GNU Mailman

GNU Mailman
Developer(s)Abhilash Raj[1]
Initial releaseJuly 30, 1999; 25 years ago (1999-07-30)[2]
Stable release
3:3.3.9[3] / 2023-10-20[±]
2:2.1.39 / 2021-12-13
Repository
Written inMostly Python, some C
Operating systemUnix-like
Available inMany languages
TypeMailing list management software
License3: GPL-3.0-or-later
2: GPL-2.0-or-later
Websitewww.gnu.org/software/mailman/

GNU Mailman is a computer software application from the GNU Project for managing electronic mailing lists.[4][5] Mailman is coded primarily in Python and currently maintained by Abhilash Raj.[1] Mailman is free software, licensed under the GNU General Public License.[5]

History

A very early version of Mailman was written by John Viega while a graduate student, who then lost his copy of the source in a hard drive crash sometime around 1998.[6] Ken Manheimer at Corporation for National Research Initiatives (CNRI), who was looking for a replacement for Majordomo, then took over development. When Manheimer left CNRI, Barry Warsaw took over. Mailman 3, the first major new version in over a decade, was released in April 2015.[7]

Web administration interface for GNU Mailman 2.1

Features

Mailman runs on most Unix-like systems, including Linux. Since Mailman 3.0 it has required Python-3.4 or newer.[8] It works with Unix-style mail servers, such as Exim, Postfix, Sendmail and qmail. Features include:

  • A customizable publicly-accessible Web page for each maillist.
  • Web application for list administration, archiving of messages, spam filtering, etc. Separate interfaces are available for users (for self-administration), moderators (to accept/reject list posts), and administrators.
  • Support for multiple administrators and moderators for each list.
  • Per-list privacy features, such as closed-subscriptions, private archives, private membership rosters, and sender-based posting rules.
  • Integrated bounce detection and automatic handling of bouncing addresses.
  • Integrated spam filters
  • Majordomo-style email based commands.
  • Support for virtual domais.
  • List archiving. The default archiver provided with Mailman 2 is Pipermail,[9] although other archivers can be used instead. The archiver for Mailman 3 is HyperKitty.[10]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b Warsaw, Barry (23 November 2017). "Time Stand Still". Mailman-Announce (Mailing list). Retrieved 5 September 2018.
  2. ^ Warsaw, Barry A. (30 July 1999). "Mailman 1.0". mailman-announce (Mailing list). Retrieved 2008-12-09.
  3. ^ "Mailman, the GNU Mailing List Manager". gnu.org. Retrieved 2023-11-19.
  4. ^ "freshmeat.net: Project details for GNU Mailman". Retrieved 2009-02-11.[dead link‍]
  5. ^ a b "Mailman, the GNU Mailing List Manager". Retrieved 2009-02-11.
  6. ^ "MyMailmanRole — Myriadicity Dot". Retrieved 2009-02-11.
  7. ^ "Mailman 3.0 to modernize mailing lists". lwn.net. 27 March 2015. Retrieved 15 October 2015.
  8. ^ "Getting started with GNU Mailman". mailman.readthedocs.org. Archived from the original on 13 October 2015. Retrieved 14 October 2015.
  9. ^ "Pipermail". amk.ca. Archived from the original on 13 February 2001. Retrieved 2 February 2017.
  10. ^ "Developer Resources". gnu.org. Retrieved 26 November 2015.

Further reading

Reviews

Other resources

Wikimedia Commons has media related to GNU Mailman.