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#GNU mailman - installation Manual About this document... About this
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_________________________________________________________________
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GNU Mailman - Installation Manual
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barry (at) list dot org
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This document describes how to install GNU Mailman on a POSIX-based
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system such as Unix, MacOSX, or GNU/Linux. It will cover basic
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installation instructions, as well as guidelines for integrating
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Mailman with your web and mail servers.
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The GNU Mailman website is at http://www.list.org
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1 Installation Requirements
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Please note that the information on this page may be out of date.
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Check for the latest installation information on the Mailman wiki.
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GNU Mailman works on most POSIX-based systems such as Unix, MacOSX, or
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GNU/Linux. It does not currently work on Windows. You must have a mail
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server that you can send messages to, and a web server that supports
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the CGI/1.1 API. Apache makes a fine choice for web server, and mail
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servers such as Postfix, Exim, Sendmail, and qmail should work just
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To install Mailman from source, you will need an ANSI C compiler to
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build Mailman's security wrappers. The GNU C compiler gcc works well.
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You must have the Python interpreter installed somewhere on your
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system. As of this writing, Python 2.4.4 is recommended, but see the
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wiki page above for the latest information.
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Before installing Mailman, you need to prepare your system by adding
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certain users and groups. You will need to have root privileges to
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perform the steps in this section.
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2.1 Add the group and user
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Mailman requires a unique user and group name which will own its
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files, and under which its processes will run. Mailman's basic
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security is based on group ownership permissions, so it's important to
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get this step right^1. Typically, you will add a new user and a new
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group, both called mailman. The mailman user must be a member of the
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mailman group. Mailman will be installed under the mailman user and
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group, with the set-group-id (setgid) bit enabled.
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If these names are already in use, you can choose different user and
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group names, as long as you remember these when you run configure. If
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you choose a different unique user name, you will have to specify this
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with configure's --with-username option, and if you choose a different
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group name, you will have to specify this with configure's
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--with-groupname option.
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On Linux systems, you can use the following commands to create these
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accounts. Check your system's manual pages for details:
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% useradd -c''GNU Mailman'' -s /no/shell -d /no/home -g mailman mailman
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2.2 Create the installation directory
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Typically, Mailman is installed into a single directory, which
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includes both the Mailman source code and the run-time list and
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archive data. It is possible to split the static program files from
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the variable data files and install them in separate directories. This
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section will describe the available options.
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The default is to install all of Mailman to /usr/local/mailman^2. You
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can change this base installation directory (referred to here as
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$prefix) by specifying the directory with the --prefix configure
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option. If you're upgrading from a previous version of Mailman, you
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may want to use the --prefix option unless you move your mailing
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Warning: You cannot install Mailman on a filesystem that is mounted
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with the nosuid option. This will break Mailman, which relies on
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setgid programs for its security. If this describes your environment,
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simply install Mailman in a location that allows setgid programs.
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Make sure the installation directory is set to group mailman (or
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whatever you're going to specify with --with-groupname) and has the
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setgid bit set^3. You probably also want to guarantee that this
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directory is readable and executable by everyone. For example, these
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shell commands will accomplish this:
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You are now ready to configure and install the Mailman software.
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3 Build and install Mailman
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Before you can install Mailman, you must run configure to set various
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installation options your system might need.
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Note: Take special note of the --with-mail-gid and --with-cgi-gid
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options below. You will probably need to use these.
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You should not be root while performing the steps in this section. Do
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them under your own login, or whatever account you typically use to
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install software. You do not need to do these steps as user mailman,
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but you could. However, make sure that the login used is a member of
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the mailman group as that that group has write permissions to the
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$prefix directory made in the previous step. You must also have
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permission to create a setgid file in the file system where it resides
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(NFS and other mounts can be configured to inhibit setgid settings).
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If you've installed other GNU software, you should be familiar with
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the configure script. Usually you can just cd to the directory you
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unpacked the Mailman source tarball into, and run configure with no
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% cd mailman-<version>
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The following options allow you to customize your Mailman
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Standard GNU configure option which changes the base directory
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that Mailman is installed into. By default $prefix is
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/usr/local/mailman. This directory must already exist, and be
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set up as described in 2.2.
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Standard GNU configure option which lets you specify a
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different installation directory for architecture dependent
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--with-var-prefix=dir
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Store mutable data under dir instead of under the $prefix or
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$exec_prefix. Examples of such data include the list archives
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and list settings database.
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--with-python=/path/to/python
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Specify an alternative Python interpreter to use for the
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wrapper programs. The default is to use the interpreter found
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first on your shell's $PATH.
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--with-username=username-or-uid
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Specify a different username than mailman. The value of this
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option can be an integer user id or a user name. Be sure your
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$prefix directory is owned by this user.
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--with-groupname=groupname-or-gid
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Specify a different groupname than mailman. The value of this
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option can be an integer group id or a group name. Be sure your
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$prefix directory is group-owned by this group.
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--with-mail-gid=group-or-groups
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Specify an alternative group for running scripts via the mail
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wrapper. group-or-groups can be a list of one or more integer
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group ids or symbolic group names. The first value in the list
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that resolves to an existing group is used. By default, the
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value is the list mailman, other, mail, and daemon.
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Note: This is highly system dependent and you must get this
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right, because the group id is compiled into the mail wrapper
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program for added security. On systems using sendmail, the
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sendmail.cf configuration file designates the group id of
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sendmail processes using the DefaultUser option. (If commented
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out, it still may be indicating the default...)
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Check your mail server's documentation and configuration files
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to find the right value for this switch.
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--with-cgi-gid=group-or-groups
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Specify an alternative group for running scripts via the CGI
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wrapper. group-or-groups can be a list of one or more integer
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group ids or symbolic group names. The first value in the list
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that resolves to an existing group is used. By default, the
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value is the the list www, www-data, and nobody.
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Note: The proper value for this is dependent on your web server
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configuration. You must get this right, because the group id is
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compiled into the CGI wrapper program for added security, and
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no Mailman CGI scripts will run if this is incorrect.
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If you're using Apache, check the values for the Group option
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in your httpd.conf file.
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--with-cgi-ext=extension
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Specify an extension for cgi-bin programs. The CGI wrappers
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placed in $prefix/cgi-bin will have this extension (some web
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servers require an extension). extension must include the
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--with-mailhost=hostname
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Specify the fully qualified host name part for outgoing email.
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After the installation is complete, this value can be overriden
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in $prefix/Mailman/mm_cfg.py.
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--with-urlhost=hostname
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Specify the fully qualified host name part of urls. After the
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installation is complete, this value can be overriden in
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$prefix/Mailman/mm_cfg.py.
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Don't use gcc, even if it is found. In this case, cc must be
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Once you've run configure, you can simply run make, then make install
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to build and install Mailman.
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4 Check your installation
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After you've run make install, you should check that your installation
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has all the correct permissions and group ownerships by running the
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check_perms script. First change to the installation (i.e. $prefix)
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directory, then run the bin/check_perms program. Don't try to run
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bin/check_perms from the source directory; it will only run from the
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installation directory.
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If this reports no problems, then it's very likely <wink> that your
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installation is set up correctly. If it reports problems, then you can
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either fix them manually, re-run the installation, or use
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bin/check_perms to fix the problems (probably the easiest solution):
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* You need to become the user that did the installation, and that
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owns all the files in $prefix, or root.
