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administrivia: notes on using this list
Digest.Net mailing list "Meta FAQ"
These general notes on using Digest.Net mailing lists are posted on
the 1st and 15th of each month. This file may be found on the web
at /general-notes.txt
[last revised 8/2/00; 7 bit ascii restriction experimentally
lifted due to yahoo mail signature problem; mention of new
web based subscription form.]
Special Notes
1) messagemedia.com & 21stcentury.com appear to have some significant
spam issues, and are blocked from access to this server.
Table of Contents
1. Why don't my postings go through?
2. Why can't I unsubscribe?
3. How do I post to the list?
4. Where are the archives?
5. What other lists are on digest.net?
6. Is there a web subscription form?
7. Why not move the lists to someplace like (egroups, topica,...)?
8. What is Krusty Motorsports, anyway?
The Meta-FAQ
1. Why don't my postings go through?
There are several things that may interfere with postings
making it to the list.
a) Are you a member?
Some read the ftp archives rather than receiving the list
in email. Persons who read the list via email are
automatically members, but readers of the FTP archive are not,
and need to contact me (rwelty@domain.elided) and get
your name added to the list of "permitted senders".
b) has your email address changed?
some of you have had changes in your email address. your old
address still works, and is still on the list, but your From:
line shows a new address. this can happen for various reasons;
you may have changed jobs or ISPs, and left a forward in place,
or your IT staff may have fiddled with the email system.
you will need to unsubscribe your old email address and subscribe
the new one. this may require my involvement, if you can't figure
out a way to get your old address off the list using the conventional
majordomo commands. you can use the majordomo "which" command to
probe for old addresses. send a message to majordomo@domain.elided
with one or more which commands in the body, one per line. to
check for potential addresses for Fred Flinstone, formerly of
bedrock.org, the following commands can be sent:
which flintstone
which bedrock
note that the matches above might return any of the following
addresses, if they appear in the list (in other words, you can
use vagueness and incompleteness in your recollection as a tool):
Fred.Flinstone@domain.elided
fflinstone@domain.elided
flintstonef@domain.elided
c) do you have more than one email address?
if so, only the subscribed addresses can post, unless you contact
me (see 1.a) above for relevant information)
d) are you using (intentionally or accidentially) special "features"
of your mail client?
formats such as html, rtf, and the like, are blocked as they
don't work well in digest format and annoy many readers of the
digest. most kinds of attachments are blocked for similar
reasons -- binaries, word documents, and excel spreadsheets are
simply not good things to send to the digest. virtual business
cards (a Netscape "feature") are blocked as well. you need to turn
off any special features of this type to get your mail through the
digest.
e) are your posts too large?
there is a 10,000 character limit on posting sizes; this is done
for various reasons. you can always split up large postings to
get mail through.
f) are you including majordomo commands at the start of your message?
administrivia control is turned on; this is a trap for things
like "unsubscribe" at the start of a message. try to avoid obvious
majordomo commands in the subject and the first 10 lines, or
misspell them in obvious ways (e.g. unzubscribe, 1ndex, h3lp,
g3t, etc.)
g) are you triggering spam traps?
some things are red flags; for example, the following phrases
in subject lines are automatically blocked:
Important Message From
growth stocks
free calling card
direct e-mail secrets
Merchant Account
Mass Marketing
make money fast
Pediatric advice
Email ? Million People
what "they" don't want
are you being investigated
the actual list is quite a bit longer; i think you get the idea.
h) are you using "funky" character sets?
[7 bit restriction lifted experimentally on 8/2/00 -- film at 11]
unfortunately, there are "issues" if i permit any character set
other than old fashioned 7 level ASCII; therefore, you need to
avoid national character sets that include various accents, umlauts,
national currency characters such as the British pound symbol, etc.
i) are you unintentionally including complete digests in your reply?
You need to check and make sure you cut down replys to the minimal
size; digests are between 20,000 and 25,000 characters in length,
and if you include a complete digest in your reply, it clearly won't
make the 10,000 character limit. By the way, this feature is
intentional.
j) Are you using a "bad" ISP or mail relay?
Krusty Motorsports (aka digest.net) subscribes to the "MAPS
Realtime Blackhole List" and the "MAPS Relay Spam Stopper".
These lists block email from known sources of spam (either ISPs
with bad attitudes or policies, or badly managed mail environments.)
Interested parties should visit http://www.mail-abuse.org/ for full
details.
k) Is the error message you get back "User Unknown"?
If so, you may be running afoul of MAPS (see j above). MAPS returns
an error code of 550, which is a generic code that many broken
mail systems report as "user unknown". If you know the IP address
of your ISPs mail relay, you can go to the maps web site and test
to see if it is on the RBL or the RSS. Additionally, the "rejectlog"
entries for the previous day's mail traffic on digest.net are now
visible at /rejectlog.01
Finally, some of you may find it useful or instructive to use the
telnet program to connect directly to port 25 on krusty-motorsports.com
and see what kind of reply you get; this requires some technical
knowledge and is not for everyone (you can get out of this at anytime
after the initial banner simply by typing quit and hitting enter.)
2. Why can't I unsubscribe?
a) are you using the right address?
send to majordomo@domain.elided, and the command format is
unsubscribe list-name my-email-address
b) has your email address changed?
majordomo has no way of knowing that Fred.Flinstone@domain.elided was
once fflintstone@domain.elided. you can check this with the which
command (see 1.b) above for details)
3. How do I post to the list?
You may use either one of two addresses: for example, the bmw-digest
may be reached using either bmw@domain.elided or bmw-digest@domain.elided
If you are using the correct addresses and your posts don't show
up, check out the stuff in 1. above.
4. Where are the archives?
see ftp://ftp.digest.net/ for digest archives. the web archives have
proven problematic, and are awaiting time for a systematic attack
on the problems they've been having.
5. What other lists are on digest.net?
see / for more information.
6. Is there a web subscription form?
Yes, recently added. go to
/bin/digest-subs.cgi
7. Why not move the lists to someplace like (egroups, topica,...)?
The Krusty Motorsports server (aka, digest.net) was explicitly
to provide for efficient management of the various automotive
mailing lists, done the way that the owner of the server wanted
it done. Any migration off of the server (which is already bought,
paid for, and configured, would create any number of issues.
8. What is Krusty Motorsports, anyway?
Krusty Motorsports (http:/www.krusty-motorsports.com/) is a
business which is owned and operated by Richard Welty
(rwelty@domain.elided). Krusty is, as of this writing,
changing from a DBA in Rensselaer County, New York, to an
S-Corporation in the State of New York. Krusty provides a number
of Internet related services, such as mailing list, web sites,
pop3/telnet accounts, and consulting on internet related issues.
For more information, see the web site for Krusty.
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