box. Entries must be valid Internet email addresses.
Click [OK] to accept the administrator address and return to the General Options tab.
|
•
|
Mail Merging – Check if you want to be able to use mail merging on this hosted LISTSERV list even when doing "normal" (standard submit) postings. When using this hosted LISTSERV list as the designated recipient list for a mail job, you will have the choice (in the recipients wizard of the mail job) to choose between a "special submit" and a "standard submit". With special submit, mail merging is always enabled (no matter the setting made here); however, this also circumvents other features of the list, like the list archive or any DIGEST settings. With a standard submit, mail merging is normally not possible (and therefore also some tracking types that rely on mail merging are not possible). However, if you check this option here, mail merging will also be possible together with standard submits.
|
|
•
|
Sender – Replies are directed to the sender of the email message. The sender address is the address based on the “From:” field of the posting.
|
|
•
|
List Administrator – Replies can be directed to the list administrator address. This is the address that was entered in the General Options tab under List Administrator Email Addresses. If there is more than one list administrator, each address will receive all replies.
|
|
•
|
Separate address – Replies are directed to an address that is entered in this field.
|
Finally, select when the settings are to be applied - always (i.e. even if the sender has supplied a "Reply-To" address of his own) or
only if the sender has not supplied a "Reply-To" address.
The Bounce Handling tab determines what happens to the subscriber addresses when messages sent to them bounce (are rejected by the email server and returned to the sender as undeliverable). LISTSERV lists can handle bounces by removing the subscriber addresses of bounced messages automatically or by collecting bounces for manual action. Unlike Hosted Recipient Lists, automatic removal of bounced addresses on Hosted LISTSERV Lists will remove the address from the list only, not from the dataset. Manually processed bounces are sent to the list administrator's mailbox. Select one of the bounce processing options:
|
•
|
Remove subscribers after X bounces within Y days – If mail sent to a subscriber bounces back to LISTSERV, and this happens at least X-many times within a period of Y-many days, then remove this subscriber from the list. The default is to remove after 100 bounces within 4 days.
|
If you have selected one of the automatic bounce handling options above, then you can also specify whether or not this should actually result in an automatic removal of addresses from the list (which is the default) or if the bounce analysis should only be forwarded (via e-mail).
If you select automatic removal, then a notification about all removed addresses will be sent to the specified group of people, and you also have the choice if you also want to be notified about any temporary bounces and bounces for addresses that are not actually subscribed to the list.
If you select no automatic removal, then you need to specify the group of people to which the bounce analysis will be forwarded to by clicking the
Add link. To change this information, click the
Edit link.
Furthermore, you can define the Passive Probing behavior of the list.
To again hide the advanced bounce handling options, click on the Hide advanced bounce handling options link. This, however, is only possible if the advanced options are set to their default values, i.e. if you have non-default advanced options, then you can also not hide the advanced options.
The List Archives tab defines whether or not postings to the list will be archived. If an archive is to be kept, then define how often a new archive file is to be created by the system and who is allowed to access and view the archive.
For the latter two options, there are two modes of specifying the necessary details: In Standard Mode, only the most common settings are available. In
Advanced Mode, all possible options are available. Toggle between the two modes with the
Switch to Standard Mode and
Switch to Advanced Mode links at the bottom of the tab.
Note: This tab is only available if the option of creating LISTSERV list archives has been enabled for your LISTSERV server by the LISTSERV Maestro administrator (this is a setting in the Administration Hub).
|
•
|
Use texts from custom template – The text for the administrative messages are taken from the specified custom template. A custom template can be used for customization and translation of the text.
|
The Subscription Notifications tab defines if LISTSERV will send a notification message when a subscriber joins a list (or more precisely, confirms subscription to the list). If you select to receive notification messages, then you can also specify an address that the notifications will be sent to. If you not specify an address, then the notifications will be sent to the list administrator.
|
•
|
Digest Behavior – Check if you want to give subscribers the option to enable the "Digest" mode for their subscription. With the digest mode enabled, they will no longer receive the postings to the list as individual mails; instead, everything is compiled into a single digest email. If you enable this option, then you must also specify the rules that are used to compile and send out the digest email to all subscribers that have enabled the digest mode.
|
Also, if your list is configured to use a bottom banner, then this banner will, by default, not be included at the bottom of each individual message in the digest (to avoid a repetition of this banner throughout the digest). Instead, the banner will only appear once, after the digest's table of content. To avoid this behavior and include the bottom banner with each individual message in the digest, check the corresponding option.
|
•
|
Subject Tag – These settings define which subject tag will be used for subscribers that have selected to receive mails with the "normal LISTSERV header, with list identification tag in subject" (for example to be able to better filter their incoming mails from this list). Either select to use the list name as the subject tag or provide an individual subject tag. In addition, you have the option to add a sequence number to the subject tag.
|
Subscribers who have chosen other header styles than "normal LISTSERV header, with list identification tag in subject", will receive the normal mail subject without a subject tag. An exception of this rule may be made for subscribers who have selected to use "sendmail-style" mail headers. If you want to
Also add the subject tag for subscribers with this mail header style, check the corresponding option. Note that this will add the subject tag for all subscribers with this header style, i.e. in contrast to the normal LISTSERV header style, where the subscriber has the choice of having the subject tag included.
The Subscription Options (defaults) tab defines the default subscription options that any new subscriber will initially use. Subscribers may later change their own subscription options to different values, but these are the options that they start with, by default.
|
•
|
Default Subscription Style – Defines the default subscription style of new subscribers. Depending on other list settings (if list archives and/or list digests are enabled), the following subscriptions styles may be available:
|
|
•
|
Plain Text Digest – The subscriber will receive a regular digest in plain text format, with a compilation of all postings since the last digest.
|
|
•
|
MIME Digest – The subscriber will receive a regular digest in MIME format, with a compilation of all postings since the last digest.
|
|
•
|
HTML Digest – The subscriber will receive a regular digest in HTML format, with a compilation of all postings since the last digest.
|
|
•
|
Plain Text Index – The subscriber will receive a regular mail in plain text format, with an index of the subject lines of all postings since the last index (but not the actual message content of the postings).
|
|
•
|
HTML Text Index – The subscriber will receive a regular mail in HTML format, with an index of the subject lines of all postings since the last index (but not the actual message content of the postings).
|
|
•
|
Default Posting Privileges – (Only available for lists of the user defined type). Define which posting privileges will be applied to new subscribers (and also non-subscribers) by default:
|
|
•
|
Normal – Normal posting privileges (as defined by the other list settings, especially the "Send" keyword).
|
|
•
|
User may bypass moderation – Posting is allowed without moderation, even on a moderated list (usually not useful on a non-moderated lists).
|
|
•
|
User may not post to list – Postings are not allowed (usually not additionally useful on lists where posting is disallowed anyway).
|
|
•
|
Default Acknowledgement Behavior – (Only available for lists of discussion-types or user defined type.) Define the acknowledgement behavior that will be applied to new subscribers by default. This determines how (and if) LISTSERV will acknowledge postings by a subscriber:
|
|
•
|
Set subscribers to "no mail" by default – Check so that any new subscribers will initially have the "no mail" option enabled, i.e. their subscription is suspended and they will not receive any mailings until they set their subscription to active.
|
|
•
|
Exempt subscribers from renewal and probing by default – Check so that any new subscribers will initially not be included in LISTSERV’s mechanisms to probe and/or renew subscriber addresses (this is used to keep the subscriber base up to date and to weed out "dead" addresses).
|
|
•
|
Hide subscriber addresses from "REVIEW" listing by default – Check so that any new subscribers will initially be "concealed". A concealed subscriber will not appear on the list of list subscribers that can be obtained from LISTSERV using the REVIEW command. There exists a special list setting that defines who is allowed to perform the review command in the first place, i.e. not all users may always execute a review, but even those users who are allowed to do this will not see the concealed subscribers. Note that concealed subscribers of a Hosted LISTSERV List will still be visible from inside of LISTSERV Maestro. Also, some privileged users may be allowed to perform an advanced review command that will list even the concealed subscribers.
|
|
•
|
Other – If selected, please select one of the more advanced header styles from the drop-down menu. These styles are for specific purposes and are usually not used with normal LISTSERV lists: Additional headers in mail body, Short headers, Individual "To:" with full headers or Individual "To:" with short headers.
|
The Change Logs tab defines if and how change log files will be maintained by LISTSERV for this list. Select whether or not a change log will be maintained; and, if so, how often LISTSERV will start a new file.
|
•
|
Suppress "ApprovedBy:" mail header – Check if you do not want the "ApprovedBy:" header to be added to all mailings that are approved by a moderator or list owner (usually only applies to moderated lists).
|
|
•
|
Remote multi-byte characters – Check if you want all multi-byte characters to be removed from postings to this list. Note that this can cause trouble on internationally used lists, where languages other than the English language may be used for postings.
|
|
•
|
If spam checking is enabled at LISTSERV – If the spam-checking feature is enabled at LISTSERV, then specify if the server-wide settings will be respected by this list (and spam checks are performed) or if the server-wide settings will be ignored for this list, meaning that no spam checks are performed for the postings to this list.
|
Posting restrictions set limitations on message attachments, message size, and the number of messages that can be sent to the list. These restrictions affect messages sent to the LISTSERV list when they are submitted as
standard list postings. A standard list posting is a normal email message sent to the list. Standard list messages can be received in a digest form, and can be viewed in the list archives if archives have been created for the list. Standard list postings can be sent (without tracking) to the list address using a normal email client, or they can be sent using LISTSERV Maestro (with or without tracking) by selecting
Send to an Existing LISTSERV List, while defining the recipients of a mailing, and by specifying
Send job as standard list message (or by using a target group based on these selections).
|
•
|
Decide based on attachment type – Any postings that include attachments are inspected. If they contain only attachments of allowed types, they are distributed normally, with all attachments. If they contain (some) attachments of disallowed types, then either those disallowed attachments are removed or the whole posting is rejected (and the poster is notified about this). Check those attachment types (MIME-types) that you want to specify as allowed attachment types. If you need to specify an attachment type as allowed for which there is no checkbox, click on the Edit link and enter the MIME-type (or types) of those additionally allowed attachment types. Then, determine what shall happen if a posting contains any disallowed attachments (remove the disallowed attachments or reject the whole posting).
|
|
•
|
Remove non-MIME attachments – If checked, then attachments of this special type will be removed from the posting before it is distributed.
|
|
•
|
Limit each message to – Specify how "large" any individual message may be at maximum. Either leave the field empty (which means that there is no limit), or specify a positive number as the limit and select what kind of limit this number describes from the drop-down menu.
|
|
•
|
Daily limit for whole list – Specify how many postings may happen on this list on any given day. Leave empty for no limit or specify the maximum number of postings to the list per day, no matter who is the sender.
|
|
•
|
Daily limit for each user – Specify how many postings each user can make on any given day. Leave empty for no limit or specify the maximum number of postings to the list per day for each user (sender). This value must be less than or equal to the Maximum postings allowed per day for whole list (see above).
|
The Posting Confirmation tab is used to avoid spamming of a list and to verify the origin of a list posting. Using the options on this tab, it is possible to enforce that postings to the list are confirmed by the poster before they are actually being distributed to the list. (Note that postings sent with LISTSERV Maestro never require this additional confirmation and are therefore not affected by the settings made here. These settings apply only for manual postings.)