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* Run bin/check_perms -f
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* Repeat previous step until no more errors are reported!
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Warning: If you're running Mailman on a shared multiuser system, and
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you have mailing lists with private archives, you may want to hide the
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private archive directory from other users on your system. In that
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case, you should drop the other execute permission (o-x) from the
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archives/private directory. However, the web server process must be
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able to follow the symbolic link in public directory, otherwise your
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public Pipermail archives will not work. To set this up, become root
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and run the following commands:
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# cd <prefix>/archives
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# chown <web-server-user> private
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You need to know what user your web server runs as. It may be www,
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apache, httpd or nobody, depending on your server's configuration.
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5 Set up your web server
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Congratulations! You've installed the Mailman software. To get
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everything running you need to hook Mailman up to both your web server
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and your mail system.
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If you plan on running your mail and web servers on different
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machines, sharing Mailman installations via NFS, be sure that the
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clocks on those two machines are synchronized closely. You might take
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a look at the file Mailman/LockFile.py; the constant CLOCK_SLOP helps
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the locking mechanism compensate for clock skew in this type of
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This section describes some of the things you need to do to connect
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Mailman's web interface to your web server. The instructions here are
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somewhat geared toward the Apache web server, so you should consult
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your web server documentation for details.
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You must configure your web server to enable CGI script permission in
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the $prefix/cgi-bin to run CGI scripts. The line you should add might
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look something like the following, with the real absolute directory
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substituted for $prefix, of course:
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Exec /mailman/* $prefix/cgi-bin/*
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ScriptAlias /mailman/ $prefix/cgi-bin/
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Warning: You want to be very sure that the user id under which your
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CGI scripts run is not in the mailman group you created above,
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otherwise private archives will be accessible to anyone.
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Copy the Mailman, Python, and GNU logos to a location accessible to
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your web server. E.g. with Apache, you've usually got an icons
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directory that you can drop the images into. For example:
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% cp $prefix/icons/*.{jpg,png} /path/to/apache/icons
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You then want to add a line to your $prefix/Mailman/mm_cfg.py file
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which sets the base URL for the logos. For example:
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IMAGE_LOGOS = '/images/'
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The default value for IMAGE_LOGOS is /icons/. Read the comment in
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Defaults.py.in for details.
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Configure your web server to point to the Pipermail public mailing
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list archives. For example, in Apache:
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Alias /pipermail/ $varprefix/archives/public/
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where $varprefix is usually $prefix unless you've used the
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--with-var-prefix option to configure. Also be sure to configure your
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web server to follow symbolic links in this directory, otherwise
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public Pipermail archives won't be accessible. For Apache users,
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consult the FollowSymLinks option.
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If you're going to be supporting internationalized public archives,
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you will probably want to turn off any default charset directive for
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the Pipermail directory, otherwise your multilingual archive pages
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won't show up correctly. Here's an example for Apache, based on the
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standard installation directories:
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<Directory "/usr/local/mailman/archives/public/">
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AddDefaultCharset Off
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Now restart your web server.
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6 Set up your mail server
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This section describes some of the things you need to do to connect
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Mailman's email interface to your mail server. The instructions here
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are different for each mail server; if your mail server is not
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described in the following subsections, try to generalize from the
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existing documentation, and consider contributing documentation
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updates to the Mailman developers.
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6.1 Using the Postfix mail server
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Mailman should work pretty much out of the box with a standard Postfix
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installation. It has been tested with various Postfix versions up to
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and including Postfix 2.1.5.
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In order to support Mailman's optional VERP delivery, you will want to
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disable luser_relay (the default) and you will want to set
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recipient_delimiter for extended address semantics. You should comment
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out any luser_relay value in your main.cf and just go with the
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defaults. Also, add this to your main.cf file:
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recipient_delimiter = +
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Using "+" as the delimiter works well with the default values for
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VERP_FORMAT and VERP_REGEXP in Defaults.py.
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When attempting to deliver a message to a non-existent local address,
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Postfix may return a 450 error code. Since this is a transient error
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code, Mailman will continue to attempt to deliver the message for
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DELIVERY_RETRY_PERIOD - 5 days by default. You might want to set
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Postfix up so that it returns permanent error codes for non-existent
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local users by adding the following to your main.cf file:
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unknown_local_recipient_reject_code = 550
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Finally, if you are using Postfix-style virtual domains, read the
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section on virtual domain support below.
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6.1.1 Integrating Postfix and Mailman
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You can integrate Postfix and Mailman such that when new lists are
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created, or lists are removed, Postfix's alias database will be
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automatically updated. The following are the steps you need to take to
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In the description below, we assume that you've installed Mailman in
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the default location, i.e. /usr/local/mailman. If that's not the case,
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adjust the instructions according to your use of configure's --prefix
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and --with-var-prefix options.
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Note: If you are using virtual domains and you want Mailman to honor
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your virtual domains, read the 6.1 section below first!
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* Add this to the bottom of the $prefix/Mailman/mm_cfg.py file:
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The MTA variable names a module in the Mailman/MTA directory which
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contains the mail server-specific functions to be executed when a
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list is created or removed.
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* Look at the Defaults.py file for the variables POSTFIX_ALIAS_CMD
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and POSTFIX_MAP_CMD command. Make sure these point to your
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postalias and postmap programs respectively. Remember that if you
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need to make changes, do it in mm_cfg.py.
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* Run the bin/genaliases script to initialize your aliases file.
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% cd /usr/local/mailman
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Make sure that the owner of the data/aliases and data/aliases.db
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file is mailman, that the group owner for those files is mailman,
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or whatever user and group you used in the configure command, and
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that both files are group writable:
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% chown mailman:mailman data/aliases*
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% chmod g+w data/aliases*
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* Hack your Postfix's main.cf file to include the following path in
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your alias_maps variable:
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/usr/local/mailman/data/aliases
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Note that there should be no trailing .db. Do not include this in
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your alias_database variable. This is because you do not want
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Postfix's newaliases command to modify Mailman's aliases.db file,
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but you do want Postfix to consult aliases.db when looking for
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You probably want to use a hash: style database for this entry.
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alias_maps = hash:/etc/postfix/aliases,
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hash:/usr/local/mailman/data/aliases
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* When you configure Mailman, use the --with-mail-gid=mailman
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switch; this will be the default if you configured Mailman after
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adding the mailman owner. Because the owner of the aliases.db file
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is mailman, Postfix will execute Mailman's wrapper program as uid
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That's it! One caveat: when you add or remove a list, the aliases.db
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file will updated, but it will not automatically run postfix reload.
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This is because you need to be root to run this and suid-root scripts
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are not secure. The only effect of this is that it will take about a
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minute for Postfix to notice the change to the aliases.db file and
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6.1.2 Virtual domains
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Postfix 2.0 supports ``virtual alias domains'', essentially what used
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to be called ``Postfix-style virtual domains'' in earlier Postfix
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versions. To make virtual alias domains work with Mailman, you need to
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do some setup in both Postfix and Mailman. Mailman will write all
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virtual alias mappings to a file called, by default,
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/usr/local/mailman/data/virtual-mailman. It will also use postmap to
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create the virtual-mailman.db file that Postfix will actually use.
