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ListProc 8.2 Release Notes
Contents
The ListProc 8.2 WWW interface (lp-web) allows access to ListProc's subscription management, subscriber options, archives and other features through a simple graphical interface. Information on the specific features of the web interface can be found at http://www.cren.net/listproc/web.html
One of the key enhancements in ListProc 8.2 is the addition of a reverse lookup table for user permissions. This table relates each user of the system to the permissions they have for each list on the system. This allows ListProc to quickly and reliably check whether or not someone is a list owner, a subscriber etc - without requiring multiple accesses to the various configuration files.
The "revdb" command included with ListProc 8.2 is a simple utility for managing this user database. "revdb" allows four types of actions:
- revdb list [user1 user2 ...]
- List the roles for the specified users. If none are specified, list everyone.
- revdb create
- Create the user dbm.
- revdb update <listname>
- Update the dbm values for the given list from the list's files.
- revdb delete <listname>
- Delete the dbm values for the given list
Note that in order to maintain the consistency of the reverse database, it is necessary to run "revdb update LIST" any time you manually edit the subscribers file or the owners file to adjust values for a list. (ListProc's PUT command does this automatically.)
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ListProc 8.2 allows system managers to define a script that will act on outgoing list messages after they have gone through the usual loop, permission and error checks, but before they are actually sent out to the list. Among other things, this allows sites to include customizable message footers, editorial notes, etc.
If enabled, the filter program will be invoked with any arguments you give it. In addition, ListProc adds the following to the end of the argument list:
--infile INFILE --outfile OUTFILE --list LISTNAME
where INFILE is the filename of the original message and OUTFILE is the filename to which the modified message should be written. (If OUTFILE doesn't exist after the filter exits, ListProc will simply send out the original message as-is.)
The pre-delivery filter is configurable both globally and on a per-list basis. The "global_filter_prog" config file directive defines the path to a default filter program. This will be used by all lists that (1) don't have their own filter program defined and (2) aren't specificially configured to NOT use a filter program. The filter program can be given either a full path or a path relative to the ListProc installation directory.
Examples:
global_filter_prog /path/to/program --arg1 value --arg2 value
global_filter_prog support/add_footer
The OUTBOUND-MESSAGE-FILTER option to ListProc's CONFIG command controls the message filter options for specific lists. The options are as follows:
- off
- disable the message filter for this list
- default
- use the system default filter command (if one has been defined)
- program /path/to/program [program_args]
- Specify the path to the program you want to use for modifying outgoing messages. Relative paths are taken relative to the ListProc installation directory (LPDIR).
Examples:
config listname pword OUTBOUND-MESSAGE-FILTER off
config listname pword OUTBOUND-MESSAGE-FILTER default
config listname pword OUTBOUND-MESSAGE-FILTER program support/add_footer
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To support full web access to list archives, ListProc 8.2 introduces a new option to allow sites to define an external program to add a message to a web archive.
ListProc will invoke the program with any arguments you specify. In addition, ListProc will add the following to the end of the program's argument list:
--list LISTNAME --arch ARCHIVENAME
(where ARCHIVENAME is the current name of ListProc's standard message archive for this list) The message to be archived is sent to the program's standard input.
As with the outbound message filter program, the web archive program can be defined either by a global default or on a list-by-list basis. The "global_web_archive_prog" config file directive defines the path to a default web archive program. This will be used by all lists that (1) don't have their own web archive program defined and (2) aren't specificially configured to NOT use a web archive program. The filter program can be given either a full path or a path relative to the ListProc installation directory.
Example:
global_web_archive_prog /path/to/lp-web/utils/add_to_archive
The WEB-ARCHIVE option to the CONFIG command is used to control the web archive options on a list-by-list basis. The options are as follows:
- off
- disable web archives for this list
- default
- use the system default web archive command (if one has been defined)
- program /path/to/program [program_args]
- Specify the path to the program you want to use for web archives. Relative paths are taken relative to the ListProc installation directory (LPDIR).
Examples:
config listname pword WEB-ARCHIVE off
config listname pword WEB-ARCHIVE default
config listname pword WEB-ARCHIVE program /path/to/my/script
The ListProc 8.2 web interface includes a sample web archiving program in "utils/add_to_archive". This will work with the MHonarc and swish programs included with the interface. You can either use this as-is, or use it as an example for integrating ListProc's archives with your favorite mail to HTML conversion and web searching programs.
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ListProc 8.2 allows greater flexibility in the methods it uses for logging and in the locations of its log files. These are conntrolled by the new "log" config file directive. The options for this directive are described below:
- file [logfile]
- Log messages are saved to the specified file. If no file is specified, messages are written to "listproc.log" in the ListProc installation directory. This is the default.