Note About LISTSERV's "OK" mechanism for confirmations: To confirm a posting, LISTSERV sends an email back to the poster requiring the confirmation. The poster must then respond to this confirmation request by either sending an email with "OK" in the body back to LISTSERV, or by clicking on the confirmation link provided in the email (the confirmation link is only provided if the LISTSERV Web Interface is installed on the LISTSERV server).
Large active LISTSERV lists often use "sub-groups" within the list to give subscribers the opportunity to receive only the posts to the list they are most interested in. Sub-groups are created in LISTSERV by defining the topics. Lists can have up to 23 topics defined. List subscribers can elect to receive only those messages that fit into the topic(s) they are interested in. Similarly, messages can be posted only to specific topics. For example, a large list could have the general subject of XYZ Software. Topics could be defined by the types of users of the software, the type software purchased, the tips and tricks for using the software. For more information on Topics, see the LISTSERV List Owner's Manual.
To define a new topic, simply click the New Topic link and fill out the empty topic row that appears. In the list, topics are displayed either in the display mode or in the editable mode. In the display mode, each topic has an associated
Edit link to set it into the editable mode. In the editable mode, the topic name can be changed and the following actions are available:
Reset (forget changes and reset the topic to the state it had when the editable mode was last entered for it),
Up (move the topic up one step in the topics list),
Down (move the topic down one step in the topics list), and
Remove (remove the topic).
When you change the topics settings of a list that already has subscribers, all of the current subscribers' topics selections need to be adjusted. This will occur when the LISTSERV list wizard is completed. The adjustment may take some time and a progress bar will be displayed as the system works.
Tip: Changing topics on a list where subscribers are currently very active needs to be carefully considered so a major disruption does not occur. A better strategy would be to temporarily close the hosted LISTSERV list for maintenance (available on the Summary), adjust the topics, and then re-open the list.
When adding new topics to a list that already has subscribers, an additional option, Existing subscribers will have the new topics selected automatically, will appear. Select this option to add the new topics automatically to all the existing subscriptions. If this option is not selected, then the existing subscribers will not be subscribed to the new topics. Subscribers will be able to change their settings to add or drop the new topics if the dataset and list subscriber pages are enabled. This option applies to all topics that are added on this page during the same List wizard session. To add several topics, some of which the current subscribers are automatically subscribed to and some not, the List wizard has to be engaged twice, once with the option selected (for those topics to be added to all subscriptions) and once with the option not selected (for those topics that will not be added to all subscriptions).
Use the [<- Back] button or any of the links on the top bar to revisit any page in the wizard to make changes.
Before the list can be used, its access level needs to be set using the Public List Access drop-down menu. The list can be set to be accessible to anyone with access to the dataset wishing to subscribe, to be accessible to only list subscribers, or to have no public access. If a list is accessible to everyone, it will appear on the membership area Web page to anyone visiting that page. If the list is accessible only to members, the list will not appear in the membership area to everyone, it will only appear only to those who are subscribed to the list. This allows existing subscribers to manage their own settings, but new subscribers must be added by the Data Administrator or designated LISTSERV Maestro team members. Lists with no public access do not appear in the membership area to anyone.
Click [Finish] to accept the list as it is summarized and return to the Recipient Dataset Details screen.
Unmoderated discussion lists allow for two-way interaction between group members. These open forums facilitate ongoing discussions among members. They are most commonly used for internal communication within an organization or group of people. For instance, many universities use secure "class lists" for interaction between students and teachers or to conduct remote teaching.
Unlike a one-way list, a discussion list not only allows, but encourages interaction between members who are part of the group. Every member can write to the list, and in doing so, all members will receive a copy of the message. In this way, discussions can take place and views can be exchanged among a large number of people.
Unmoderated discussion lists can provide a dynamic platform for disseminating information, sharing opinions, collaborative learning, and much more. However, unmoderated discussion lists have the potential to generate a large amount of mail and take up server resources if archives are kept. Some thought needs to be given to the number and type of subscribers permitted to join this type of LISTSERV list and some monitoring may need to take place in order to keep the level and topics of discussion pertinent to list.
|
•
|
Name – The name of the mailing list. Subscribers will see this name on the web form when they subscribe. Data administrators will see this name in the dataset tree if they create a target group from a classic LISTSERV list (see Section 14 Classic LISTSERV List Target Groups). Users will see the list name if they are allowed to define recipients for a job by sending to an existing LISTSERV list.
|
|
•
|
Internal Description – The internal description is only seen by users working within the Maestro User Interface.
|
|
•
|
Public Description – The public description of the list appears on the subscription web form. If subscribers are permitted to select the lists they want to join and can view and change their subscription settings, having accurate descriptions will help them accomplish those tasks.
|
The Profile Fields screen lists all of the fields in the dataset. Other fields can be added to the list. Any added list fields will
not be shared among the other lists in the dataset. To add a new field, click the
Add Field link. For each new field, enter the following information:
|
•
|
Name – The name of the field as it will be used internally by the system for mail merging and querying. Field names can only use upper and lower case letters A-Z and a-z, the numbers 0 – 9 and the underscore “_”. Spaces and other special characters are not allowed.
|
|
•
|
Display Name – The label that identifies the blank field on the web form. The display name will be seen by anyone accessing the list’s public subscription page on the Web. All alphanumeric characters are permitted, as well as spaces and special characters allowed by the encoding scheme of the dataset.
|
|
•
|
Data Type – Choose the type of data to be entered in the field from the drop-down menu. Three different classifications of data are available (selection lists are not available for hosted LISTSERV lists):
|
|
•
|
Text – Text fields can accept any type of text, including dates in specific formats such as dd/mm/yyy or mm.dd.yyyy.
|
|
•
|
Number – Number fields accept any whole integers.
|
|
•
|
Boolean – Boolean fields are based on two states – true or false.
|
|
•
|
Input Type – Decide whether the data is mandatory for subscribers to enter into the web form or optional. Optional fields can be designated as hidden or read-only if the subscribers are not allowed to enter or change the data in those fields. Boolean fields cannot be optional due to the nature of the data type. Boolean fields can be visible or hidden.
|
After list fields are created, they can be edited, removed, moved up, or moved down by using the corresponding links. Dataset fields cannot be moved or edited from this screen.
The Profile Field Details screen lets you specify which LISTSERV fields are used to assemble the “Full Name” of the list subscriber. Hosted LISTSERV lists require a
Name Field to be defined. If a single name field exists for each subscriber, move that field from the
Profile Fields box to the
Name Fields box. If two (or more) fields are to be used to make up a full name, move each of the fields from the
Profile Fields box to the
Name Fields box. The second field is added after the first field, leaving a space in between. This makes it easy to combine a first name field with a last name field to produce a
Full Name field, for example. Use the
Move Up and
Move Down links to change the order of the name fields. The fields are not required to be mandatory; although, the existence of at least one name field is required, but it does not have to be filled in by every subscriber.
The List Type screen lets you select the type of list you want to create. Select the Unmoderated Discussion List option. This type of list is used for two-way communication. Subscribers are allowed to post to the list directly. List postings are not reviewed by a moderator or editor.
Note: If the list is defined so that everyone can post, then you can use any sender address for the mail job. If the list is defined so that only subscribers and editors can post, the sender address of the mail job must be one of the addresses listed as the
Allowed Sender Addresses on the Allowed Sender Addresses tab of the Posting Restrictions screen.
Important: This is an advanced feature that requires knowledge of and experience with LISTSERV list headers and list header keywords; therefore, it should only be used by experienced LISTSERV list administrators. For most standard list purposes, there is no need to edit the list header keywords on this tab directly, but you can instead use the controls that are provided on the following wizard pages (List Options, Posting Restrictions, and Topics).
This tab shows a tree with all available list header keywords, separated into seven groups (see the list of groups and keywords below). Click on the “+” icon to open a group or the “-” icon to close a group.
|
•
|
A red circle icon and bold black text: This keyword has been configured with a manually supplied value via the Edit link here on the Advanced Configuration tab and was included in the list header with the displayed value (or was omitted from the list header, if applicable). However, when the list header was transferred to LISTSERV, LISTSERV reported an error in the value of this keyword. To see the original LISTSERV error message for this keyword, select the keyword in the tree and click the Edit link.
|
To view the actual textual list header that is the result of the keyword input here in the keyword tree and in the user interface controls on the following wizard pages, and which thus defines this Hosted LISTSERV List, click on the
View Configuration as Plaintext link at the bottom of the tree.
To edit the value of a given keyword, select the keyword in the tree and click on the Edit link at the top right corner of the tree. Depending on the selected keyword, there are three possible edit situations:
|
•
|
Editing via wizard controls only – For keywords of this type, all possible values that the keywords can have can be configured via the user interface controls that the wizard offers on the following wizard pages. Therefore, there is no need to be able to input a keyword value manually. If you click the Edit link for such a keyword, then a message box will inform you that instead of editing the keyword value manually, please use the provided user interface controls on the specified wizard page.
|
|
•
|
Editing via wizard controls or manual input – For keywords of this type, user interface controls exist on the following wizard pages. However, those controls do not allow you to input the full range of possible values for this keyword (but only the most common values). You therefore have the choice of either using the user interface controls in the wizard or to supply a specific value for the keyword manually. If you choose to supply a value manually here in the keywords tree, then the corresponding user interface control on one of the following wizard pages will no longer be available. Instead a message will be displayed that informs you, that a custom value has been supplied for the corresponding keyword in the keywords tree. To make the user interface controls available again, go back to the keywords tree and remove the manually supplied value. If you click the Edit link for such a keyword, an input dialog will allow you to choose between using the user interface control in the wizard (this also includes an information about where to find the corresponding user interface control) or to supply your own customized value.
|
|
•
|
Editing via manual input only – For keywords of this type, there exists no dedicated user interface control on any of the following wizard pages. Therefore, the only way of changing these keywords is by supplying a customized value for the keyword manually, here in the keywords tree. Keywords of this type are keywords for very specific and advanced LISTSERV list features, which are seldom used. If you click the Edit link for such a keyword, an input dialog will allow you to supply the value for the keyword.
|
The List Options screen is divided into several tabs – General Options, Reply Behavior, Bounce Handling, List Archive, and several with advanced features – that can be accessed by clicking the drop-down menu. The List Archive is optional and will not appear unless archives have been set up in the HUB. For more information on archives, see the LISTSERV Maestro Administrator’s Manual.