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First, you need to set up the Postfix virtual alias domains as
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described in the Postfix documentation (see Postfix's virtual(5)
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manpage). Note that it's your responsibility to include the
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virtual-alias.domain anything line as described manpage; Mailman will
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not include this line in virtual-mailman. You are highly encouraged to
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make sure your virtual alias domains are working properly before
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integrating with Mailman.
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Next, add a path to Postfix's virtual_alias_maps variable, pointing to
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the virtual-mailman file, e.g.:
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virtual_alias_maps = <your normal virtual alias files>,
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hash:/usr/local/mailman/data/virtual-mailman
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assuming you've installed Mailman in the default location. If you're
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using an older version of Postfix which doesn't have the
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virtual_alias_maps variable, use the virtual_maps variable instead.
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Next, in your mm_cfg.py file, you will want to set the variable
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POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS to the list of virtual domains that
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Mailman should update. This may not be all of the virtual alias
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domains that your Postfix installation supports! The values in this
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list will be matched against the host_name attribute of mailing lists
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objects, and must be an exact match.
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Here's an example. Say that Postfix is configured to handle the
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virtual domains dom1.ain, dom2.ain, and dom3.ain, and further that in
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your main.cf file you've got the following settings:
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myhostname = mail.dom1.ain
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mydestination = $myhostname, localhost.$mydomain
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hash:/some/path/to/virtual-dom1,
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hash:/some/path/to/virtual-dom2,
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hash:/some/path/to/virtual-dom2
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If in your virtual-dom1 file, you've got the following lines:
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@dom1.ain @mail.dom1.ain
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this tells Postfix to deliver anything addressed to dom1.ain to the
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same mailbox at mail.dom1.com, its default destination.
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In this case you would not include dom1.ain in
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POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS because otherwise Mailman will write
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entries for mailing lists in the dom1.ain domain as
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mylist@dom1.ain mylist
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mylist-request@dom1.ain mylist-request
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The more specific entries trump your more general entries, thus
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breaking the delivery of any dom1.ain mailing list.
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However, you would include dom2.ain and dom3.ain in mm_cfg.py:
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POSTFIX_STYLE_VIRTUAL_DOMAINS = ['dom2.ain', 'dom3.ain']
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Now, any list that Mailman creates in either of those two domains,
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will have the correct entries written to
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/usr/local/mailman/data/virtual-mailman.
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As above with the data/aliases* files, you want to make sure that both
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data/virtual-mailman and data/virtual-mailman.db are user and group
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6.1.3 An alternative approach
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Fil fil@rezo.net has an alternative approach based on virtual maps and
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regular expressions, as described at:
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* (French) http://listes.rezo.net/comment.php
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* (English) http://listes.rezo.net/how.php
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This is a good (and simpler) alternative if you don't mind exposing an
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additional hostname in the domain part of the addresses people will
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use to contact your list. I.e. if people should use
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mylist@lists.dom.ain instead of mylist@dom.ain.
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6.2 Using the Exim mail server
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Note: This section is derived from Nigel Metheringham's ``HOWTO -
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Using Exim and Mailman together'', which covers Mailman 2.0.x and Exim
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3. It has been updated to cover Mailman 2.1 and Exim 4. The original
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document is here: http://www.exim.org/howto/mailman.html.
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There is no Mailman configuration needed other than the standard
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options detailed in the Mailman install documentation. The Exim
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configuration is transparent to Mailman. The user and group settings
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for Mailman must match those in the config fragments given below.
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6.2.1 Exim configuration
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The Exim configuration is built so that a list created within Mailman
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automatically appears to Exim without the need for defining any
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The drawback of this configuration is that it will work poorly on
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systems supporting lists in several different mail domains. While
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Mailman handles virtual domains, it does not yet support having two
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distinct lists with the same name in different virtual domains, using
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the same Mailman installation. This will eventually change. (But see
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below for a variation on this scheme that should accommodate virtual
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The configuration file excerpts below are for use in an already
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functional Exim configuration, which accepts mail for the domain in
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which the list resides. If this domain is separate from the others
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handled by your Exim configuration, then you'll need to:
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* add the list domain, ``my.list.domain'' to local_domains
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* add a ``domains=my.list.domain'' option to the director (router)
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* (optional) exclude that domain from your other directors (routers)
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Note: The instructions in this document should work with either Exim 3
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or Exim 4. In Exim 3, you must have a local_domains configuration
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setting; in Exim 4, you most likely have a local_domains domainlist.
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If you don't, you probably know what you're doing and can adjust
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accordingly. Similarly, in Exim 4 the concept of ``directors'' has
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disappeared - there are only routers now. So if you're using Exim 4,
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whenever this document says ``director'', read ``router''.
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Whether you are using Exim 3 or Exim 4, you will need to add some
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macros to the main section of your Exim config file. You will also
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need to define one new transport. With Exim 3, you'll need to add a
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new director; with Exim 4, a new router plays the same role.
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Finally, the configuration supplied here should allow co-habiting
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Mailman 2.0 and 2.1 installations, with the proviso that you'll
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probably want to use mm21 in place of mailman - e.g., MM21_HOME,
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6.2.2 Main configuration settings
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First, you need to add some macros to the top of your Exim config
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file. These just make the director (router) and transport below a bit
580
cleaner. Obviously, you'll need to edit these based on how you
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configured and installed Mailman.
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# Home dir for your Mailman installation -- aka Mailman's prefix
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MAILMAN_HOME=/usr/local/mailman
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MAILMAN_WRAP=MAILMAN_HOME/mail/mailman
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# User and group for Mailman, should match your --with-mail-gid
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# switch to Mailman's configure script.
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MAILMAN_GROUP=mailman
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6.2.3 Transport for Exim 3
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Add this to the transports section of your Exim config file, i.e.
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somewhere between the first and second ``end'' line:
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command = MAILMAN_WRAP \
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'${if def:local_part_suffix \
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{${sg{$local_part_suffix}{-(\\w+)(\\+.*)?}{\$1}}} \
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current_directory = MAILMAN_HOME
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home_directory = MAILMAN_HOME
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group = MAILMAN_GROUP
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6.2.4 Director for Exim 3
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If you're using Exim 3, you'll need to add the following director to
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your config file (directors go between the second and third ``end''
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lines). Also, don't forget that order matters - e.g. you can make
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Mailman lists take precedence over system aliases by putting this
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director in front of your aliasfile director, or vice-versa.
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# Handle all addresses related to a list 'foo': the posting address.
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# Automatically detects list existence by looking
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# for lists/$local_part/config.pck under MAILMAN_HOME.
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require_files = MAILMAN_HOME/lists/$local_part/config.pck
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suffix = -bounces : -bounces+* : \
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-confirm+* : -join : -leave : \
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-owner : -request : -admin
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transport = mailman_transport
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6.2.5 Router for Exim 4
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In Exim 4, there's no such thing as directors - you need to add a new
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router instead. Also, the canonical order of the configuration file
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was changed so routers come before transports, so the router for Exim
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4 comes first here. Put this router somewhere after the ``begin
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routers'' line of your config file, and remember that order matters.
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require_files = MAILMAN_HOME/lists/$local_part/config.pck
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local_part_suffix_optional
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local_part_suffix = -admin : -bounces : -bounces+* : \
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-confirm : -confirm+* : \
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-owner : -request : \
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-subscribe : -unsubscribe
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transport = mailman_transport
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6.2.6 Transports for Exim 4
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The transport for Exim 4 is the same as for Exim 3 (see 6.2; just copy
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the transport given above to somewhere under the ``begin transports''
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line of your Exim config file.
