The mailing list for listmasters using Sympa

[Olivier Salaün - CRU <address@concealed>]

Jeff Abbott wrote:

> One of the areas where I believe the Sympa documentation is  
> especially lacking is with regard to list families.  In considering  
> them for use at Duke, I'm wondering about how they're intended to be  
> used and whether or not a list can be added to or removed from a  
> family at will.

Yes a family list can be removed just like a "normal" list.
A  single list can also be added to a family with 'sympa.pl --add_list', 
as described here  : 
http://www.sympa.org/doc/html/node18.html#SECTION001825000000000000000

> What caught my interest with families is, of course, the  
> param_constraint.conf ability to restrict what people can change --  
> we have lots of lists here and I'd like to restrict people from being  
> able to change settings on their lists which could affect other  
> lists' ability to function.  I'd like to have a basic bundle of  
> families of different standard configurations, the majority of which  
> would meet 85%+ of the users' needs here.  The remaining ~15% would  
> need one-off lists, independent of families, with configuration  
> options specific to their list(s).  Is this how families are intended  
> to be used in Sympa, or is the idea that all lists will be stand- 
> alone lists except for specific bundles (say, a small group of lists  
> related to a specific research project) which would be a family?  

The goal of list families is really to provide a set of lists with 
common options and editing rules. Currently family list creation is 
restricted to the command line but we wish to generalize families to 
replace existing create_list_templates.

> Is  it possible to take a family-based list and move it to another  
> family, 

We did not take this as a desired feature in the families design. What 
would be the goal of this operation ?

> or to remove it from any family association at all and turn  it into a 
> stand-alone list?

You can do that, just removing the list's 'family' parameter.

> I'd like to get a good grasp of how families work and are supposed to  
> be used because I'd like to see if I can clean up, enhance, or add to  
> the standard documentation on list families.  I feel it's lagging  
> behind the other sections in the documentation while being one of  
> Sympa's more compelling features and I'd like to do what I can to  
> remedy that lag.

That would be a great contribution to the reference manual.
PLease let us know if you need additional technical information...

Attachment: smime.p7s
Description: S/MIME Cryptographic Signature