On the General tab, all list types require that a list administrator called a “list owner” be set. Enter at least one email address that will become the administrator (owner) of the LISTSERV list. Click the
Edit link to add a new address or edit the existing ones in the pop-up dialog box. Entries must be valid Internet email addresses.
Click [OK] to accept the administrator address and return to the General Options tab.
|
•
|
Use mail merging – Select this option to allow the system to insert subscriber specific content into the message based on the data associated with each subscriber. Subscribers will each receive a customized copy of the message with their own email address and name on the To: line. Other data fields can be merged into the message as well to further personalize the email.
|
|
•
|
Sender – Replies are directed to the sender of the email message. The sender address is the address based on the “From:” field of the posting.
|
|
•
|
List – Replies are directed back to the list. If subscribers are not well informed that, when they hit the “reply” key in their mail client, their message goes to everyone, then they might post private or off topic messages back to the list by mistake.
|
|
•
|
Separate address – Replies are directed to the address entered in this text box.
|
Then, using the Apply the Settings drop-down menu, select when the settings are to be applied.
The Bounce Handling tab determines what happens to the subscriber addresses when messages sent to them bounce (are rejected from the email server and returned to the sender undeliverable). LISTSERV lists can handle bounces by removing the bouncing addresses automatically or by collecting bounces for manual action. Manually processed bounces are sent to the list administrator’s address.
|
•
|
Remove immediately after first bounce – The address that bounced the mail will be removed from the list after the first bounce. Subscribers will have to be re-added to the list to receive any additional mail.
|
|
•
|
Remove subscribers after X bounces within X days – Enter the number of bounces that are permitted in the first text box, and the number of days they can occur over in the second box. This setting is more flexible than the first setting. For example, if the reason for the bounce is temporary, such as a full mailbox, then new messages can still be sent. Subscribers will not be removed from the list unless the messages continue to bounce over the given time period, or bounce the number of times specified. Care must be taken to choose realistic numbers, in accordance with the expected list traffic
|
|
•
|
Collect bounces for manual processing – Bounce addresses will be sent to a specific address where they can be reviewed and action can be taken manually. Subscriber addresses that generate bounces will not be removed from the list automatically, regardless of the number of bounces.
|
If you have selected one of the automatic bounce handling options above, then you can also specify whether or not this should actually result in an automatic removal of addresses from the list (which is the default) or if the bounce analysis should only be forwarded (via e-mail).
If you select automatic removal, then a notification about all removed addresses will be sent to the specified group of people, and you also have the choice if you also want to be notified about any temporary bounces and bounces for addresses that are not actually subscribed to the list.
If you select no automatic removal, then you need to specify the group of people to which the bounce analysis will be forwarded to by clicking the
Add link. To change this information, click the
Edit link.
Furthermore, you can define the Passive Probing behavior of the list.
To again hide the advanced bounce handling options, click on the Hide advanced bounce handling options link. This, however, is only possible if the advanced options are set to their default values, i.e. if you have non-default advanced options, then you can also not hide the advanced options.
The List Archives tab defines whether or not postings to the list will be archived. If an archive is to be kept, then define how often a new archive file is to be created by the system and who is allowed to access and view the archive.
For the latter two options, there are two modes of specifying the necessary details: In Standard Mode, only the most common settings are available. In
Advanced Mode, all possible options are available. Toggle between the two modes with the
Switch to Standard Mode and
Switch to Advanced Mode links at the bottom of the tab.
Note: This tab is only available if the option of creating LISTSERV list archives has been enabled for your LISTSERV server by the LISTSERV Maestro administrator (this is a setting in the Administration Hub).
|
•
|
Use texts from custom template – The text for the administrative messages are taken from the specified custom template. A custom template can be used for customization and translation of the text.
|
The Subscription Notifications tab defines if LISTSERV will send a notification message when a subscriber joins a list (or more precisely, confirms subscription to the list). If you select to receive notification messages, then you can also specify an address that the notifications will be sent to. If you not specify an address, then the notifications will be sent to the list administrator.
|
•
|
Digest Behavior – Check if you want to give subscribers the option to enable the "Digest" mode for their subscription. With the digest mode enabled, they will no longer receive the postings to the list as individual mails; instead, everything is compiled into a single digest email. If you enable this option, then you must also specify the rules that are used to compile and send out the digest email to all subscribers that have enabled the digest mode.
|
Also, if your list is configured to use a bottom banner, then this banner will, by default, not be included at the bottom of each individual message in the digest (to avoid a repetition of this banner throughout the digest). Instead, the banner will only appear once, after the digest's table of content. To avoid this behavior and include the bottom banner with each individual message in the digest, check the corresponding option.
|
•
|
Subject Tag – These settings define which subject tag will be used for subscribers that have selected to receive mails with the "normal LISTSERV header, with list identification tag in subject" (for example to be able to better filter their incoming mails from this list). Either select to use the list name as the subject tag or provide an individual subject tag. In addition, you have the option to add a sequence number to the subject tag.
|
Subscribers who have chosen other header styles than "normal LISTSERV header, with list identification tag in subject", will receive the normal mail subject without a subject tag. An exception of this rule may be made for subscribers who have selected to use "sendmail-style" mail headers. If you want to
Also add the subject tag for subscribers with this mail header style, check the corresponding option. Note that this will add the subject tag for all subscribers with this header style, i.e. in contrast to the normal LISTSERV header style, where the subscriber has the choice of having the subject tag included.
The Subscription Options (defaults) tab defines the default subscription options that any new subscriber will initially use. Subscribers may later change their own subscription options to different values, but these are the options that they start with, by default.
|
•
|
Default Subscription Style – Defines the default subscription style of new subscribers. Depending on other list settings (if list archives and/or list digests are enabled), the following subscriptions styles may be available:
|
|
•
|
Plain Text Digest – The subscriber will receive a regular digest in plain text format, with a compilation of all postings since the last digest.
|
|
•
|
MIME Digest – The subscriber will receive a regular digest in MIME format, with a compilation of all postings since the last digest.
|
|
•
|
HTML Digest – The subscriber will receive a regular digest in HTML format, with a compilation of all postings since the last digest.
|
|
•
|
Plain Text Index – The subscriber will receive a regular mail in plain text format, with an index of the subject lines of all postings since the last index (but not the actual message content of the postings).
|
|
•
|
HTML Text Index – The subscriber will receive a regular mail in HTML format, with an index of the subject lines of all postings since the last index (but not the actual message content of the postings).
|
|
•
|
Default Posting Privileges – (Only available for lists of the user defined type). Define which posting privileges will be applied to new subscribers (and also non-subscribers) by default:
|
|
•
|
Normal – Normal posting privileges (as defined by the other list settings, especially the "Send" keyword).
|
|
•
|
User may bypass moderation – Posting is allowed without moderation, even on a moderated list (usually not useful on a non-moderated lists).
|
|
•
|
User may not post to list – Postings are not allowed (usually not additionally useful on lists where posting is disallowed anyway).
|
|
•
|
Default Acknowledgement Behavior – (Only available for lists of discussion-types or user defined type.) Define the acknowledgement behavior that will be applied to new subscribers by default. This determines how (and if) LISTSERV will acknowledge postings by a subscriber:
|
|
•
|
Set subscribers to "no mail" by default – Check so that any new subscribers will initially have the "no mail" option enabled, i.e. their subscription is suspended and they will not receive any mailings until they set their subscription to active.
|
|
•
|
Exempt subscribers from renewal and probing by default – Check so that any new subscribers will initially not be included in LISTSERV’s mechanisms to probe and/or renew subscriber addresses (this is used to keep the subscriber base up to date and to weed out "dead" addresses).
|
|
•
|
Hide subscriber addresses from "REVIEW" listing by default – Check so that any new subscribers will initially be "concealed". A concealed subscriber will not appear on the list of list subscribers that can be obtained from LISTSERV using the REVIEW command. There exists a special list setting that defines who is allowed to perform the review command in the first place, i.e. not all users may always execute a review, but even those users who are allowed to do this will not see the concealed subscribers. Note that concealed subscribers of a Hosted LISTSERV List will still be visible from inside of LISTSERV Maestro. Also, some privileged users may be allowed to perform an advanced review command that will list even the concealed subscribers.
|
|
•
|
Other – If selected, please select one of the more advanced header styles from the drop-down menu. These styles are for specific purposes and are usually not used with normal LISTSERV lists: Additional headers in mail body, Short headers, Individual "To:" with full headers or Individual "To:" with short headers.
|
The Change Logs tab defines if and how change log files will be maintained by LISTSERV for this list. Select whether or not a change log will be maintained; and, if so, how often LISTSERV will start a new file.
|
•
|
Suppress "ApprovedBy:" mail header – Check if you do not want the "ApprovedBy:" header to be added to all mailings that are approved by a moderator or list owner (usually only applies to moderated lists).
|
|
•
|
Remote multi-byte characters – Check if you want all multi-byte characters to be removed from postings to this list. Note that this can cause trouble on internationally used lists, where languages other than the English language may be used for postings.
|
|
•
|
If spam checking is enabled at LISTSERV – If the spam-checking feature is enabled at LISTSERV, then specify if the server-wide settings will be respected by this list (and spam checks are performed) or if the server-wide settings will be ignored for this list, meaning that no spam checks are performed for the postings to this list.
|
Posting restrictions set limitations on message attachments, message size, and the number of messages that can be sent to the list. These restrictions affect messages sent to the LISTSERV list when they are submitted as
standard list postings. A standard list posting is a normal email message sent to the list. Standard list messages can be received in a digest form, and can be viewed in the list archives if archives have been created for the list. Standard list postings can be sent (without tracking) to the list address using a normal email client, or they can be sent using LISTSERV Maestro (with or without tracking) by selecting
Send to an Existing LISTSERV List, while defining the recipients of a mailing, and by specifying
Send job as standard list message (or by using a target group based on these selections).
|
•
|
Decide based on attachment type – Any postings that include attachments are inspected. If they contain only attachments of allowed types, they are distributed normally, with all attachments. If they contain (some) attachments of disallowed types, then either those disallowed attachments are removed or the whole posting is rejected (and the poster is notified about this). Check those attachment types (MIME-types) that you want to specify as allowed attachment types. If you need to specify an attachment type as allowed for which there is no checkbox, click on the Edit link and enter the MIME-type (or types) of those additionally allowed attachment types. Then, determine what shall happen if a posting contains any disallowed attachments (remove the disallowed attachments or reject the whole posting).
|
|
•
|
Remove non-MIME attachments – If checked, then attachments of this special type will be removed from the posting before it is distributed.