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6.2.7 Additional notes
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Exim should be configured to allow reasonable volume - e.g. don't set
658
max_recipients down to a silly value - and with normal degrees of
659
security - specifically, be sure to allow relaying from 127.0.0.1, but
660
pretty much nothing else. Parallel deliveries and other tweaks can
661
also be used if you like; experiment with your setup to see what
662
works. Delay warning messages should be switched off or configured to
663
only happen for non-list mail, unless you like receiving tons of mail
664
when some random host is down.
668
* Mailman will send as many MAIL FROM/RCPT TO as it needs. It may
669
result in more than 10 or 100 messages sent in one connection,
670
which will exceed the default value of Exim's
671
smtp_accept_queue_per_connection value. This is bad because it
672
will cause Exim to switch into queue mode and severely delay
673
delivery of your list messages. The way to fix this is to set
674
Mailman's SMTP_MAX_SESSIONS_PER_CONNECTION (in
675
$prefix/Mailman/mm_cfg.py) to a smaller value than Exim's
676
smtp_accept_queue_per_connection.
677
* Mailman should ignore Exim delay warning messages, even though
678
Exim should never send this to list messages. Mailman 2.1's
679
general bounce detection and VERP support should greatly improve
680
the bounce detector's hit rates.
681
* List existence is determined by the existence of a config.pck file
682
for a list. If you delete lists by foul means, be aware of this.
683
* If you are getting Exim or Mailman complaining about user ids when
684
you send mail to a list, check that the MAILMAN_USER and
685
MAILMAN_GROUP match those of Mailman itself (i.e. what were used
686
in the configure script). Also make sure you do not have aliases
687
in the main alias file for the list.
689
6.2.9 Receiver Verification
691
Exim's receiver verification feature is very useful - it lets Exim
692
reject unrouteable addresses at SMTP time. However, this is most
693
useful for externally-originating mail that is addressed to mail in
694
one of your local domains. For Mailman list traffic, mail originates
695
on your server, and is addressed to random external domains that are
696
not under your control. Furthermore, each message is addressed to many
697
recipients - up to 500 if you use Mailman's default configuration and
698
don't tweak SMTP_MAX_RCPTS.
700
Doing receiver verification on Mailman list traffic is a recipe for
701
trouble. In particular, Exim will attempt to route every recipient
702
addresses in outgoing Mailman list posts. Even though this requires
703
nothing more than a few DNS lookups for each address, it can still
704
introduce significant delays. Therefore, you should disable recipient
705
verification for Mailman traffic.
707
Under Exim 3, put this in your main configuration section:
709
receiver_verify_hosts = !127.0.0.1
711
Under Exim 4, this is probably already taken care of for you by the
712
default recipient verification ACL statement (in the RCPT TO ACL):
714
accept domains = +local_domains
716
message = unknown user
719
which only does recipient verification on addresses in your domain.
720
(That's not exactly the same as doing recipient verification only on
721
messages coming from non-127.0.0.1 hosts, but it should do the trick
726
Exim's SMTP callback feature is an even more powerful way to detect
727
bogus sender addresses than normal sender verification. Unfortunately,
728
lots of servers send bounce messages with a bogus address in the
729
header, and there are plenty that send bounces with bogus envelope
730
senders (even though they're supposed to just use an empty envelope
733
In order to ensure that Mailman can disable/remove bouncing addresses,
734
you generally want to receive bounces for Mailman lists, even if those
735
bounces are themselves not bounceable. Thus, you might want to disable
736
SMTP callback on bounce messages.
738
With Exim 4, you can accomplish this using something like the
739
following in your RCPT TO ACL:
741
# Accept bounces to lists even if callbacks or other checks would fail
742
warn message = X-WhitelistedRCPT-nohdrfromcallback: Yes
744
${if and {{match{$local_part}{(.*)-bounces\+.*}} \
745
{exists {MAILMAN_HOME/lists/$1/config.pck}}} \
749
${if and {{match{$local_part}{(.*)-bounces\+.*}} \
750
{exists {MAILMAN_HOME/lists/$1/config.pck}}} \
753
# Now, check sender address with SMTP callback.
754
deny !verify = sender/callout=90s
756
If you also do SMTP callbacks on header addresses, you'll want
757
something like this in your DATA ACL:
759
deny !condition = $header_X-WhitelistedRCPT-nohdrfromcallback:
760
!verify = header_sender/callout=90s
762
6.2.11 Doing VERP with Exim and Mailman
764
VERP will send one email, with a separate envelope sender (return
765
path), for each of your subscribers - read the information in
766
$prefix/Mailman/Defaults.py for the options that start with VERP. In a
767
nutshell, all you need to do to enable VERP with Exim is to add these
768
lines to $prefix/Mailman/mm_cfg.py:
770
VERP_PASSWORD_REMINDERS = Yes
771
VERP_PERSONALIZED_DELIVERIES = Yes
772
VERP_DELIVERY_INTERVAL = Yes
773
VERP_CONFIRMATIONS = Yes
775
(The director (router) above is smart enough to deal with VERP
778
6.2.12 Virtual Domains
780
One approach to handling virtual domains is to use a separate Mailman
781
installation for each virtual domain. Currently, this is the only way
782
to have lists with the same name in different virtual domains handled
785
In this case, the MAILMAN_HOME and MAILMAN_WRAP macros are useless -
786
you can remove them. Change your director (router) to something like
789
require_files = /virtual/${domain}/mailman/lists/${lc:$local_part}/config.pck
791
and change your transport like this:
793
command = /virtual/${domain}/mailman/mail/mailman \
794
${if def:local_part_suffix \
795
{${sg{$local_part_suffix}{-(\\w+)(\\+.*)?}{\$1}}}
798
current_directory = /virtual/${domain}/mailman
799
home_directory = /virtual/${domain}/mailman
801
6.2.13 List Verification
803
This is how a set of address tests for the Exim lists look on a
804
working system. The list in question is
805
quixote-users@mems-exchange.org, and these commands were run on the
806
mems-exchange.org mail server ("% " indicates the Unix shell prompt):
808
% exim -bt quixote-users
809
quixote-users@mems-exchange.org
810
router = mailman_main_router, transport = mailman_transport
812
% exim -bt quixote-users-request
813
quixote-users-request@mems-exchange.org
814
router = mailman_router, transport = mailman_transport
816
% exim -bt quixote-users-bounces
817
quixote-users-bounces@mems-exchange.org
818
router = mailman_router, transport = mailman_transport
820
% exim -bt quixote-users-bounces+luser=example.com
821
quixote-users-bounces+luser=example.com@mems-exchange.org
822
router = mailman_router, transport = mailman_transport
824
If your exim -bt output looks something like this, that's a start: at
825
least it means Exim will pass the right messages to the right Mailman
826
commands. It by no means guarantees that your Exim/Mailman
827
installation is functioning perfectly, though!
829
6.2.14 Document History
831
Originally written by Nigel Metheringham postmaster@exim.org. Updated
832
by Marc Merlin marc_soft@merlins.org for Mailman 2.1, Exim 4.
