Re: mailing with sendmail binary / errors

[Todd Olson <tco2 @ cornell . edu>]

Hi Lee

>Date: Thu, 04 Nov 2004 17:53:11 +0000
>From: lee <davislee@btinternet.com>
>To: list-managers@greatcircle.com
>Subject: mailing with sendmail binary / errors
>Message-ID: <418A6C87.2070600@btinternet.com>
>
>
>hello everyone,
>
>I'm running a mailing list manager using the sendmail binary for
>outgoing mail, because smtp is too restricted to make the 300+
>zubscriber base workable.
>
>Trouble is, when people mail the list they get a 'personal' mail
>delivery error from the mail daemon if there happen to be any dead or
>over quota addresses on the list at that time. Using smtp (on smaller
>lists) seems not to do this.


If you are refering to using entries in the sendmail aliases file
to implement a mailing list, such as

    mylist-l:  john@a.com, jim@b.com, ....

Then to make sure the envelope address gets set correctly
so that mail deamon errors go to the list owner you should add at
least the following line to the aliases file

    owner-mylist-l:  your@name.com


For further details see p264 of 3rd ed of the book "Sendmail" by
Costales & Allman (O'Reilly publisher)

Many MLMs have three lines in the sendmail aliases file

    mylist-l:          "| posting_handling_program"
    owner-mylist-l:    "| error_handling_program"
    mylist-l-request:  "| forwarding_to_human_for_assistance_program"

Details vary depending on the MLM

Regards,
Todd Olson
Cornell University