Intro to Majordomo

At the end of this document is a link to more information about specific majordomo commands.

Getting started on a list
Sending messages to everyone on the list
Replying to messages
Cc to the list
Dealing with mail delivery problems

It is important to remember that to 'talk' to Majordomo you send mail to majordomo@victoria.tc.ca, and to talk to the subscribers to a mail list called (for example) "lobsters-r-us" you would send mail to:

lobsters-r-us@victoria.tc.ca

Getting started on a list

To join a list you must send the subscribe command in an e-mail to majordomo@victoria.tc.ca (Remember to specify the name of the list you want to join).

You were most likely given the name of the list by someone else; the Secretary of your club or association, or anyone who thinks you might benefit from joining.

However if you have forgotten the exact name of the mail list, you can obtain the names of all mail lists hosted by VTN by sending the lists command to majordomo.

Sending messages to everyone on the list

To send e-mail to everyone on the list, simply send it to <listname>@victoria.tc.ca

or in our previous example

          lobsters-r-us@victoria.tc.ca

Mail sent to that address will automatically be picked up by majordomo and sent to each of the subscribers.

That is a good thing to remember. ANYTHING you say in a message sent to lobsters-r-us@victoria.tc.ca will be read by every member of that mail list.

Replying to messages

As with normal E-mail, you can:

reply to a message received from the list
forward a message (received from another address) to the list, or
send the list a 'carbon copy' (Cc:) of a message you are sending to another address.

Although these options are technically possible, you should consider whether the material in any message will be of sufficient interest to other list subscribers to warrant wide distribution. (When in doubt consult... in this case, the list owner.)

Good Practice

When replying to a previous message, it is good practice to include relevant portions of previous messages. It is important that the comments of others are accurately attributed. The Pine mailer uses multi-level indenting to indicate previously included information and you should be careful to preserve this formatting.

It is equally good practice to delete unnecessary information from replies... Forcing other list members to scroll through a 200 line message only to find a "Right ON!" comment is a poor way to make a good impression.

If you are replying to several comments/questions you can insert your response(s) below the relevant section.

After the first reply, it is best to cut out unimportant parts of the last message, and mark them with <snip> to clearly show you have removed material.

CC'ing to the mail list

If you happen to be writing a message to some other member on the list, and realize the information should be seen by all, just insert the list address in the CC: in your header.

If you later realize you forgot to CC a message, you can retrieve it from your 'sent-mail' folder and forward it to the list address.

Sometimes you CC and Forward to the list only because you want a record kept, as when the list has an Archive. (This might be the case with a closed list that is used by an organization for internal correspondence.)

Help

Any time while in mail you cannot remember a majordomo command, and don't have time to search for this tutorial, just send the following message :



To      : majordomo@victoria.tc.ca
Cc      :
Attchmnt:
Subject :
----- Message Text -----

help

Soon after your cry for help, back will come a list, of the available commands, each with a brief explanation.