833
Overhauled/reformatted/clarified/simplified by Greg Ward
836
6.3 Using the Sendmail mail server
838
Warning: You may be tempted to set the DELIVERY_MODULE configuration
839
variable in mm_cfg.py to 'Sendmail' when using the Sendmail mail
840
server. Don't. The Sendmail.py module is misnamed - it's really a
841
command line based message handoff scheme as opposed to the SMTP
842
scheme used in SMTPDirect.py (the default). Sendmail.py has known
843
security holes and is provided as a proof-of-concept only^4. If you
844
are having problems using SMTPDirect.py fix those instead of using
845
Sendmail.py, or you may open your system up to security exploits.
847
6.3.1 Sendmail ``smrsh'' compatibility
849
Many newer versions of Sendmail come with a restricted execution
850
utility called ``smrsh'', which limits the executables that Sendmail
851
will allow to be used as mail programs. You need to explicitly allow
852
Mailman's wrapper program to be used with smrsh or Mailman will not
853
work. If mail is not getting delivered to Mailman's wrapper program
854
and you're getting an ``operating system error'' in your mail syslog,
855
this could be your problem.
857
One good way of enabling this is:
859
* Find out where your Sendmail executes its smrsh wrapper
860
% grep smrsh /etc/mail/sendmail.cf
862
* Figure out where smrsh expects symlinks for allowable mail
863
programs. At the very beginning of the following output you will
864
see a full path to some directory, e.g. /var/adm/sm.bin or
866
% strings $path_to_smrsh | less
868
* cd into /var/adm/sm.bin, or where ever it happens to reside on
869
your system - alternatives include /etc/smrsh, /var/smrsh and
873
* Create a symbolic link to Mailman's wrapper program:
874
% ln -s /usr/local/mailman/mail/mailman mailman
876
6.3.2 Integrating Sendmail and Mailman
878
David Champion has contributed a recipe for more closely integrating
879
Sendmail and Mailman, such that Sendmail will automatically recognize
880
and deliver to new mailing lists as they are created, without having
881
to manually edit alias tables.
883
In the contrib directory of Mailman's source distribution, you will
886
* mm-handler.readme - an explanation of how to set everything up
887
* mm-handler - the mail delivery agent (MDA)
888
* mailman.mc - a toy configuration file sample
889
* virtusertable - a sample for RFC 2142 address exceptions
891
6.3.3 Performance notes
893
One of the surest performance killers for Sendmail users is when
894
Sendmail is configured to synchronously verify the recipient's host
895
via DNS. If it does this for messages posted to it from Mailman, you
896
will get horrible performance. Since Mailman usually connects via
897
localhost (i.e. 127.0.0.1) to the SMTP port of Sendmail, you should be
898
sure to configure Sendmail to not do DNS verification synchronously
899
for localhost connections.
901
6.4 Using the Qmail mail server
903
There are some issues that users of the qmail mail transport agent
904
have encountered. None of the core maintainers use qmail, so all of
905
this information has been contributed by the Mailman user community,
906
especially Martin Preishuber and Christian Tismer, with notes by
907
Balazs Nagy (BN) and Norbert Bollow (NB).
909
* You might need to set the mail-gid user to either qmail, mailman,
910
or nofiles by using the --with-mail-gid configure option.
911
BN: it highly depends on your mail storing policy. For example if
912
you use the simple ~alias/.qmail-* files, you can use `id -g
913
alias`. But if you use /var/qmail/users, the specified mail gid
915
If you are going to be directing virtual domains directly to the
916
mailman user (using ``virtualdomains'' on a list-only domain, for
917
example), you will have to use --with-mail-gid=gid of mailman
918
user's group. This is incompatible with having list aliases in
919
~alias, unless that alias simply forwards to mailman-listname*.
920
* If there is a user mailman on your system, the alias mailman-owner
921
will work only in ~mailman. You have to do a touch .qmail-owner in
922
~mailman directory to create this alias.
923
NB: An alternative, IMHO better solution is to chown root
924
~mailman, that will stop qmail from considering mailman to be a
925
user to whom mail can be delivered. (See ``man 8 qmail-getpw''.)
926
* In a related issue, if you have any users with the same name as
927
one of your mailing lists, you will have problems if list names
928
contain "-" in them. Putting .qmail redirections into the user's
929
home directory doesn't work because the Mailman wrappers will not
930
get spawned with the proper GID. The solution is to put the
931
following lines in the /var/qmail/users/assign file:
932
+zope-:alias:112:11:/var/qmail/alias:-:zope-:
934
where in this case the listname is e.g. zope-users.
935
NB: Alternatively, you could host the lists on a virtual domain,
936
and use the /var/qmail/control/virtualdomains file to put the
937
mailman user in charge of this virtual domain.
938
* BN:If inbound messages are delivered by another user than mailman,
939
it's necessary to allow it to access ~mailman. Be sure that
940
~mailman has group writing access and setgid bit is set. Then put
941
the delivering user to mailman group, and you can deny access to
942
~mailman to others. Be sure that you can do the same with the WWW
944
By the way the best thing is to make a virtual mail server to
945
handle all of the mail. NB: E.g. make an additional "A" DNS record
946
for the virtual mailserver pointing to your IP address, add the
947
line lists.kva.hu:mailman to /var/qmail/control/virtualdomains and
948
a lists.kva.hu line to /var/qmail/control/rcpthosts file. Don't
949
forget to HUP the qmail-send after modifying ``virtualdomains''.
950
Then every mail to lists.kva.hu will arrive to mail.kva.hu's
952
Then make your aliases:
953
.qmail => mailman@...'s letters
954
.qmail-owner => mailman-owner's letters
955
For list aliases, you can either create them manually:
956
.qmail-list => posts to the 'list' list
957
.qmail-list-admin => posts to the 'list's owner
958
.qmail-list-request => requests to 'list'
960
or for automatic list alias handling (when using the lists.kva.hu
961
virtual as above), see contrib/qmail-to-mailman.py in the Mailman
962
source distribution. Modify the ~mailman/.qmail-default to
964
|preline /path/to/python /path/to/qmail-to-mailman.py
965
and new lists will automatically be picked up.
966
* You have to make sure that the localhost can relay. If you start
967
qmail via inetd and tcpenv, you need some line the following in
968
your /etc/hosts.allow file:
969
tcp-env: 127. 10.205.200. : setenv RELAYCLIENT
970
where 10.205.200. is your IP address block. If you use tcpserver,
971
then you need something like the following in your /etc/tcp.smtp
973
10.205.200.:allow,RELAYCLIENT=""
974
127.:allow,RELAYCLIENT=""
975
* BN: Bigger /var/qmail/control/concurrencyremote values work better
976
sending outbound messages, within reason. Unless you know your
977
system can handle it (many if not most cannot) this should not be
978
set to a value greater than 120.
979
* More information about setting up qmail and relaying can be found
980
in the qmail documentation.
982
BN: Last but not least, here's a little script to generate aliases to
983
your lists (if for some reason you can/will not have them
984
automatically picked up using contrib/qmail-to-mailman.py):
986
This script is for the Mailman 2.0 series:
991
echo Making links to $i in the current directory...