|
|
•
|
Limit each message to – Specify how "large" any individual message may be at maximum. Either leave the field empty (which means that there is no limit), or specify a positive number as the limit and select what kind of limit this number describes from the drop-down menu.
|
|
•
|
Daily limit for whole list – Specify how many postings may happen on this list on any given day. Leave empty for no limit or specify the maximum number of postings to the list per day, no matter who is the sender.
|
|
•
|
Daily limit for each user – Specify how many postings each user can make on any given day. Leave empty for no limit or specify the maximum number of postings to the list per day for each user (sender). This value must be less than or equal to the Maximum postings allowed per day for whole list (see above).
|
Note: For an unmoderated-discussion-type list, at first glance it seems illogical to have a List Moderation tab at all (after all, the list is unmoderated). However, there are actually some cases in which moderation may even be required on an unmoderated list. These cases are however advanced cases, which is why this tab appears in the "Advanced" group for unmoderated-discussion-type lists. For such lists, moderation is generally not used, however, individual subscribers (for example known "troublemakers") can be marked for moderation anyway, even when all other subscribers can post without moderation. Therefore, in some cases the moderation settings are needed even for unmoderated lists.
|
•
|
Moderator Addresses – Specify the addresses to which list postings that require moderation are forwarded. Only after a moderator has reviewed and confirmed a list posting will it actually be distributed to the list. Click the Edit link to specify the addresses.
|
|
•
|
Moderation Type – If there are several moderator addresses, then LISTSERV can either send a posting that requires moderation to only one of the moderators (LISTSERV selects which one) who must then approve the posting, or LISTSERV can send a copy of the posting to each moderator, and an approval from any of them will allow the posting to be distributed. Choose which type you want to use for this list.
|
Note: This choice is disabled unless you have at least two moderator addresses specified.
|
•
|
A simple "OK" is enough – The moderator can approve postings by sending back an email to LISTSERV with "OK" as the only content, or the moderator can approve the a posting via the LISTSERV Web Interface (if the web interface is installed).
|
|
•
|
Require the moderator to forward the full message – The moderate has to forward the whole message to the list in order to approve it (i.e. essential the moderator re-posts the same message, which will then be distributed directly). Note that with this mechanism an approval via the LISTSERV Web Interface is not possible.
|
The Posting Confirmation tab is used to avoid spamming of a list and to verify the origin of a list posting. Using the options on this tab, it is possible to enforce that postings to the list are confirmed by the poster before they are actually being distributed to the list. (Note that postings sent with LISTSERV Maestro never require this additional confirmation and are therefore not affected by the settings made here. These settings apply only for manual postings.)
Note About LISTSERV's "OK" mechanism for confirmations: To confirm a posting, LISTSERV sends an email back to the poster requiring the confirmation. The poster must then respond to this confirmation request by either sending an email with "OK" in the body back to LISTSERV, or by clicking on the confirmation link provided in the email (the confirmation link is only provided if the LISTSERV Web Interface is installed on the LISTSERV server).
Large active LISTSERV lists often use "sub-groups" within the list to give subscribers the opportunity to receive only the posts to the list they are most interested in reading. Sub-groups are created by defining topics. Lists can have up to 23 topics defined. List subscribers can elect to receive only those messages that fit into the topic(s) they are interested in reading. Similarly, messages can be posted only to specific topics. For example, a large list could have the general subject of XYZ Software. Topics could be defined by the types of users of the software, the type software purchased, or tips and tricks for using the software. For more information on Topics, see the LISTSERV List Owner's Manual.
To define a new topic, simply click the New Topic link and fill out the empty topic row that appears. In the list, topics are displayed either in the display mode or in the editable mode. In the display mode, each topic has an associated
Edit link to set it into the editable mode. In the editable mode, the topic name can be changed and the following actions are available:
Reset (forget changes and reset the topic to the state it had when the editable mode was last entered for it),
Up (move the topic up one step in the topics list),
Down (move the topic down one step in the topics list), and
Remove (remove the topic).
When the topic settings of a populated list change, then all current subscribers' topic selections will need to be adjusted. This will occur when the LISTSERV list wizard is completed. The adjustment may take some time and a progress bar will be displayed as the system works.
Tip: Changing topics on a list where subscribers are currently very active needs to be carefully considered so a disruption does not occur. A better strategy would be to temporarily close the hosted LISTSERV list for maintenance (available on the Summary screen), adjust the topics, and then re-open the list.
When adding new topics to a list that already has subscribers, an additional option, Existing subscribers will have the new topics selected automatically, will appear. Select this option to automatically add the new topics to all the existing subscriptions. If this option is not selected, then the existing subscribers will not be subscribed to the new topics. Subscribers will be able to change their settings to add or drop the new topics if the dataset and list subscriber pages are enabled. This option applies to all topics that are added on this page during the same List wizard session. To add several topics, some of which the current subscribers are automatically subscribed to and some not, the List wizard has to be engaged twice, once with the option selected (for those topics to be added to all subscriptions) and once with the option not selected (for those topics that will not be added to all subscriptions).
The Summary screen displays all the selections made for the LISTSERV list during its creation. Use the
[<- Back] button or any of the links in the top bar to revisit any page in the wizard to make changes.
Before the list can be used, its access level needs to be set using the Public List Access drop-down menu. The list can be set to be accessible to anyone with access to the dataset wishing to subscribe, to be accessible to only list subscribers, or to have no public access. If a list is accessible to everyone, it will appear on the membership area Web page to anyone visiting that page. If the list is accessible only to members, the list will not appear in the membership area to everyone, it will only appear only to those who are subscribed to the list. This allows existing subscribers to manage their own settings, but new subscribers must be added by the Data Administrator or designated LISTSERV Maestro team members. Lists with no public access do not appear in the membership area to anyone.
Click [Finish] to accept the list as it is summarized and return to the Recipient Dataset Details screen.
Similar to the unmoderated discussion list, a moderated list allows for the exchange of postings between subscribers, but a moderator receives all incoming messages. The moderator then decides to accept the message, and post it to the list, or reject the message, and not post it to the list. Lists can be set up with more than one moderator.
Moderators receive and review postings sent to the list. They then decide to approve the messages, sending them through to the list, or reject them, preventing them from being sent to the list. If there are multiple moderators, the list postings are sent to all moderators. The first moderator to take action, approving or rejecting the message will determine how the message is handled in regards to the list.
The editors are those addresses that are allowed to send messages to the list without requiring moderation. If no moderator addresses are defined, then the first listed editor becomes the sole editor. The list administrator address is always allowed to send mail to the list without moderation, and if no moderator or editor addresses are added, then the first list administrator automatically becomes the moderator so that all messages sent to the list will go to that address for approval or rejection.
|
•
|
Name – The name of the mailing list. Subscribers will see this name of the list on the web form when they subscribe. Data administrators will see the list name in the dataset tree and if they create a target group from a classic LISTSERV list (see Section 14 Classic LISTSERV List Target Groups for details). LISTSERV Maestro users will see the list name if they are allowed to define recipients for a job using by sending to an existing LISTSERV list.
|
|
•
|
Internal Description – The internal description is only seen by users working within the Maestro User Interface.
|
|
•
|
Public Description – The public description of the list appears on the subscription web form. If subscribers are permitted to select the lists they want to join and can view and change their subscription settings, then having accurate descriptions will help them accomplish those tasks.
|
The Profile Fields screen lists all of the fields in the dataset. Other fields can be added to the list. Any added list fields will
not be shared with the other lists in the dataset. To add a new field, click the
Add Field link.
|
•
|
Name – The name of the field as it will be used internally by the system for mail merging and querying. Field names can only use upper and lower case letters “A-Z” and “a-z”, the numbers “0 – 9” and the underscore “_”. Spaces and other special characters are not allowed.
|
|
•
|
Display Name – The label that identifies the field on the web form. The display name will be seen by anyone accessing the list’s public subscription page on the Web. All alphanumeric characters are permitted, as well as spaces and special characters allowed by the dataset encoding scheme.
|
|
•
|
Data Type – Choose the type of data to be entered in the field from the drop-down menu. Three different classifications of data are available (selection lists are not available for hosted LISTSERV lists):
|
|
•
|
Text – Text fields can accept any type of text, including dates in specific formats such as dd/mm/yyy or mm.dd.yyyy.
|
|
•
|
Number – Number fields accept any whole integers.
|
|
•
|
Boolean – Boolean fields are based on two states – true or false.
|
|
•
|
Input Type – Decide whether the data is mandatory for subscribers to enter into the web form or optional. Optional fields can be designated as hidden or read-only if the subscribers are not allowed to enter or change the data in those fields. Boolean fields cannot be optional due to the nature of the data type. Boolean fields can be visible or hidden.
|
After list fields are created, they can be edited, removed, moved up, or moved down by using the corresponding links on the right side of the table. Fields belonging to the dataset cannot be moved or edited from this screen.
Hosted LISTSERV lists require a Name Field to be defined. If a single name field exists for each subscriber, move that field from the
Profile Fields box to the
Name Fields box. If two (or more) fields are to be used to make up a full name, move each of the fields from the
Profile Fields box to the
Name Fields box. The second field is added after the first field, leaving a space in between. This makes it easy to combine a first name field with a last name field to produce a
Full Name field, for example. Use the
Move Up and
Move Down links to change the order of the name fields. The fields are not required to be mandatory; although, the existence of at least one name field is required, but it does not have to be filled in by every subscriber.
The List Type screen lets you select the type of list you want to create. Select the Moderated Discussion List option. This type of list is used for two-way communication. Subscribers’ posts are sent to a list moderator who can approve the message and have it distributed to the list members, or reject the message so it is not sent on to the list members.
Note: For this list type, the sender address must be one of the addresses listed as the
Moderator Addresses or the
Unmoderated Senders on the List Moderation tab of the Posting Restrictions screen.
Important: This is an advanced feature that requires knowledge of and experience with LISTSERV list headers and list header keywords; therefore, it should only be used by experienced LISTSERV list administrators. For most standard list purposes, there is no need to edit the list header keywords on this tab directly, but you can instead use the controls that are provided on the following wizard pages (List Options, Posting Restrictions, and Topics).
This tab shows a tree with all available list header keywords, separated into seven groups (see the list of groups and keywords below). Click on the “+” icon to open a group or the “-” icon to close a group.
|
•
|
A red circle icon and bold black text: This keyword has been configured with a manually supplied value via the Edit link here on the Advanced Configuration tab and was included in the list header with the displayed value (or was omitted from the list header, if applicable). However, when the list header was transferred to LISTSERV, LISTSERV reported an error in the value of this keyword. To see the original LISTSERV error message for this keyword, select the keyword in the tree and click the Edit link.
|
To view the actual textual list header that is the result of the keyword input here in the keyword tree and in the user interface controls on the following wizard pages, and which thus defines this Hosted LISTSERV List, click on the
View Configuration as Plaintext link at the bottom of the tree.
