Managing Mailing Lists: Majordomo, LISTSERV, Listproc, and SmartList

Review by David Barr for Managing Mailing Lists: Majordomo, LISTSERV, Listproc, and SmartList
Rating:
A great book! This book covers both server and list administration for Listproc, Majordomo, SmartList, and LISTSERV Lite. It starts of by covering the basics of an email message and a mailing list, and what mailing list software does. It even covers how you can do some basic mailing list functions with sendmail without using an MLM (Mailing List Manager). While the software this book covers are mostly UNIX-specific, this book is a must-have for anyone wanting to install and run mailing list management software. In one book you can see the different features of the leading UNIX-based MLM’s, and get an honest appraisal of their relative strengths and weaknesses. You may have already have decided on one MLM, but this book may change your mind!Not just for server administrators, this book covers all the issues with respect to managing a mailing list. Learn about how to run a moderated list, or how to offer a digested version of your list. This book is also well laid out — with multiple “layers”. As you read on things are covered in greater detail. The last chapters are an in-depth reference for the commands and features of each MLM covered.

Review by for Managing Mailing Lists: Majordomo, LISTSERV, Listproc, and SmartList
Rating:
I needed to get a listserver up and running in two weeks… I knew perl and linux… O’Reilly came to the rescue. Managing Mailing Lists helped me choose the right MLM, install it, and configure it with little to no hassle. I would like to have seen the book focus on majordomo solely, since the others probably have software manuals and are supported by their vendors. But the info was adequate, and the other chapters on LISTSERV, ListProc, and SmartList helped thicken the book up so that it fits nicely on my O’Reilly bookshelf..The book had quite a few typos, some contradictions, and even some misprints that downright hosed up performance and functionality. But once I got through the installation, I was able to go back and easily spot the errors, as the book does a good job explaining the what’s and why’s of its code. (if the editor reads this, please contact me for a list of corrections for the next edition)As far as I know it’s the only book on majordomo. With a step by step approach (a simple method I wish more books would follow these days) and great hints and tips (BTW, excellent loop-check script incl.) this book gets a 4/5 from me. Typos on critical info/code knocks a point. Second ed. should remedy that… *-)

Review by Gerald Ford for Managing Mailing Lists: Majordomo, LISTSERV, Listproc, and SmartList
Rating:
I bought this book because I needed to familiarize myself with ListProc, Listserve and Majordomo, all 3 of which are used at my University. I got just what I needed. This book covers everything you need to know about these, plus it has some extras which help round out the book. I became convinced that SmartList was useful for my home system, and have installed it, and I also enjoyed some of the articles posted in the book.My only coplaint about this book was the lack of clarity regarding email headers (which came up pretty often throughout). I supposed I should have read the intro chapter more closely. Still, it really wasn’t hard to follow along the book. I enjoyed this book much and can’t wait to see the Second Edition.

Review by Makiko Itoh for Managing Mailing Lists: Majordomo, LISTSERV, Listproc, and SmartList
Rating:
I don’t know about the other MLMs described in this book, but if you must administer a Majordomo mailing list, this book is essential. You should also subscribe to the majordomo users list and the list moderator’s list (if that applies to you) at GreatCircle.com too, but for having the information you need about how to set up the config files and the users etc for generating digests and so on, this book is quite useful. However, it has some shortcomings – not much information about setting up web archives, or dealing with MIME, etc. And there is nothing at all about Mailman, the other heavyweight mailing list manager. Perhaps an update is due that covers Mailman?

Review by for Managing Mailing Lists: Majordomo, LISTSERV, Listproc, and SmartList
Rating:
I wouldn’t recommend this book to anybody trying to set up a mailing list. This would be more appropriate in the hands of some manager who just wants a quick rundown on how e-mail works and then hire someone to set up a mailing list for him/her.Through all the pages of the text, this book didn’t provide any useful information on setting up mailing lists. The author is vague and never focuses on any mailing list manager program, instead he just gives little facts on all different ones. One cannot possibly set up a mailing list from the info in this book.Often the book would raise questions and leave them unanswered. He would describe certain problems with mailing lists (i.e. malicious attacks, susceptibility to human errors), but it was up to you and a lot of web surfing to find out how to solve these problems.Not the kind of text I would expect O’Reilly to print.