992
echo "|preline /home/mailman/mail/mailman post $i" > .qmail-$i
993
echo "|preline /home/mailman/mail/mailman mailowner $i" > .qmail-$i-admin
994
echo "|preline /home/mailman/mail/mailman mailowner $i" > .qmail-$i-owner
995
echo "|preline /home/mailman/mail/mailman mailowner $i" > .qmail-owner-$i
996
echo "|preline /home/mailman/mail/mailman mailcmd $i" > .qmail-$i-request
999
Note: This is for a new Mailman 2.1 installation. Users upgrading from
1000
Mailman 2.0 would most likely change /usr/local/mailman to
1001
/home/mailman. If in doubt, refer to the --prefix option passed to
1002
configure during compile time.
1007
echo Making links to $i in the current directory...
1008
echo "|preline /usr/local/mailman/mail/mailman post $i" > .qmail-$i
1009
echo "|preline /usr/local/mailman/mail/mailman admin $i" > .qmail-$i-admin
1010
echo "|preline /usr/local/mailman/mail/mailman bounces $i" > .qmail-$i-boun
1012
# The following line is for VERP
1013
# echo "|preline /usr/local/mailman/mail/mailman bounces $i" > .qmail-$i-bo
1015
echo "|preline /usr/local/mailman/mail/mailman confirm $i" > .qmail-$i-conf
1017
echo "|preline /usr/local/mailman/mail/mailman join $i" > .qmail-$i-join
1018
echo "|preline /usr/local/mailman/mail/mailman leave $i" > .qmail-$i-leave
1019
echo "|preline /usr/local/mailman/mail/mailman owner $i" > .qmail-$i-owner
1020
echo "|preline /usr/local/mailman/mail/mailman request $i" > .qmail-$i-requ
1022
echo "|preline /usr/local/mailman/mail/mailman subscribe $i" > .qmail-$i-su
1024
echo "|preline /usr/local/mailman/mail/mailman unsubscribe $i" > .qmail-$i-
1028
6.4.1 Information on VERP
1030
You will note in the alias generating script for 2.1 above, there is a
1031
line for VERP that has been commented out. If you are interested in
1032
VERP there are two options. The first option is to allow Mailman to do
1033
the VERP formatting. To activate this, uncomment that line and add the
1034
following lines to your mm_cfg.py file:
1036
VERP_FORMAT = '%(bounces)s-+%(mailbox)s=%(host)s'
1037
VERP_REGEXP = r'^(?P<bounces>.*?)-\+(?P<mailbox>[^=]+)=(?P<host>[^@]+)@.*$'
1039
The second option is a patch on SourceForge located at:
1041
http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=300103&aid=645513&gro
1044
This patch currently needs more testing and might best be suitable for
1045
developers or people well familiar with qmail. Having said that, this
1046
patch is the more qmail-friendly approach resulting in large
1049
6.4.2 Virtual mail server
1051
As mentioned in the 6.4 section for a virtual mail server, a patch
1052
under testing is located at:
1054
http://sf.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid=621257&group_id=103&at
1057
Again, this patch is for people familiar with their qmail
1060
6.4.3 More information
1062
You might be interested in some information on modifying footers that
1063
Norbert Bollow has written about Mailman and qmail, available here:
1065
http://mailman.cis.to/qmail-verh/
1067
7 Review your site defaults
1069
Mailman has a large number of site-wide configuration options which
1070
you should now review and change according to your needs. Some of the
1071
options control how Mailman interacts with your environment, and other
1072
options select defaults for newly created lists^5. There are system
1073
tuning parameters and integration options.
1075
The full set of site-wide defaults lives in the
1076
$prefix/Mailman/Defaults.py file, however you should never modify this
1077
file! Instead, change the mm_cfg.py file in that same directory. You
1078
only need to add values to mm_cfg.py that are different than the
1079
defaults in Defaults.py, and future Mailman upgrades are guaranteed
1080
never to touch your mm_cfg.py file.
1082
The Defaults.py file is documented extensively, so the options are not
1083
described here. The Defaults.py and mm_cfg.py are both Python files so
1084
valid Python syntax must be maintained or your Mailman installation
1087
Note: Do not change the HOME_DIR or MAILMAN_DIR variables. These are
1088
set automatically by the configure script, and you will break your
1089
Mailman installation by if you change these.
1091
You should make any changes to mm_cfg.py using the account you
1092
installed Mailman under in the 14 section.
1094
8 Create a site-wide mailing list
1096
After you have completed the integration of Mailman and your mail
1097
server, you need to create a ``site-wide'' mailing list. This is the
1098
one that password reminders will appear to come from, and it is
1099
required for proper Mailman operation. Usually this should be a list
1100
called mailman, but if you need to change this, be sure to change the
1101
MAILMAN_SITE_LIST variable in mm_cfg.py. You can create the site list
1102
with this command, following the prompts:
1104
% bin/newlist mailman
1106
Now configure your site list. There is a convenient template for a
1107
generic site list in the installation directory, under
1108
data/sitelist.cfg which can help you with this. You should review the
1109
configuration options in the template, but note that any options not
1110
named in the sitelist.cfg file won't be changed.
1112
The template can be applied to your site list by running:
1114
% bin/config_list -i data/sitelist.cfg mailman
1116
After applying the sitelist.cfg options, be sure you review the site
1117
list's configuration via the admin pages.
1119
You should also subscribe yourself to the site list.
1123
Several Mailman features occur on a regular schedule, so you must set
1124
up cron to run the right programs at the right time^6.
1126
If your version of crontab supports the -u option, you must be root to
1127
do this next step. Add $prefix/cron/crontab.in as a crontab entry by
1128
executing these commands:
1131
% crontab -u mailman crontab.in
1133
If you used the --with-username option, use that user name instead of
1134
mailman for the -u argument value. If your crontab does not support
1135
the -u option, try these commands:
1139
% crontab crontab.in
1141
10 Start the Mailman qrunner
1143
Mailman depends on a process called the ``qrunner'' to delivery all
1144
email messages it sees. You must start the qrunner by executing the
1145
following command from the $prefix directory:
1147
% bin/mailmanctl start
1149
You probably want to start Mailman every time you reboot your system.
1150
Exactly how to do this depends on your operating system. If your OS
1151
supports the chkconfig command (e.g. RedHat and Mandrake Linuxes) you
1152
can do the following (as root, from the Mailman install directory):
1154
% cp scripts/mailman /etc/init.d/mailman
1155
% chkconfig --add mailman
1157
Note that /etc/init.d may be /etc/rc.d/init.d on some systems.
1159
On Gentoo Linux, you can do the following:
1161
% cp scripts/mailman /etc/init.d/mailman
1162
% rc-update add mailman default
1164
On Debian, you probably want to use:
1166
% update-rc.d mailman defaults
1168
For Unixes that don't support chkconfig, you might try the following
1171
% cp scripts/mailman /etc/init.d/mailman
1172
% cp misc/mailman /etc/init.d
1173
% cd /etc/rc.d/rc0.d
1174
% ln -s ../init.d/mailman K12mailman
1176
% ln -s ../init.d/mailman K12mailman
1178
% ln -s ../init.d/mailman S98mailman
1180
% ln -s ../init.d/mailman S98mailman
1182
% ln -s ../init.d/mailman S98mailman
1184
% ln -s ../init.d/mailman S98mailman
1186
% ln -s ../init.d/mailman K12mailman
1188
11 Check the hostname settings
1190
You should check the values for DEFAULT_EMAIL_HOST and
1191
DEFAULT_URL_HOST in Defaults.py. Make any necessary changes in the
1192
mm_cfg.py file, not in the Defaults.py file. If you change either of
1193
these two values, you'll want to add the following afterwards in the
1196
add_virtualhost(DEFAULT_URL_HOST, DEFAULT_EMAIL_HOST)
1198
You will want to run the bin/fix_url.py to change the domain of any
1201
12 Create the site password
1203
There are two site-wide passwords that you can create from the command
1204
line, using the bin/mmsitepass script. The first is the ``site
1205
password'' which can be used anywhere a password is required in the
1206
system. The site password will get you into the administration page
1207
for any list, and it can be used to log in as any user. Think root for
1208
a Unix system, so pick this password wisely!