To edit the value of a given keyword, select the keyword in the tree and click on the Edit link at the top right corner of the tree. Depending on the selected keyword, there are three possible edit situations:
|
•
|
Editing via wizard controls only – For keywords of this type, all possible values that the keywords can have can be configured via the user interface controls that the wizard offers on the following wizard pages. Therefore, there is no need to be able to input a keyword value manually. If you click the Edit link for such a keyword, then a message box will inform you that instead of editing the keyword value manually, please use the provided user interface controls on the specified wizard page.
|
|
•
|
Editing via wizard controls or manual input – For keywords of this type, user interface controls exist on the following wizard pages. However, those controls do not allow you to input the full range of possible values for this keyword (but only the most common values). You therefore have the choice of either using the user interface controls in the wizard or to supply a specific value for the keyword manually. If you choose to supply a value manually here in the keywords tree, then the corresponding user interface control on one of the following wizard pages will no longer be available. Instead a message will be displayed that informs you, that a custom value has been supplied for the corresponding keyword in the keywords tree. To make the user interface controls available again, go back to the keywords tree and remove the manually supplied value. If you click the Edit link for such a keyword, an input dialog will allow you to choose between using the user interface control in the wizard (this also includes an information about where to find the corresponding user interface control) or to supply your own customized value.
|
|
•
|
Editing via manual input only – For keywords of this type, there exists no dedicated user interface control on any of the following wizard pages. Therefore, the only way of changing these keywords is by supplying a customized value for the keyword manually, here in the keywords tree. Keywords of this type are keywords for very specific and advanced LISTSERV list features, which are seldom used. If you click the Edit link for such a keyword, an input dialog will allow you to supply the value for the keyword.
|
The List Options screen is divided into several tabs – General Options, Reply Behavior, Bounce Handling, List Archive, and several with advanced features – that can be accessed by clicking the drop-down menu. The List Archive is optional and will not appear unless archives have been set up in the HUB. For more information on archives, see the LISTSERV Maestro Administrator’s Manual.
On the General tab, all list types require that a list administrator called a “list owner” be set. Enter at least one email address that will become the administrator (owner) of the LISTSERV list. Click the
Edit link to add a new address or edit the existing ones in the pop-up dialog box. Entries must be valid Internet email addresses.
Click [OK] to accept the administrator address and return to the General Options tab.
|
•
|
Mail Merging – Select the Use mail merging option to allow the system to insert subscriber specific content into the message based on the data associated with each subscriber. Subscribers will each receive a customized copy of the message with their own email address and name on the To: line. Other data fields can be merged into the message as well to further personalize the email.
|
|
•
|
Sender – Replies are directed to the sender of the email message. The sender address is the address based on the “From:” field of the posting.
|
|
•
|
List – Replies are directed back to the list. If subscribers are not well informed that, when they hit the “reply” key in their mail client, their message goes to everyone, then they might post private or off topic messages back to the list by mistake.
|
|
•
|
Separate address – Replies are directed to the address entered in this text box.
|
Then, using the Apply the Settings drop-down menu, select when the settings are to be applied.
The Bounce Handling tab determines what happens to the subscriber addresses when messages sent to them bounce (are rejected from the email server and returned to the sender undeliverable). LISTSERV lists can handle bounces by removing the bouncing addresses automatically or by collecting bounces for manual action. Manually processed bounces are sent to the list administrator’s address. Select one of the three available the bounce processing options:
|
•
|
Remove immediately after first bounce – The address that bounced the mail will be removed from the list after the first bounce. Subscribers will have to be re-added to the list to receive any additional mail.
|
|
•
|
Remove subscribers after X bounces within X days – Enter the number of bounces that are permitted in the first text box, and the number of days they can occur over in the second box. This setting is more flexible than the first setting. For example, if the reason for the bounce is temporary, such as a full mailbox, then new messages can still be sent. Subscribers will not be removed from the list unless the messages continue to bounce over the given time period, or bounce the number of times specified. Care must be taken to choose realistic numbers, in accordance with the expected list traffic
|
|
•
|
Collect bounces for manual processing – Bounce addresses will be sent to a specific address where they can be reviewed and action can be taken manually. Subscriber addresses that generate bounces will not be removed from the list automatically, regardless of the number of bounces.
|
If you have selected one of the automatic bounce handling options above, then you can also specify whether or not this should actually result in an automatic removal of addresses from the list (which is the default) or if the bounce analysis should only be forwarded (via e-mail).
If you select automatic removal, then a notification about all removed addresses will be sent to the specified group of people, and you also have the choice if you also want to be notified about any temporary bounces and bounces for addresses that are not actually subscribed to the list.
If you select no automatic removal, then you need to specify the group of people to which the bounce analysis will be forwarded to by clicking the
Add link. To change this information, click the
Edit link.
Furthermore, you can define the Passive Probing behavior of the list.
To again hide the advanced bounce handling options, click on the Hide advanced bounce handling options link. This, however, is only possible if the advanced options are set to their default values, i.e. if you have non-default advanced options, then you can also not hide the advanced options.
The List Archives tab defines whether or not postings to the list will be archived. If an archive is to be kept, then define how often a new archive file is to be created by the system and who is allowed to access and view the archive.
For the latter two options, there are two modes of specifying the necessary details: In Standard Mode, only the most common settings are available. In
Advanced Mode, all possible options are available. Toggle between the two modes with the
Switch to Standard Mode and
Switch to Advanced Mode links at the bottom of the tab.
Note: This tab is only available if the option of creating LISTSERV list archives has been enabled for your LISTSERV server by the LISTSERV Maestro administrator (this is a setting in the Administration Hub).
|
•
|
Use texts from custom template – The text for the administrative messages are taken from the specified custom template. A custom template can be used for customization and translation of the text.
|
The Subscription Notifications tab defines if LISTSERV will send a notification message when a subscriber joins a list (or more precisely, confirms subscription to the list). If you select to receive notification messages, then you can also specify an address that the notifications will be sent to. If you not specify an address, then the notifications will be sent to the list administrator.
|
•
|
Digest Behavior – Check if you want to give subscribers the option to enable the "Digest" mode for their subscription. With the digest mode enabled, they will no longer receive the postings to the list as individual mails; instead, everything is compiled into a single digest email. If you enable this option, then you must also specify the rules that are used to compile and send out the digest email to all subscribers that have enabled the digest mode.
|
Also, if your list is configured to use a bottom banner, then this banner will, by default, not be included at the bottom of each individual message in the digest (to avoid a repetition of this banner throughout the digest). Instead, the banner will only appear once, after the digest's table of content. To avoid this behavior and include the bottom banner with each individual message in the digest, check the corresponding option.
|
•
|
Subject Tag – These settings define which subject tag will be used for subscribers that have selected to receive mails with the "normal LISTSERV header, with list identification tag in subject" (for example to be able to better filter their incoming mails from this list). Either select to use the list name as the subject tag or provide an individual subject tag. In addition, you have the option to add a sequence number to the subject tag.
|
Subscribers who have chosen other header styles than "normal LISTSERV header, with list identification tag in subject", will receive the normal mail subject without a subject tag. An exception of this rule may be made for subscribers who have selected to use "sendmail-style" mail headers. If you want to
Also add the subject tag for subscribers with this mail header style, check the corresponding option. Note that this will add the subject tag for all subscribers with this header style, i.e. in contrast to the normal LISTSERV header style, where the subscriber has the choice of having the subject tag included.
The Subscription Options (defaults) tab defines the default subscription options that any new subscriber will initially use. Subscribers may later change their own subscription options to different values, but these are the options that they start with, by default.
|
•
|
Default Subscription Style – Defines the default subscription style of new subscribers. Depending on other list settings (if list archives and/or list digests are enabled), the following subscriptions styles may be available:
|
|
•
|
Plain Text Digest – The subscriber will receive a regular digest in plain text format, with a compilation of all postings since the last digest.
|
|
•
|
MIME Digest – The subscriber will receive a regular digest in MIME format, with a compilation of all postings since the last digest.
|
|
•
|
HTML Digest – The subscriber will receive a regular digest in HTML format, with a compilation of all postings since the last digest.
|
|
•
|
Plain Text Index – The subscriber will receive a regular mail in plain text format, with an index of the subject lines of all postings since the last index (but not the actual message content of the postings).
|
|
•
|
HTML Text Index – The subscriber will receive a regular mail in HTML format, with an index of the subject lines of all postings since the last index (but not the actual message content of the postings).
|
|
•
|
Default Posting Privileges – (Only available for lists of the user defined type). Define which posting privileges will be applied to new subscribers (and also non-subscribers) by default:
|
|
•
|
Normal – Normal posting privileges (as defined by the other list settings, especially the "Send" keyword).
|
|
•
|
User may bypass moderation – Posting is allowed without moderation, even on a moderated list (usually not useful on a non-moderated lists).
|
|
•
|
User may not post to list – Postings are not allowed (usually not additionally useful on lists where posting is disallowed anyway).
|
|
•
|
Default Acknowledgement Behavior – (Only available for lists of discussion-types or user defined type.) Define the acknowledgement behavior that will be applied to new subscribers by default. This determines how (and if) LISTSERV will acknowledge postings by a subscriber:
|
|
•
|
Set subscribers to "no mail" by default – Check so that any new subscribers will initially have the "no mail" option enabled, i.e. their subscription is suspended and they will not receive any mailings until they set their subscription to active.
|
|
•
|
Exempt subscribers from renewal and probing by default – Check so that any new subscribers will initially not be included in LISTSERV’s mechanisms to probe and/or renew subscriber addresses (this is used to keep the subscriber base up to date and to weed out "dead" addresses).
|
|
•
|
Hide subscriber addresses from "REVIEW" listing by default – Check so that any new subscribers will initially be "concealed". A concealed subscriber will not appear on the list of list subscribers that can be obtained from LISTSERV using the REVIEW command. There exists a special list setting that defines who is allowed to perform the review command in the first place, i.e. not all users may always execute a review, but even those users who are allowed to do this will not see the concealed subscribers. Note that concealed subscribers of a Hosted LISTSERV List will still be visible from inside of LISTSERV Maestro. Also, some privileged users may be allowed to perform an advanced review command that will list even the concealed subscribers.
|
|
•
|
Other – If selected, please select one of the more advanced header styles from the drop-down menu. These styles are for specific purposes and are usually not used with normal LISTSERV lists: Additional headers in mail body, Short headers, Individual "To:" with full headers or Individual "To:" with short headers.
|
The Change Logs tab defines if and how change log files will be maintained by LISTSERV for this list. Select whether or not a change log will be maintained; and, if so, how often LISTSERV will start a new file.