- individual
- individual log files are kept for each ListProc binary, with names such as ".report.PROGRAM" (where PROGRAM is the name of the program). Older messages from these logs are placed in ".rep.PROGRAM.acc" each time ListProc restarts.
- old_style
- This keeps individual log files as with the "individual" option. In addition, the log files include timestamp information on the line after the actual message. This is available for sites that have pre-existing utilities that parse this older style of log file. In general, this format is less useful than the others, and we discourage its use.
- syslog <FACIL>
- This instructs ListProc to send log messages to the specified syslog facility. Common choices for the facility are LOG_DAEMON, LOG_MAIL, LOG_USER and LOG_LOCAL0 through LOG_LOCAL7
Examples:
log file /var/log/listproc
log syslog LOG_LOCAL7
(Note: for compatibility the "syslog" config file directive can still be used to specify syslog logging. This has the same effect as the "log syslog <FACIL>" command described above. The "log" directve is preferred for new installations.
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- WEB-ARCHIVE
- (see above)
- OUTBOUND-MESSAGE-FILTER
- (see above)
- LISTNAME-IN-SUBJECT
LISTNAME-NOT-IN-SUBJECT
- Control whether or not the list's name should be added to the Subject: line of outgoing list messages. If this is set, the Subject: lines will look like this:
Subject: [LISTNAME:num] Original Subject
The number after the list name shows that this is the num-th message to the list.
- MIME-MODERATION-MESSAGES
NON-MIME-MODERATION-MESSAGES
- Turn on or off MIME encapsulation of moderation messages. MIME encapsulation will preserve the internal attachements in moderated messages, but it may also cause problems for moderators with some mail programs (e.g. Groupwise). Additionally, turning off MIME encapsulation of moderator messages may simplify the moderation process for MODERATED-EDIT lists.
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- global_filter_prog
- (see above)
- filter_prog
- Used in list config files to store the filter program options. If this is not present, the "default" method is used.
- global_web_archive_prog
- (see above)
- web_archive
- Used in list config files to store the web archive options. If this is not present, the "default" method is used.
- user <username>
- Define the user as whom ListProc should run. This prevents accidental changes to file ownership and permissions by starting ListProc as root.
- log
- (see above)
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- internalized list sorting routines
- Previous versions of ListProc relied on external UNIX utilities for sorting list subscribers. This was often unreliable. This functionality is now handled by an internal sorting routine.
- Internalization of MD5
- The MD5 algorithm has now been added as an internal component of ListProc. This simplifies the installation, and prevents potential problems with bad copies of the md5 binary on host systems.
- Internalization of STATS command
- The "STATS" command also relied on UNIX utilities determine the number of messages from each active subscriber. This has now been changed to use an interal routine. The result is approximately a 6-fold speed up of the STATS command.
- Locking Scheme
- Previous versions of ListProc used somewhat error prone wait loops with semaphore bits to lock access to critical files. In ListProc 8.2, these have been replaced with file locks using fcntl(). We believe this should be much more reliable. IN addition, because the file locks are external, this allows locking of critical files by processes that were NOT spawned by the main serverd process. This is particularly important for the web interface, since the web interface requires processes to be spawned by the web server.
- Removal of path dependancies
- The parsing of LPDIR/help/TOPICS has been changed to allow both fully qualified path names as well as relative path names. Relative paths are considered relative to the ListProc installation directory.
- Modified labeling of mail archives
- Mail archives were previously labled by the contents of the Subject line of the first message in the archive. This often lead to confusion when people used the INDEX command to view archives. The archive routines have been changed to instead simply list the list's name and the file creation date as the description.
- Improved reliability of mbox file handling
- Several improvements have been made to the handling of incoming message files, both to improve efficiency and reliability.
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- Fixed bug in farch - previously didn't remove archives w/ passwords from master index.
- Changed "message addressed to owners" rejection notice to "message addressed to list's errors folder"
- Changed owner address in report messages to construct list-requst@host from the list address in the config file, rather than from the system host address. This allows better hiding of domains, "virtual" domains, etc.
- Fixed sysexec() to remove spurious ps and fgrep warnings. These often lead to confusion by cluttering up the LPDIR/.warning file.
- Fixed auth in config command - manager can now use either list or manager password.
- Fixed the output of the REVIEW command to place the list's info file in the correct spot. (In previous versions, the info appeared between the header for the subscriber list and the actual list itself.)
- Removed the spurious comma after the list address in the "init" command
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