1210
The second password is a site-wide ``list creator'' password. You can
1211
use this to delegate the ability to create new mailing lists without
1212
providing all the privileges of the site password. Of course, the
1213
owner of the site password can also create new mailing lists, but the
1214
list creator password is limited to just that special role.
1216
To set the site password, use this command:
1218
% $prefix/bin/mmsitepass <your-site-password>
1220
To set the list creator password, use this command:
1222
% $prefix/bin/mmsitepass -c <list-creator-password>
1224
It is okay not to set a list creator password, but you probably do
1225
want a site password.
1227
13 Create your first mailing list
1229
For more detailed information about using Mailman, including creating
1230
and configuring mailing lists, see the Mailman List Adminstration
1231
Manual. These instructions provide a quick guide to creating your
1232
first mailing list via the web interface:
1234
* Start by visiting the url http://my.dom.ain/mailman/create.
1235
* Fill out the form as described in the on-screen instructions, and
1236
in the ``List creator's password'' field, type the password you
1237
entered in section 7. Type your own email address for the
1238
``Initial list owner address'', and select ``Yes'' to notify the
1240
* Click on the ``Create List'' button.
1241
* Check your email for a message from Mailman informing you that
1242
your new mailing list was created.
1243
* Now visit the list's administration page, either by following the
1244
link on the confirmation web page or clicking on the link from the
1245
email Mailman just sent you. Typically the url will be something
1246
like http://my.dom.ain/mailman/admin/mylist.
1247
* Type in the list's password and click on ``Let me in...''
1248
* Click on ``Membership Management'' and then on ``Mass
1250
* Enter your email address in the big text field, and click on
1251
``Submit Your Changes''.
1252
* Now go to your email and send a message to mylist@my.dom.ain.
1253
Within a minute or two you should see your message reflected back
1256
Congratulations! You've just set up and tested your first Mailman
1257
mailing list. If you had any problems along the way, please see the 14
1262
If you encounter problems with running Mailman, first check the
1263
question and answer section below. If your problem is not covered
1264
there, check the online help, including the FAQ and the community FAQ
1267
Also check for errors in your syslog files, your mail and web server
1268
log files and in Mailman's $prefix/logs/error file. If you're still
1269
having problems, you should send a message to the
1270
mailman-users@python.org mailing list^7; see
1271
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/mailman-users for more
1274
Be sure to including information on your operating system, which
1275
version of Python you're using, and which version of Mailman you're
1278
Here is a list of some common questions and answers:
1280
* Problem: All Mailman web pages give a 404 File not found error.
1281
Solution: Your web server has not been set up properly for
1282
handling Mailman's CGI programs. Make sure you have:
1283
1. configured the web server to give permissions to
1285
2. restarted the web server properly.
1286
Consult your web server's documentation for instructions on how to
1287
do check these issues.
1288
* Problem: All Mailman web pages give an "Internal Server Error".
1289
Solution: The likely problem is that you are using the wrong user
1290
or group for the CGI scripts. Check your web server's log files.
1291
If you see a line like
1292
Attempt to exec script with invalid gid 51, expected 99
1293
you will need to reinstall Mailman, specifying the proper CGI
1294
group id, as described in the section.
1295
* Problem: I send mail to the list, and get back mail saying the
1297
Solution: You probably didn't add the necessary aliases to the
1298
system alias database, or you didn't properly integrate Mailman
1299
with your mail server. Perhaps you didn't update the alias
1300
database, or your system requires you to run newaliases
1301
explicitly. Refer to your server specific instructions in the 6
1303
* Problem: I send mail to the list, and get back mail saying,
1304
``unknown mailer error''.
1305
Solution: The likely problem is that you are using the wrong user
1306
or group id for the mail wrappers. Check your mail server's log
1307
files; if you see a line like
1308
Attempt to exec script with invalid gid 51, expected 99
1309
you will need to reinstall Mailman, specifying the proper mail
1310
group id as described in the section.
1311
* Problem: I use Postfix as my mail server and the mail wrapper
1312
programs are logging complaints about the wrong GID.
1313
Solution: Make sure the $prefix/data/aliases.db file is user owned
1314
by mailman (or whatever user name you used in the configure
1315
command). If this file is not user owned by mailman, Postfix will
1316
not run the mail programs as the correct user.
1317
* Problem: I use Sendmail as my mail server, and when I send mail to
1318
the list, I get back mail saying, ``sh: mailman not available for
1319
sendmail programs''.
1320
Solution: Your system uses the Sendmail restricted shell (smrsh).
1321
You need to configure smrsh by creating a symbolic link from the
1322
mail wrapper ($prefix/mail/mailman) to the directory identifying
1323
executables allowed to run under smrsh.
1324
Some common names for this directory are /var/admin/sm.bin,
1325
/usr/admin/sm.bin or /etc/smrsh.
1326
Note that on Debian Linux, the system makes /usr/lib/sm.bin, which
1327
is wrong, you will need to create the directory /usr/admin/sm.bin
1328
and add the link there. Note further any aliases newaliases spits
1329
out will need to be adjusted to point to the secure link to the
1331
* Problem: I messed up when I called configure. How do I clean
1332
things up and re-install?
1335
% ./configure --with-the-right-options
1338
15 Platform and operating system notes
1340
Generally, Mailman runs on any POSIX-based system, such as Solaris,
1341
the various BSD variants, Linux systems, MacOSX, and other generic
1342
Unix systems. It doesn't run on Windows. For the most part, the
1343
generic instructions given in this document should be sufficient to
1344
get Mailman working on any supported platform. Some operating systems
1345
have additional recommended installation or configuration
1348
15.1 GNU/Linux issues
1350
Linux seems to be the most popular platform for running Mailman. Here
1351
are some hints on getting Mailman to run on Linux:
1353
* If you are getting errors with hard link creations and/or you are
1354
using a special secure kernel (securelinux/openwall/grsecurity),
1355
see the file contrib/README.check_perms_grsecurity in the Mailman
1356
source distribution.
1357
Note that if you are using Linux Mandrake in secure mode, you are
1358
probably concerned by this.
1359
* Apparently Mandrake 9.0 changed the permissions on gcc, so if you
1360
build as the mailman user, you need to be sure mailman is in the
1362
* If you installed Python from your Linux distribution's package
1363
manager (e.g. .rpms for Redhat-derived systems or .deb for
1364
Debian), you must install the ``development'' package of Python,
1365
or you may not get everything you need.
1366
For example, using Python 2.2 on Debian, you will need to install
1367
the python2.2-dev package. On Redhat, you probably need the
1368
python2-devel package.
1369
If you install Python from source, you should be fine.
1370
One symptom of this problem, although for unknown reasons, is that
1371
you might get an error such as this during your install:
1372
Traceback (most recent call last):
1373
File "bin/update", line 44, in ?