|
•
|
Suppress "ApprovedBy:" mail header – Check if you do not want the "ApprovedBy:" header to be added to all mailings that are approved by a moderator or list owner (usually only applies to moderated lists).
|
|
•
|
Remote multi-byte characters – Check if you want all multi-byte characters to be removed from postings to this list. Note that this can cause trouble on internationally used lists, where languages other than the English language may be used for postings.
|
|
•
|
If spam checking is enabled at LISTSERV – If the spam-checking feature is enabled at LISTSERV, then specify if the server-wide settings will be respected by this list (and spam checks are performed) or if the server-wide settings will be ignored for this list, meaning that no spam checks are performed for the postings to this list.
|
Posting restrictions set limitations on message attachments, message size, and the number of messages that can be sent to the list. These restrictions affect messages sent to the LISTSERV list when they are submitted as
standard list postings. A standard list posting is a normal email message sent to the list. Standard list messages can be received in a digest form, and can be viewed in the list archives if archives have been created for the list. Standard list postings can be sent (without tracking) to the list address using a normal email client, or they can be sent using LISTSERV Maestro (with or without tracking) by selecting
Send to an Existing LISTSERV List, while defining the recipients of a mailing, and by specifying
Send job as standard list message (or by using a target group based on these selections).
|
•
|
Decide based on attachment type – Any postings that include attachments are inspected. If they contain only attachments of allowed types, they are distributed normally, with all attachments. If they contain (some) attachments of disallowed types, then either those disallowed attachments are removed or the whole posting is rejected (and the poster is notified about this). Check those attachment types (MIME-types) that you want to specify as allowed attachment types. If you need to specify an attachment type as allowed for which there is no checkbox, click on the Edit link and enter the MIME-type (or types) of those additionally allowed attachment types. Then, determine what shall happen if a posting contains any disallowed attachments (remove the disallowed attachments or reject the whole posting).
|
|
•
|
Remove non-MIME attachments – If checked, then attachments of this special type will be removed from the posting before it is distributed.
|
|
•
|
Limit each message to – Specify how "large" any individual message may be at maximum. Either leave the field empty (which means that there is no limit), or specify a positive number as the limit and select what kind of limit this number describes from the drop-down menu.
|
|
•
|
Daily limit for whole list – Specify how many postings may happen on this list on any given day. Leave empty for no limit or specify the maximum number of postings to the list per day, no matter who is the sender.
|
|
•
|
Daily limit for each user – Specify how many postings each user can make on any given day. Leave empty for no limit or specify the maximum number of postings to the list per day for each user (sender). This value must be less than or equal to the Maximum postings allowed per day for whole list (see above).
|
|
•
|
Moderator Addresses – Specify the addresses to which list postings that require moderation are forwarded. Only after a moderator has reviewed and confirmed a list posting will it actually be distributed to the list. Click the Edit link to specify the addresses.
|
|
•
|
Moderation Type – If there are several moderator addresses, then LISTSERV can either send a posting that requires moderation to only one of the moderators (LISTSERV selects which one) who must then approve the posting, or LISTSERV can send a copy of the posting to each moderator, and an approval from any of them will allow the posting to be distributed. Choose which type you want to use for this list.
|
Note: This choice is disabled unless you have at least two moderator addresses specified.
Click on the Show advanced distribution handling option link for more options.
|
•
|
A simple "OK" is enough – The moderator can approve postings by sending back an email to LISTSERV with "OK" as the only content, or the moderator can approve the a posting via the LISTSERV Web Interface (if the web interface is installed).
|
|
•
|
Require the moderator to forward the full message – The moderate has to forward the whole message to the list in order to approve it (i.e. essential the moderator re-posts the same message, which will then be distributed directly). Note that with this mechanism an approval via the LISTSERV Web Interface is not possible.
|
|
•
|
Unmoderated Senders – Specify any address that are allowed to post to the list without having to go through moderation (you do not have to specify any moderator addresses here since moderators are always allowed to post without going through moderation themselves.) Click the Edit link to specify the addresses.
|
The Posting Confirmation tab is used to avoid spamming of a list and to verify the origin of a list posting. Using the options on this tab, it is possible to enforce that postings to the list are confirmed by the poster before they are actually being distributed to the list. (Note that postings sent with LISTSERV Maestro never require this additional confirmation and are therefore not affected by the settings made here. These settings apply only for manual postings.)
|
•
|
Require the moderator(s) to confirm their own messages – Normal posters do not have to confirm their postings, but moderators must confirm any posting they submit. The idea behind this is the following: On a moderated discussion list, all postings go through moderation anyway and thus any spam can easily be stopped by the moderator. So in theory, the only entry to the list would be spoofing the moderator addresses (since their postings do not go through moderation). Therefore, the requirement for moderators to confirm their own postings because anyone spoofing a moderator address would be unable to provide this confirmation so his postings would not be distributed. This is the minimum recommended settings for moderated lists. However, it still has a drawback because if a lot of spam is sent to the list, then even though this spam will not be distributed, it will still end up in the moderator's inbox, making life difficult.
|
|
•
|
Only require confirmation for postings from addresses that are not on the list – Posters that are subscribed to the list do not have to confirm their postings, any moderators or non-subscribers must confirm any posting they submit. The idea behind this is the following: The weakness of the previous option was that it had the potential of flooding the moderator's inbox with spam (since the only protection against spam would be the moderator himself). Under the assumption that most of this spam would originate from addresses that are not subscribed to the list themselves, this option here offers an improvement: Any list subscribers are still not required to confirm their postings (which will then be sent to the moderator for approval), but all non-subscribers will first have to confirm their postings before they are even forwarded to the moderator, and since this usually not happens for spam, the spam does not even reach the moderator's inbox.
|
|
•
|
All messages require confirmation – All postings are only distributed to the list once they have been confirmed with LISTSERV's "OK" mechanism (see below for details).
|
Note About LISTSERV's "OK" mechanism for confirmations: To confirm a posting, LISTSERV sends an email back to the poster requiring the confirmation. The poster must then respond to this confirmation request by either sending an email with "OK" in the body back to LISTSERV, or by clicking on the confirmation link provided in the email (the confirmation link is only provided if the LISTSERV Web Interface is installed on the LISTSERV server).
Large active LISTSERV lists often use "sub-groups" within the list to give subscribers the opportunity to receive only the posts to the list they are most interested in. Sub-groups are created in LISTSERV by defining the keyword
Topics in the list header. Lists can have up to 23 topics defined in the header. List subscribers can elect to receive only those messages that fit into the topic(s) they are interested in reading. Similarly, messages can be posted only to specific topics. For example, a large list could have the general subject of XYZ Software. Topics could be defined by the types of users of the software, the type software purchased, or tips and tricks for using the software. For more information on Topics, see the LISTSERV List Owner's Manual.
To define a new topic, simply click the New Topic link and fill out the empty topic row that appears. In the list, topics are displayed either in the display mode or in the editable mode. In the display mode, each topic has an associated
Edit link to set it into the editable mode. In the editable mode, the topic name can be changed and the following actions are available:
Reset (forget changes and reset the topic to the state it had when the editable mode was last entered for it),
Up (move the topic up one step in the topics list),
Down (move the topic down ones step in the topics list), and
Remove (remove the topic).
When the topic settings of a populated list change, all current subscribers' topic selections will need to be adjusted. This will occur when the LISTSERV list wizard is completed. The adjustment may take some time and a progress bar will be displayed as the system works.
Tip: Changing topics on a list where subscribers are currently very active needs to be carefully considered so a disruption does not occur. A better strategy would be to temporarily close the hosted LISTSERV list for maintenance (see Summary page), adjust the topics, and then re-open the list.
When adding new topics to a list that already has subscribers, an additional option, Existing subscribers will have the new topics selected automatically, will appear. Select this option to automatically add the new topics to all existing subscriptions. If this option is not selected, then the existing subscribers will not be subscribed to the new topics. Subscribers will be able to change their settings to add or drop the new topics if the dataset and list subscriber pages are enabled. This option applies to all topics that are added on this page during the same List wizard session. To add several topics, some of which the current subscribers are automatically subscribed to and some not, the List wizard has to be engaged twice, once with the option selected (for those topics to be added to all subscriptions) and once with the option not selected (for those topics that will not be added to all subscriptions).
Use the [<- Back] button or any of the links in the top bar to revisit any page in the wizard to make changes.
Before the list can be used, its access level needs to be set using the Public List Access drop-down menu. The list can be set to be accessible to anyone with access to the dataset wishing to subscribe, to be accessible to only list subscribers, or to have no public access. If a list is accessible to everyone, it will appear on the membership area Web page to anyone visiting that page. If the list is accessible only to members, the list will not appear in the membership area to everyone, it will only appear only to those who are subscribed to the list. This allows existing subscribers to manage their own settings, but new subscribers must be added by the Data Administrator or designated LISTSERV Maestro team members. Lists with no public access do not appear in the membership area to anyone.
Click [Finish] to accept the list as it is summarized and return to the Recipient Dataset Details screen.
Creating user defined lists is an advanced feature that requires knowledge of LISTSERV list headers and list header keywords; therefore, this list type is most suited for those experienced LISTSERV users. The behavior of this list depends entirely on the value that is entered for the Send keyword. This list type is a perfect for those occasions when an announcement, moderated, or unmoderated list doesn’t meet your needs.
|
•
|
Name – The name of the mailing list. Subscribers will see this name of the list on the web form when they subscribe. Data administrators will see the list name in the dataset tree and if they create a target group from a classic LISTSERV list (see Section 14 Classic LISTSERV List Target Groups for details). LISTSERV Maestro users will see the list name if they are allowed to define recipients for a job using by sending to an existing LISTSERV list.
|
|
•
|
Internal Description – The internal description is only seen by users working within the Maestro User Interface.
|
|
•
|
Public Description – The public description of the list appears on the subscription web form. If subscribers are permitted to select the lists they want to join and can view and change their subscription settings, then having accurate descriptions will help them accomplish those tasks.
|
The Profile Fields screen lists all of the fields in the dataset. Other fields can be added to the list. Any added list fields will
not be shared with the other lists in the dataset. To add a new field, click the
Add Field link.
|
•
|
Name – The name of the field as it will be used internally by the system for mail merging and querying. Field names can only use upper and lower case letters “A-Z” and “a-z”, the numbers “0 – 9” and the underscore “_”. Spaces and other special characters are not allowed.
|
|
•
|
Display Name – The label that identifies the field on the web form. The display name will be seen by anyone accessing the list’s public subscription page on the Web. All alphanumeric characters are permitted, as well as spaces and special characters allowed by the dataset encoding scheme.
|
|
•
|
Data Type – Choose the type of data to be entered in the field from the drop-down menu. Three different classifications of data are available (selection lists are not available for hosted LISTSERV lists):
|
|
•
|
Text – Text fields can accept any type of text, including dates in specific formats such as dd/mm/yyy or mm.dd.yyyy.
|
|
•
|
Number – Number fields accept any whole integers.
|
|
•
|
Boolean – Boolean fields are based on two states – true or false.
|
|
•
|
Input Type – Decide whether the data is mandatory for subscribers to enter into the web form or optional. Optional fields can be designated as hidden or read-only if the subscribers are not allowed to enter or change the data in those fields. Boolean fields cannot be optional due to the nature of the data type. Boolean fields can be visible or hidden.
|
After list fields are created, they can be edited, removed, moved up, or moved down by using the corresponding links on the right side of the table. Fields belonging to the dataset cannot be moved or edited from this screen.
