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ListProc 7.2 Release Notes

Release Date: August 30, 1995

CONTENTS

I. Bug Fixes

  • Fixed a bug with CONFIG ... DISABLE or ENABLE. ListProc would not let a manager disable/enable requests at random.

  • Fixed a bug with CONFIG ... ARCHIVE where the first dash would not expand.

  • Fixed a bug with UNLOCK where the .time.* file would not be removed. The result of this is if one edits (with locking) the lists subscribers and aliases file, then UNLOCK's the list. The next time any file is edited, it will appear that the subscribers and aliases file are also being edited.

  • Fixed a bug with Confirm, when the following option was set for a list:

    send-by-[owner|subscriber]-confirm

    any trailing blanks in the

    Confirm: pw

    line in the posting to the list was matched against the password and causing the message to be rejected. Trailing blanks are now ignored. The log message was also revised to give clearer diagnostics.

  • Fixed a bug with FUI. If an FUI-able archive has sub-archives, ListProc will tell users to provide a password when one is not necessary.

  • Fixed a bug with SET... mail ACK|NOACK from DIGEST. In the case when the mail mode was fixed to DIGEST (i.e. the list is only distributed as a digest), when subscribers reset their mail mode from digest, they received a partial digest, thus negating the lists' settings.

  • Fixed a bug with binaries using/working with environment variables. ULISTPROC_ARCHIVES_UMASK was simply ignored.

  • Fixed a bug with COMPRESSED_ARCHIVES. It caused the system files FST, SFT and FMT to be compressed also, thus nullifying AFD/FUI functionality.

  • Fixed a security hole with manager privileges; requests effected are hold, free, lock, unlock, purge, archive, put and configuration.

  • Fixed a bug with error_analysis: errors that contain | & [] and other "regular expression" characters may cause a subscribers mail mode to reset to POSTPONE. These characters are now converted to spaces.
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II. News - Mail Changes

We have made some significant changes in the behavior of Newsgroup - Mailing lists. This is especially apparent in for Moderated lists/newsgroups. I hope that these changes are consistent with the input we have received from various sites running moderated list-moderated newsgroup gateways.

In summary:

  • If a list is moderated, an Approved: header is put when sending to the newsgroup moderators (if any) or when posting with inews.

  • If an article comes in with an Approved: header, ListProc considers the message already approved and posts it to the list, bypassing the lists moderator if the list is moderated-edit. If the list is moderated-no-edit, ListProc follows the normal path and requests approval from the moderator.
Reasoning:
  • There is no way to know at the moment an article is posted if the group is moderated. So the assumption on moderated lists is that a similar restriction (moderated) will apply to a newsgroups to which it is posting.

  • If the list is configured moderated-edit, then an article sent to the moderators for approval will be duplicated at the newsgroup if indeed the article is approved by the moderators. This is because a message sent to the list by the owners/moderators can not be classified as approval of mail or approval of the article, therefore .. message from privileged users are always posted to the newsgroup.

  • For lists that are configured moderated-no-edit, an incoming article still needs approval. This is done because it would be easy for anyone to add an Approved: header. Since "catmail" is involved here, it can not know if the sender is a news feed or a regular user.

  • X- Headers are not forwarded to the newsgroup or its moderator.

  • The cc: header is removed when posting an article or sending to the groups moderator.

  • The To: header appears only when sending to the groups moderator (this is currently true). Other times ... it is removed.

  • The Approved: header is added only if the list is moderated. This way, a message has at least been approved by the List's moderator.
Here is a table of configuration options and the expected behavior on newsgroups: 
   OPTION				     BEHAVIOR
   SEND-BY-OWNERS-CONFIRM          incoming articles rejected
   
   SEND-BY-OWNERS                  incoming articles rejected
   
   SEND-BY-SUBSCRIBERS-CONFIRM     incoming articles rejected
   
   SEND-BY-SUBSCRIBERS             incoming articles OK
   
   SEND-BY-ALL                     incoming articles OK
   
   UNMODERATED                     incoming articles OK
   
   MODERATED-EDIT                  Newsgroup has to be moderated so that
                                   the Approved: header line is sent with
                                   incoming articles, otherwise the same
                                   article will be reposted.
   
   MODERATED-NO-EDIT               Newsgroup can be moderated or
                                   unmoderated.  All incoming postings will
                                   need moderated approval

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III. New Features

Tools

  • A utility for checking and verifying the behavior of regular expressions in the .aliases and .ignored file is now provided. This program is called dblpfiles (data base list proc files). It will tell you the effect of the alias or ignored on a specific address. It is an interactive program.

New Config File Directives

These are new statements that effect your ListProc config file. In some cases, they are optional, in others ListProc will not start unless the change is made. Those required changes are highlighted with an "*".
  • global-query-server <address> <host> [port]
    NOTE: CREN no longer hosts a global list database.

    This defines the host for the global list queries. ListProc now has the ability to make available to your site remote lists by defining this server. A site no longer has to maintain the file remote.lists (but may choose to do so).

    If the file remote.lists does not exist on the local host or the list is not defined in the local remote.lists, ListProc will then connect to the "global-query-server" for processing of that request. CREN will maintain a "global-query-server" and the following line will connect you to it:

    global-query-server listproc@listproc.listproc.net listproc.listproc.net

    In this case, no port is specified because the CREN query_server listens on the default port of 372.

  • global-update-server <address> <time>

    ListProc now has the ability to define a server which will cause local lists to be published in the CREN global list database. (See New List Configuration Options below). This config file directive tells ListProc where to send information about list which the site wants to widely disseminate goes to and when each day will ListProc process this information. (This information is updated daily). The following will send updates to CREN's "global-update-server" daily at 04:00 local time:

    global-update-server global-update-server@listproc.listproc.net 0400

    NOTE: If no "global-update-server" is defined, lists which are configured to be disseminated in this fashion will not be.

  • option multiple_listprocs

    If this config file option is defined, ListProc will not send notification to users telling them that their request has been forwarded because the list is not local. This is useful for sites that are running multiple copies of ListProc and want to make the distribution and dissemination of lists transparent to end users by providing them with the address of a "smart" server.

  • option readonly_subscribers_files

    This options disables PUT ... SUBSCRIBERS by owners. It was requested by some sites where owners were putting back invalid files.

    * server listproc@host.domain host.domain

    The server keyword in the config file now requires a host name argument. This should be the fully qualified host name of the machine running ListProc. This is used by the server when sending a lists of "published lists" to the "global-update-server".

    WARNING: serverd will not start unless the server line is modified to the new syntax.

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New Configuration Directives

  • PUBLISHED-LIST
    UNPUBLISHED-LIST

    This directive makes the list appear/not appear in the database maintained by CREN's global-update-server. This means that the list will be available for people outside the organization to query, subscribe ...

    It is important for a published list to have a COMMENT field that describes the list because that description is what will be used to describe the list and search for keywords on, and; an info file so that people who are interested can get more information on what the list is about.