1375
ImportError: No module named paths
1376
make: *** [update] Error 1
1377
If this happens, install the Python development package and try
1378
configure and make install again. Or install the latest version of
1379
Python from source, available from http://www.python.org.
1380
This problem can manifest itself in other Linux distributions in
1381
different ways, although usually it appears as ImportErrors.
1385
Vivek Khera writes that some BSDs do nightly security scans for setuid
1386
file changes. setgid directories also come up on the scan when they
1387
change. Also, the setgid bit is not necessary on BSD systems because
1388
group ownership is automatically inherited on files created in
1389
directories. On other Unixes, this only happens when the directory has
1390
the setgid bit turned on.
1392
To install without turning on the setgid bit on directories, simply
1393
pass in the DIRSETGID variable to make, after you've run configure:
1395
% make DIRSETGID=: install
1397
This disables the chmod g+s command on installed directories.
1401
Many people run Mailman on MacOSX. Here are some pointers that have
1402
been collected on getting Mailman to run on MacOSX.
1404
* Jaguar (MacOSX 10.2) comes with Python 2.2. While this isn't the
1405
very latest stable version of Python, it ought to be sufficient to
1407
* David B. O'Donnell has a web page describing his configuration of
1408
Mailman 2.0.13 and Postfix on MacOSX Server.
1409
http://www.afp548.com/Articles/mail/python-mailman.html
1410
* Kathleen Webb posted her experiences in getting Mailman running on
1411
Jaguar using Sendmail.
1412
http://mail.python.org/pipermail/mailman-users/2002-October/022944
1414
* Panther server (MacOSX 10.3) comes with Mailman; Your operating
1415
system should contain documentation that will help you, and Apple
1416
has a tech document about a problem you might encounter running
1417
Mailman on Mac OS X Server 10.3:
1418
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=107889
1420
Terry Allen provides the following detailed instructions on running
1421
Mailman on the 'client' version of OSX, or in earlier versions of OSX:
1423
Mac OSX 10.3 and onwards has the basics for a successful Mailman
1424
installation. Users of earlier versions of Mac OSX contains Sendmail
1425
and those users should look at the Sendmail installation section for
1426
tips. You should follow the basic installation steps as described
1427
earlier in this manual, substituting as appropriate, the steps
1428
outlined in this section.
1430
By default, Mac OSX 10.3 'client' version does not have a fully
1431
functional version of Postfix. Setting up a working MTA such as
1432
Postfix is beyond the scope of this guide and you should refer to
1433
http://www.postfix.org for tips on getting Postfix running. An easy
1434
way to set Postfix up is to install and run Postfix Enabler, a
1435
stand-alone tool for configuring Postfix on Mac OSX, available from
1436
http://www.roadstead.com/weblog/Tutorials/PostfixEnabler.html.
1438
Likewise, Mac OSX 'client' version from 10.1 onwards includes a
1439
working Apache webserver. This is switched on using the System
1440
Preferences control panel under the 'Sharing tab'. A useful tool for
1441
configuring the Apache on Mac OSX is Webmin, which can be obtained
1442
from http://www.webmin.com.
1444
Webmin can also perform configuration for other system tasks,
1445
including Postfix, adding jobs to your crontab, adding user and
1446
groups, plus adding startup and shutdown jobs.
1448
In a stock installation of OSX, the requirement for Mailman is to have
1449
Python installed. Python is not installed by default, so it is advised
1450
that you install the developer's tools package, which may have been
1451
provided with your system. It can also be downloaded from the Apple
1452
developer site at http://connect.apple.com. Not only is the developer
1453
tools package an essential requirement for installing Mailman, but it
1454
will come in handy at a later date should you need other tools. The
1455
developer's tools are also know by the name XCode tools.
1457
As a minimum, the Python version should be 2.2, but 2.3 is
1460
If you wish to add a user and group using the command line in OSX
1461
instead of via Webmin or another GUI interface, open your terminal
1462
application and follow the commands as indicated below - do not type
1463
the comments following the "#" since they are just notes:
1466
niutil -create / /users/mailman
1467
niutil -createprop / /users/mailman name mailman
1468
# Note that xxx is a free user ID number on your system
1469
niutil -createprop / /users/mailman uid xxx
1470
niutil -createprop / /users/mailman home /usr/local/mailman
1471
mkdir -p /usr/local/mailman
1472
niutil -createprop / /users/mailman shell /bin/tcsh
1474
# To prevent malicious hacking, supply a secure password here
1475
niutil -create / /groups/mailman
1476
niutil -createprop / /groups/mailman name mailman
1477
# Note that xxx is a free group ID number on your system
1478
niutil -createprop / /groups/mailman gid xxx
1479
niutil -createprop / /groups/mailman passwd '*'
1480
niutil -createprop / /groups/mailman users 'mailman'
1481
chown mailman:mailman /usr/local/mailman
1482
cd /usr/local/mailman
1487
For setting up Apache on OSX to handle Mailman, the steps are almost
1488
identical and the configuration file on a stock Mac OSX Client version
1489
is stored in the nearly standard location of /etc/httpd/httpd.conf.
1491
The AFP548.com site has a time-saving automated startup item creator
1492
for Mailman, which can be found at
1493
http://www.afp548.com/Software/MailmanStartup.tar.gz
1495
To install it, copy it into your /Library/StartupItems directory. As
1496
the root or superuser, from the terminal, enter the following:
1498
gunzip MailmanStartup.tar.gz
1499
tar xvf MailmanStartup.tar
1501
It will create the startup item for you so that when you reboot,
1502
Mailman will start up.
1504
About this document ...
1506
GNU Mailman - Installation Manual, January 11, 2009, Release 2.1
1508
This document was generated using the LaTeX2HTML translator.
1510
LaTeX2HTML is Copyright � 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, Nikos Drakos,
1511
Computer Based Learning Unit, University of Leeds, and Copyright �
1512
1997, 1998, Ross Moore, Mathematics Department, Macquarie University,
1515
The application of LaTeX2HTML to the Python documentation has been
1516
heavily tailored by Fred L. Drake, Jr. Original navigation icons were
1517
contributed by Christopher Petrilli.
1518
_________________________________________________________________
1523
You will be able to check and repair your permissions after
1524
installation is complete.
1526
.../usr/local/mailman^2
1527
This is the default for Mailman 2.1. Earlier versions of
1528
Mailman installed everything under /home/mailman by default.
1531
BSD users should see the 15.2 section for additional
1535
In fact, in later versions of Mailman, this module is
1536
explicitly sabotaged. You have to know what you're doing in
1537
order to re-enable it.
1540
In general, changing the list defaults described in this
1541
section will not affect any already created lists. To make
1542
changes after a list has been created, use the web interface or
1543
the command line scripts, such as bin/withlist and
1547
Note that if you're upgrading from a previous version of
1548
Mailman, you'll want to install the new crontab, but be careful
1549
if you're running multiple Mailman installations on your site!
1550
Changing the crontab could mess with other parallel Mailman
1554
You must subscribe to this mailing list in order to post to it,
1555
but the mailing list's archives are publicly visible.
1556
_________________________________________________________________
1558
Previous Page Up one Level Next Page GNU Mailman - Installation Manual
1559
_________________________________________________________________
1561
Release 2.1, documentation updated on January 11, 2009.
added
removed
doc/mailman-install.txt