Hosted LISTSERV lists require a Name Field to be defined. If a single name field exists for each subscriber, move that field from the
Profile Fields box to the
Name Fields box. If two (or more) fields are to be used to make up a full name, move each of the fields from the
Profile Fields box to the
Name Fields box. The second field is added after the first field, leaving a space in between. This makes it easy to combine a first name field with a last name field to produce a
Full Name field, for example. Use the
Move Up and
Move Down links to change the order of the name fields. The fields are not required to be mandatory; although, the existence of at least one name field is required, but it does not have to be filled in by every subscriber.
The List Type screen lets you select the type of list you want to create. Select the User Defined List option. This type of list is an advanced feature that requires knowledge of LISTSERV list headers and list header keywords; therefore, it is only suited for experienced LISTSERV users.
The behavior of this list depends on the value that you supply for the Send keyword. Click on the
Edit link to define it. If you leave the value blank, then the LISTSERV default is applied.
Note: LISTSERV Maestro will not perform any verification of the sender address of the mail job. You must make sure that the address you specify in the sender information will actually be accepted by your list (i.e. that this address is allowed to post to the list). If you happen to specify a sender address that is not allowed to post to the list, then the job will still be delivered successfully in LISTSERV Maestro (i.e. your posting is sent to the list successfully), but then your list posting will be rejected by the list and returned to the sender address. The sender address you need to use in the mail job depends on the user defined settings of the list.
Important: This is an advanced feature that requires knowledge of and experience with LISTSERV list headers and list header keywords; therefore, it should only be used by experienced LISTSERV list administrators. For most standard list purposes, there is no need to edit the list header keywords on this tab directly, but you can instead use the controls that are provided on the following wizard pages (List Options, Posting Restrictions, and Topics).
This tab shows a tree with all available list header keywords, separated into seven groups (see the list of groups and keywords below). Click on the “+” icon to open a group or the “-” icon to close a group.
|
•
|
A red circle icon and bold black text: This keyword has been configured with a manually supplied value via the Edit link here on the Advanced Configuration tab and was included in the list header with the displayed value (or was omitted from the list header, if applicable). However, when the list header was transferred to LISTSERV, LISTSERV reported an error in the value of this keyword. To see the original LISTSERV error message for this keyword, select the keyword in the tree and click the Edit link.
|
To view the actual textual list header that is the result of the keyword input here in the keyword tree and in the user interface controls on the following wizard pages, and which thus defines this Hosted LISTSERV List, click on the
View Configuration as Plaintext link at the bottom of the tree.
To edit the value of a given keyword, select the keyword in the tree and click on the Edit link at the top right corner of the tree. Depending on the selected keyword, there are three possible edit situations:
|
•
|
Editing via wizard controls only – For keywords of this type, all possible values that the keywords can have can be configured via the user interface controls that the wizard offers on the following wizard pages. Therefore, there is no need to be able to input a keyword value manually. If you click the Edit link for such a keyword, then a message box will inform you that instead of editing the keyword value manually, please use the provided user interface controls on the specified wizard page.
|
|
•
|
Editing via wizard controls or manual input – For keywords of this type, user interface controls exist on the following wizard pages. However, those controls do not allow you to input the full range of possible values for this keyword (but only the most common values). You therefore have the choice of either using the user interface controls in the wizard or to supply a specific value for the keyword manually. If you choose to supply a value manually here in the keywords tree, then the corresponding user interface control on one of the following wizard pages will no longer be available. Instead a message will be displayed that informs you, that a custom value has been supplied for the corresponding keyword in the keywords tree. To make the user interface controls available again, go back to the keywords tree and remove the manually supplied value. If you click the Edit link for such a keyword, an input dialog will allow you to choose between using the user interface control in the wizard (this also includes an information about where to find the corresponding user interface control) or to supply your own customized value.
|
|
•
|
Editing via manual input only – For keywords of this type, there exists no dedicated user interface control on any of the following wizard pages. Therefore, the only way of changing these keywords is by supplying a customized value for the keyword manually, here in the keywords tree. Keywords of this type are keywords for very specific and advanced LISTSERV list features, which are seldom used. If you click the Edit link for such a keyword, an input dialog will allow you to supply the value for the keyword.
|
The List Options screen is divided into several tabs – General Options, Reply Behavior, Bounce Handling, List Archive, and several with advanced features – that can be accessed by clicking the drop-down menu. The List Archive is optional and will not appear unless archives have been set up in the HUB. For more information on archives, see the LISTSERV Maestro Administrator’s Manual.
On the General tab, all list types require that a list administrator called a “list owner” be set. Enter at least one email address that will become the administrator (owner) of the LISTSERV list. Click the
Edit link to add a new address or edit the existing ones in the pop-up dialog box. Entries must be valid Internet email addresses.
Click [OK] to accept the administrator address and return to the General Options tab.
|
•
|
Use mail merging – Select this option to allow the system to insert subscriber specific content into the message based on the data associated with each subscriber. Subscribers will each receive a customized copy of the message with their own email address and name on the To: line. Other data fields can be merged into the message as well to further personalize the email.
|
|
•
|
Sender – Replies are directed to the sender of the email message. The sender address is the address based on the “From:” field of the posting.
|
|
•
|
List – Replies are directed back to the list. If subscribers are not well informed that, when they hit the “reply” key in their mail client, their message goes to everyone, then they might post private or off topic messages back to the list by mistake.
|
|
•
|
List Administrator – Replies are directed to the first administrator address specified on the General Options tab.
|
|
•
|
Separate address – Replies are directed to the address entered in this text box.
|
Then, using the Apply the Settings drop-down menu, select when the settings are to be applied.
The Bounce Handling tab determines what happens to the subscriber addresses when messages sent to them bounce (are rejected from the email server and returned to the sender undeliverable). LISTSERV lists can handle bounces by removing the bouncing addresses automatically or by collecting bounces for manual action. Manually processed bounces are sent to the list administrator’s address. Select one of the three available the bounce processing options:
|
•
|
Remove subscribers after X bounces within X days – Enter the number of bounces that are permitted in the first text box, and the number of days they can occur over in the second box. This setting is more flexible than the first setting. For example, if the reason for the bounce is temporary, such as a full mailbox, then new messages can still be sent. Subscribers will not be removed from the list unless the messages continue to bounce over the given time period, or bounce the number of times specified. Care must be taken to choose realistic numbers, in accordance with the expected list traffic
|
|
•
|
Only collect bounces for manual processing – Bounce addresses will be sent to a specific address where they can be reviewed and action can be taken manually. Subscriber addresses that generate bounces will not be removed from the list automatically, regardless of the number of bounces.
|
If you have selected one of the automatic bounce handling options above, then you can also specify whether or not this should actually result in an automatic removal of addresses from the list (which is the default) or if the bounce analysis should only be forwarded (via e-mail).
If you select automatic removal, then a notification about all removed addresses will be sent to the specified group of people, and you also have the choice if you also want to be notified about any temporary bounces and bounces for addresses that are not actually subscribed to the list.
If you select no automatic removal, then you need to specify the group of people to which the bounce analysis will be forwarded to by clicking the
Add link. To change this information, click the
Edit link.
Furthermore, you can define the Passive Probing behavior of the list.
To again hide the advanced bounce handling options, click on the Hide advanced bounce handling options link. This, however, is only possible if the advanced options are set to their default values, i.e. if you have non-default advanced options, then you can also not hide the advanced options.
The List Archives tab defines whether or not postings to the list will be archived. If an archive is to be kept, then define how often a new archive file is to be created by the system and who is allowed to access and view the archive.
For the latter two options, there are two modes of specifying the necessary details: In Standard Mode, only the most common settings are available. In
Advanced Mode, all possible options are available. Toggle between the two modes with the
Switch to Standard Mode and
Switch to Advanced Mode links at the bottom of the tab.
Note: This tab is only available if the option of creating LISTSERV list archives has been enabled for your LISTSERV server by the LISTSERV Maestro administrator (this is a setting in the Administration Hub).
|
•
|
Use texts from custom template – The text for the administrative messages are taken from the specified custom template. A custom template can be used for customization and translation of the text.
|
The Subscription Notifications tab defines if LISTSERV will send a notification message when a subscriber joins a list (or more precisely, confirms subscription to the list). If you select to receive notification messages, then you can also specify an address that the notifications will be sent to. If you not specify an address, then the notifications will be sent to the list administrator.
|
•
|
Digest Behavior – Check if you want to give subscribers the option to enable the "Digest" mode for their subscription. With the digest mode enabled, they will no longer receive the postings to the list as individual mails; instead, everything is compiled into a single digest email. If you enable this option, then you must also specify the rules that are used to compile and send out the digest email to all subscribers that have enabled the digest mode.
|
Also, if your list is configured to use a bottom banner, then this banner will, by default, not be included at the bottom of each individual message in the digest (to avoid a repetition of this banner throughout the digest). Instead, the banner will only appear once, after the digest's table of content. To avoid this behavior and include the bottom banner with each individual message in the digest, check the corresponding option.
|
•
|
Subject Tag – These settings define which subject tag will be used for subscribers that have selected to receive mails with the "normal LISTSERV header, with list identification tag in subject" (for example to be able to better filter their incoming mails from this list). Either select to use the list name as the subject tag or provide an individual subject tag. In addition, you have the option to add a sequence number to the subject tag.
|
Subscribers who have chosen other header styles than "normal LISTSERV header, with list identification tag in subject", will receive the normal mail subject without a subject tag. An exception of this rule may be made for subscribers who have selected to use "sendmail-style" mail headers. If you want to
Also add the subject tag for subscribers with this mail header style, check the corresponding option. Note that this will add the subject tag for all subscribers with this header style, i.e. in contrast to the normal LISTSERV header style, where the subscriber has the choice of having the subject tag included.
