[BlueOnyx:07108] Re: Majordomo setup

[Michael Stauber]

Hi Christoph,

> I have a few points to be adressed in the majordomo setup resp. in the
> configs generated (which I currently see as pretty useless or even
> dangerous):
> 
> 1. All lists include nobody which maps to admin, means admin User gets
> every mail that is sent over any list on the server. I haven't found a
> reason for this yet. If there is good reason, I'd appreciate some hits
> with the clue-stick.

Yeah, this is some legacy behaviour that has been built into the majordomo 
configuration ever since the Cobalt days. It was even that way before 
Sausalito with the old RaQ1 to RaQ4. I can understand why "admin" gets the 
list bounces (which is bad enough), considering that postmaster maps to 
"admin". But forcibly subscribing (sort of) admin to each list is a bit over 
the head, indeed.

> 2. The lists are open to all sorts of abuse (i.e. who listname), I can't
> see any reason to have the who access open, even to listmembers.

True.
 
> Are the devs planning a new release or would they be open for a patch
> submissions so that the configs created are actually meaningful ?

To be honest: I haven't planned any future work on the Majordomo 
implementation - unless I have to. I've started on the new Mailman integration 
a while ago, as that got kind of jump started with an awesome code 
contribution from a third party (thanks again, Leslie!). With all the things 
that recently went on, I've got a bit distracted there, but in a few weeks 
time BlueOnyx will switch to Mailman.

However: It is not yet clear what we'll do with existing boxes that still have 
Majordomo and if we can convert existing Majordomo lists to Mailman at runtime 
without using CMU, and/or if we can import not only the list settings, but 
also old messages. But I doubt that we'll be able to automatically "yum 
update" existing BlueOnyx boxes from Majordomo to Mailman seamlessly.

So at the worst we may end up with older installs that still run Majordomo 
until they get manually converted, or CMU migrated to a newer BlueOnyx 
(CentOS5 or CentOS6 based) that already runs Mailman instead of Majordomo.

In that case any useful maintenance and fixes that we can integrate into the 
old Majordomo implementation will still be useful and is certainly appreciated 
by those that are using it.

> While it would probably be easier to just fix things with a 5min
> cronjob, I'd think it's a good candidate to fix it in BlueOnyx itself. I
> guess I could manage to fix the files in questions and send in patches,
> however I'd need somebody to review and pack them from the devs. And I
> don't want to waste my time if i.e. there is no interested as you plane
> to move away from majordomo with the next release.
> 
> Is there any interest in fixing this or should I just programmatically
> invoke the sed-awk festival every 5mins ?

I welcome any contribution, Christoph. Please send me your fixes or patches 
and I'll see to it that they're integrated. I'll also send you another email 
offlist about some other details.

-- 
With best regards

Michael Stauber