lear@NET.BIO.NET (Eliot Lear) (07/31/89)
A number of people have asked the question, ``What is LISTSERV?''
By no means am I the authority on LISTSERV, but this short message
should be enough for most people.
LISTSERV is a sophisticated mailing list manager that runs on IBM
hosts. It has a number of features that make it worth mentioning.
Mailing lists can be created such that individual network users may
add themselves to or delete themselves from open lists without
intervention of the list maintainer. One simply sends a message to
LISTSERV@{hostwithmailinglist} with the one line command, "SUBSCRIBE
{listname} {User's Full Name}". For example, I might send a message
to LISTSERV@BITNIC.BITNET with the text,
"SUBSCRIBE DOMAIN-L Eliot Lear".
To remove myself, I would change the message to say, "UNSUB DOMAIN-L".
Additionally, LISTSERV supports private lists, in which the above
capability is disabled.
LISTSERV allows maintainers to maintain a list without having to log
into the machine on which it is housed. I used to maintain an Amiga
interest list, and I was able to add, delete, and change user statuses
simply by sending mail messages to the LISTSERV. I was also able to
review the status of the entire list. Obviously, there are
possibilities for all sorts of authentication problems, but I presume
that after the first disaster, there will be authentication in
LISTSERV.
LISTSERV also allows access to files, with some protection scheme.
Generally, these end up being archives of the lists it carries.
Anyway, this should give you some small understanding of LISTSERV.
If you want to learn more, find your nearest LISTSERV and send a
message to it saying ``HELP''.
One final note. LISTSERVs tend to trounce headers around a bit. This
tends to be a pain when you are trying to gateway a LISTSERV mailing
list to a netnews group with multiple entry points. In particular,
whether a LISTSERV includes a message id is configurable.