rBuilder:Manage Mailing Lists

From rPath Wiki

rBuilder provides mailing list options on projects to allow users, both registered and unregistered, to participate in email discussion about the project.

Project owners can manage the mailing lists for that project, including creating the lists, listing list members, adding and inviting users, removing users, and blocking users.

Mailing lists for a project are created from the project's Mailing Lists page. After the list is created, the links to manage the lists take the project owner outside of rBuilder to another application designed to handle mailing lists. This application is an adapted version of the GNU Mailman open source mailing list software. For rBuilder Online, this application is hosted at http://lists.rpath.org.

Some basic mailing list management for rBuilder projects is included on this page. For more information on options and features, see Mailman's documentation resources.

Do not confuse mailing list membership (subscriptions) with project membership. Users can subscribe to mailing lists or be added to a mailing list regardless of being an rBuilder user. Not all project members on a project will subscribe to a mailing list, and not all mailing list members will watch or join the project in rBuilder.

Please see the note about mailing lists for orphaned projects.

Create a Mailing List

Besides having the option to create mailing lists when a project is created, a project owner can create additional mailing lists at any time. The following steps should be used to create a new mailing list.

1. Navigate to the project in rBuilder.
2. Click Manage Mailing Lists in the Project Resources panel.
3. Complete the Create a New Mailing List form at the bottom of the Mailing Lists page. Type the list name (using no spaces), description, and administrative password. Note that the password will be generated randomly if one is not specified here, and this password is required to view and manage the mailing list.
4. Click Create List.
5. Confirm the new mailing list is listed on the Mailing Lists page.

The email address associated with the new list is the list name at the domain configured for the rBuilder's machine to use for email. For example, if a machine is configured to handle rBuilder email using rbuilder.mycompany.com, and the new mailing list name is project1-features, then the email address for the list is project1-features@rbuilder.mycompany.com.

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Access the Admin Page for a List

Project owners have an ADMIN PAGE link displayed for each mailing list on the project's Mailing Lists page. When the project owner clicks this link, a new browser window opens with a prompt for the mailing list password. Type the mailing list password in this box and click Let me in... to access the wide variety of administrative features.

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Add or Invite Mailing List Members

There are two ways that mailing lists can be populated: project owner adding or user subscribing. Provided there are no restrictions on a mailing list, users can subscribe or unsubscribe from the list at any time, even without registering as an rBuilder user. Also, project owners can add or invite members to the list using the following steps.

1. Click the appropriate ADMIN PAGE link from the project's Mailing Lists page.
2. Type the administrative password for the mailing list and click Let me in...
3. Click Membership Management.
4. Click Mass Subscription.
5. Complete the Mass Subscriptions form.
   1. Choose whether to Subscribe or Invite the members.
   2. Type each email address to add to the list, one address per line, in the text box provided. You can also choose to upload a text file containing a list of emails addresses.
   3. Complete the other options as desired.
6. Click Submit Your Changes.

If you have chosen to invite members and to receive notices when a member subscribes to the list, each project owner will receive an email notifying them of the new subscription.

View Mailing List Members

Only a list administrator (project owner) can see the list members of a mailing list. Mailing list members consist of users that were added by a project owner and subscribers that added themselves from the project's Mailing Lists page. Use the following steps to list these mailing list members.

1. Click the appropriate ADMIN PAGE link from the project's Mailing Lists page.
2. Type the administrative password for the mailing list and click Let me in...
3. Click Membership Management....
4. Scroll to the Membership List portion of the page to view the list of members on the list.

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Block or Moderate Mailing List Members

Blocking certain members from participating in mailing list discussions includes two elements: blocking them from receiving email from the list and moderating email they send to the list. If you wish to eliminate a member's ability to send email, you must remove the members from the list. Use the following steps to block and moderate a user's email.

1. Click the appropriate ADMIN PAGE link from the project's Mailing Lists page.
2. Type the administrative password for the mailing list and click Let me in...
3. Click Membership Management....
4. Scroll to the Membership List portion of the page to view the list of members on the list.
5. Check the box in the nomail column for a user to prevent from receiving email.
6. Check the box in the mod column for a user to give list administrators the ability to moderate the email, giving the option to accept or reject the email before it is posted to the membership.
7. Click Submit Your Changes.

Remove Mailing List Members

There are two ways to remove mailing list members: individual selection and mass removal.

Use the following steps to remove, or unsubscribe, individual users.

1. Click the appropriate ADMIN PAGE link from the project's Mailing Lists page.
2. Type the administrative password for the mailing list and click Let me in...
3. Click Membership Management....
4. Scroll to the Membership List portion of the page to view the list of members on the list.
5. Check the box in the unsub column for a user to designate the user to be unsubscribed from the list.
6. Click Submit Your Changes.

Use the following steps to remove several users in a single operation (mass removal).

1. Click the appropriate ADMIN PAGE link from the project's Mailing Lists page.
2. Type the administrative password for the mailing list and click Let me in...
3. Click Membership Management....
4. Click Mass Removal.
5. Complete the Mass Removals form.
   1. Type each email address to remove from the list, one address per line, in the text box provided. You can also choose to upload a text file containing a list of emails addresses.
   2. Complete the other options as desired.
6. Click Submit Your Changes.