The Subscription Options (Defaults) tab defines the default subscription options that any new subscriber will initially use. Subscribers may later change their own subscription options to different values, but these are the options that they start with, by default.
|
•
|
Default Subscription Style – Defines the default subscription style of new subscribers. Depending on other list settings (if list archives and/or list digests are enabled), the following subscriptions styles may be available:
|
|
•
|
Plain Text Digest – The subscriber will receive a regular digest in plain text format, with a compilation of all postings since the last digest.
|
|
•
|
MIME Digest – The subscriber will receive a regular digest in MIME format, with a compilation of all postings since the last digest.
|
|
•
|
HTML Digest – The subscriber will receive a regular digest in HTML format, with a compilation of all postings since the last digest.
|
|
•
|
Plain Text Index – The subscriber will receive a regular mail in plain text format, with an index of the subject lines of all postings since the last index (but not the actual message content of the postings).
|
|
•
|
HTML Text Index – The subscriber will receive a regular mail in HTML format, with an index of the subject lines of all postings since the last index (but not the actual message content of the postings).
|
|
•
|
Default Posting Privileges – (Only available for lists of the user defined type). Define which posting privileges will be applied to new subscribers (and also non-subscribers) by default:
|
|
•
|
Normal – Normal posting privileges (as defined by the other list settings, especially the "Send" keyword).
|
|
•
|
User may bypass moderation – Posting is allowed without moderation, even on a moderated list (usually not useful on a non-moderated lists).
|
|
•
|
User may not post to list – Postings are not allowed (usually not additionally useful on lists where posting is disallowed anyway).
|
|
•
|
Default Acknowledgement Behavior – (Only available for lists of discussion-types or user defined type.) Define the acknowledgement behavior that will be applied to new subscribers by default. This determines how (and if) LISTSERV will acknowledge postings by a subscriber:
|
|
•
|
Set subscribers to "no mail" by default – Check so that any new subscribers will initially have the "no mail" option enabled, i.e. their subscription is suspended and they will not receive any mailings until they set their subscription to active.
|
|
•
|
Exempt subscribers from renewal and probing by default – Check so that any new subscribers will initially not be included in LISTSERV’s mechanisms to probe and/or renew subscriber addresses (this is used to keep the subscriber base up to date and to weed out "dead" addresses).
|
|
•
|
Hide subscriber addresses from "REVIEW" listing by default – Check so that any new subscribers will initially be "concealed". A concealed subscriber will not appear on the list of list subscribers that can be obtained from LISTSERV using the REVIEW command. There exists a special list setting that defines who is allowed to perform the review command in the first place, i.e. not all users may always execute a review, but even those users who are allowed to do this will not see the concealed subscribers. Note that concealed subscribers of a Hosted LISTSERV List will still be visible from inside of LISTSERV Maestro. Also, some privileged users may be allowed to perform an advanced review command that will list even the concealed subscribers.
|
|
•
|
Other – If selected, please select one of the more advanced header styles from the drop-down menu. These styles are for specific purposes and are usually not used with normal LISTSERV lists: Additional headers in mail body, Short headers, Individual "To:" with full headers or Individual "To:" with short headers.
|
The Change Logs tab defines if and how change log files will be maintained by LISTSERV for this list. Select whether or not a change log will be maintained; and, if so, how often LISTSERV will start a new file.
|
•
|
Suppress "ApprovedBy:" mail header – Check if you do not want the "ApprovedBy:" header to be added to all mailings that are approved by a moderator or list owner (usually only applies to moderated lists).
|
|
•
|
Remote multi-byte characters – Check if you want all multi-byte characters to be removed from postings to this list. Note that this can cause trouble on internationally used lists, where languages other than the English language may be used for postings.
|
|
•
|
If spam checking is enabled at LISTSERV – If the spam-checking feature is enabled at LISTSERV, then specify if the server-wide settings will be respected by this list (and spam checks are performed) or if the server-wide settings will be ignored for this list, meaning that no spam checks are performed for the postings to this list.
|
Posting restrictions set limitations on message attachments, message size, and the number of messages that can be sent to the list. These restrictions affect messages sent to the LISTSERV list when they are submitted as
standard list postings. A standard list posting is a normal email message sent to the list. Standard list messages can be received in a digest form, and can be viewed in the list archives if archives have been created for the list. Standard list postings can be sent (without tracking) to the list address using a normal email client, or they can be sent using LISTSERV Maestro (with or without tracking) by selecting
Send to an Existing LISTSERV List, while defining the recipients of a mailing, and by specifying
Send job as standard list message (or by using a target group based on these selections).
To enable the advance mode, click the Switch to Advanced Mode link. In advanced mode, these options are also available:
|
•
|
Decide based on attachment type – Any postings that include attachments are inspected. If they contain only attachments of allowed types, they are distributed normally, with all attachments. If they contain (some) attachments of disallowed types, then either those disallowed attachments are removed or the whole posting is rejected (and the poster is notified about this). Check those attachment types (MIME-types) that you want to specify as allowed attachment types. If you need to specify an attachment type as allowed for which there is no checkbox, click on the Edit link and enter the MIME-type (or types) of those additionally allowed attachment types. Then, determine what shall happen if a posting contains any disallowed attachments (remove the disallowed attachments or reject the whole posting).
|
|
•
|
Remove non-MIME attachments – If checked, then attachments of this special type will be removed from the posting before it is distributed.
|
|
•
|
Limit each message to – Specify how "large" any individual message may be at maximum. Either leave the field empty (which means that there is no limit), or specify a positive number as the limit and select what kind of limit this number describes from the drop-down menu.
|
|
•
|
Daily limit for whole list – Specify how many postings may happen on this list on any given day. Leave empty for no limit or specify the maximum number of postings to the list per day, no matter who is the sender.
|
|
•
|
Daily limit for each user – Specify how many postings each user can make on any given day. Leave empty for no limit or specify the maximum number of postings to the list per day for each user (sender). This value must be less than or equal to the Maximum postings allowed per day for whole list (see above).
|
|
•
|
Moderator Addresses – Specify the addresses to which list postings that require moderation are forwarded. Only after a moderator has reviewed and confirmed a list posting will it actually be distributed to the list. Click the Edit link to specify the addresses.
|
|
•
|
Moderation Type – If there are several moderator addresses, then LISTSERV can either send a posting that requires moderation to only one of the moderators (LISTSERV selects which one) who must then approve the posting, or LISTSERV can send a copy of the posting to each moderator, and an approval from any of them will allow the posting to be distributed. Choose which type you want to use for this list.
|
Note: This choice is disabled unless you have at least two moderator addresses specified.
|
•
|
A simple "OK" is enough – The moderator can approve postings by sending back an email to LISTSERV with "OK" as the only content, or the moderator can approve the a posting via the LISTSERV Web Interface (if the web interface is installed).
|
|
•
|
Require the moderator to forward the full message – The moderate has to forward the whole message to the list in order to approve it (i.e. essential the moderator re-posts the same message, which will then be distributed directly). Note that with this mechanism an approval via the LISTSERV Web Interface is not possible.
|
|
•
|
Unmoderated Senders – Specify any address that are allowed to post to the list without having to go through moderation (you do not have to specify any moderator addresses here since moderators are always allowed to post without going through moderation themselves.) Click the Edit link to specify the addresses.
|
The Posting Confirmation tab is used to avoid spamming of a list and to verify the origin of a list posting. Using the options on this tab, it is possible to enforce that postings to the list are confirmed by the poster before they are actually being distributed to the list. (Note that postings sent with LISTSERV Maestro never require this additional confirmation and are therefore not affected by the settings made here. These settings apply only for manual postings.)
|
•
|
All messages require confirmation – All postings are only distributed to the list once they have been confirmed with LISTSERV's "OK" mechanism (see below for details).
|
Note About LISTSERV's "OK" mechanism for confirmations: To confirm a posting, LISTSERV sends an email back to the poster requiring the confirmation. The poster must then respond to this confirmation request by either sending an email with "OK" in the body back to LISTSERV, or by clicking on the confirmation link provided in the email (the confirmation link is only provided if the LISTSERV Web Interface is installed on the LISTSERV server).
Large active LISTSERV lists often use "sub-groups" within the list to give subscribers the opportunity to receive only the posts to the list they are most interested in. Sub-groups are created in LISTSERV by defining the keyword
Topics in the list header. Lists can have up to 23 topics defined in the header. List subscribers can elect to receive only those messages that fit into the topic(s) they are interested in reading. Similarly, messages can be posted only to specific topics. For example, a large list could have the general subject of XYZ Software. Topics could be defined by the types of users of the software, the type software purchased, or tips and tricks for using the software. For more information on Topics, see the LISTSERV List Owner's Manual.
To define a new topic, simply click the New Topic link and fill out the empty topic row that appears. In the list, topics are displayed either in the display mode or in the editable mode. In the display mode, each topic has an associated
Edit link to set it into the editable mode. In the editable mode, the topic name can be changed and the following actions are available:
Reset (forget changes and reset the topic to the state it had when the editable mode was last entered for it),
Up (move the topic up one step in the topics list),
Down (move the topic down ones step in the topics list), and
Remove (remove the topic).
When the topic settings of a populated list change, all current subscribers' topic selections will need to be adjusted. This will occur when the LISTSERV list wizard is completed. The adjustment may take some time and a progress bar will be displayed as the system works.
Tip: Changing topics on a list where subscribers are currently very active needs to be carefully considered so a disruption does not occur. A better strategy would be to temporarily close the hosted LISTSERV list for maintenance (see Summary page), adjust the topics, and then re-open the list.
When adding new topics to a list that already has subscribers, an additional option, Existing subscribers will have the new topics selected automatically, will appear. Select this option to automatically add the new topics to all existing subscriptions. If this option is not selected, then the existing subscribers will not be subscribed to the new topics. Subscribers will be able to change their settings to add or drop the new topics if the dataset and list subscriber pages are enabled. This option applies to all topics that are added on this page during the same List wizard session. To add several topics, some of which the current subscribers are automatically subscribed to and some not, the List wizard has to be engaged twice, once with the option selected (for those topics to be added to all subscriptions) and once with the option not selected (for those topics that will not be added to all subscriptions).
Use the [<- Back] button or any of the links in the top bar to revisit any page in the wizard to make changes.
Before the list can be used, its access level needs to be set using the Public List Access drop-down menu. The list can be set to be accessible to anyone with access to the dataset wishing to subscribe, to be accessible to only list subscribers, or to have no public access. If a list is accessible to everyone, it will appear on the membership area Web page to anyone visiting that page. If the list is accessible only to members, the list will not appear in the membership area to everyone, it will only appear only to those who are subscribed to the list. This allows existing subscribers to manage their own settings, but new subscribers must be added by the Data Administrator or designated LISTSERV Maestro team members. Lists with no public access do not appear in the membership area to anyone.
Click [Finish] to accept the list as it is summarized and return to the Recipient Dataset Details screen.
