Mailman on CentOS

General Interworx Control Panel Info General Inquries
1

I’ve started a mailman installation on my new CentOS server using the script and procedure outlined by Paul HERE:

http://interworx.info/forums/showthread.php?t=58&page=1&pp=15

The script went even smoother than the last time (on my Red Hat 9 Box)

[root@centos root]# cd mailman-new
-bash: cd: mailman-new: No such file or directory
[root@centos root]# mkdir mailman-new
[root@centos root]# cd mailman-new
[root@centos mailman-new]# wget http://updates.interworx.info/scripts/mailman.sh
–20:56:12-- http://updates.interworx.info/scripts/mailman.sh
=> mailman.sh' Resolving updates.interworx.info... done. Connecting to updates.interworx.info[66.118.190.30]:80... connected. HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 302 Found Location: http://updates.interworx.info/iworx/legacy/scripts/mailman.sh [following] --20:56:12-- http://updates.interworx.info/iworx/legacy/scripts/mailman.sh => mailman.sh’
Connecting to updates.interworx.info[66.118.190.30]:80… connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response… 200 OK
Length: 3,283 [application/x-sh]

100%[====================================>] 3,283 3.13M/s ETA 00:00

20:56:12 (3.13 MB/s) - `mailman.sh’ saved [3283/3283]

[root@centos mailman-new]# dir
mailman.sh
[root@centos mailman-new]# sh mailman.sh transwarphosting.net
This script will install mailman for one domain. It will install it on lists.transwarphosting.net.
Mailman will be downloaded, configured, compiled, and installed.
If this sounds ok, hit . Otherwise, .

Please wait…
Please provide an e-mail box password for postmaster@lists.transwarphosting.net
Please enter password for postmaster:
enter password again:
Downloading mailman sources…
Uncompressing mailman sources…
Building mailman…
Mailman build complete

Mailman is about to ask you for a password. Do Not Forget It, you’ll need it later to create lists.

New site password:
Again to confirm password:
Password changed.

You need to create the ‘mailman’ list, which will be the list that administrative tasks appear to come from. Follow the prompts…
Enter the email of the person running the list: listmaster@transwarplists.net
Initial mailman password:
To finish creating your mailing list, you must edit your /etc/aliases (or
equivalent) file by adding the following lines, and possibly running the
`newaliases’ program:

mailman mailing list

mailman: “|/home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/mail/mailman post mailman”
mailman-admin: “|/home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/mail/mailman admin mailman”
mailman-bounces: “|/home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/mail/mailman bounces mailman”
mailman-confirm: “|/home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/mail/mailman confirm mailman”
mailman-join: “|/home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/mail/mailman join mailman”
mailman-leave: “|/home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/mail/mailman leave mailman”
mailman-owner: “|/home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/mail/mailman owner mailman”
mailman-request: “|/home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/mail/mailman request mailman”
mailman-subscribe: “|/home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/mail/mailman subscribe mailman”
mailman-unsubscribe: “|/home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/mail/mailman unsubscribe mailman”

Hit enter to notify mailman owner…

Starting mailman…
Starting Mailman’s master qrunner.
no crontab for mailman

Done. COPY THESE INSTRUCTIONS NOW.

Put the following VirtualHost block ABOVE THE OTHER VIRTUAL HOSTS in /etc/httpd/conf.d/transwarphosting.net.conf

<VirtualHost :80>
ServerName lists.transwarphosting.net

ServerAdmin postmaster
DocumentRoot /home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/
Alias /pipermail/ /home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/archives/public/
ScriptAlias /mailman/ /home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/cgi-bin/
ErrorLog /home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/logs/error_log
</VirtualHost>

Then restart Apache (service httpd restart)

Assuming all went well, you can point your browser to:
http://lists.transwarphosting.net/mailman/admin
and start creating lists.

[root@centos mailman-new]#

I don’t want to dedicate the whole domain to the mailman software. I want it to load from

lists.transwarphosting.net

so I made a modification to the code that the script gave me

<VirtualHost 207.150.160.100:80>
ServerName lists.transwarphosting.net

ServerAdmin postmaster
DocumentRoot /home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/lists/
Alias /pipermail/ /home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/archives/public/
ScriptAlias /mailman/ /home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/cgi-bin/
ErrorLog /home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/logs/error_log
</VirtualHost>

I had to add the IP to the top line because I got an invalid syntax error on that line when I tried to restart httpd without it.

I added the /lists/ on the end of the document root because I want mailman in that subdomain

httpd says it is working fine

[root@centos mailman-new]# service httpd status
httpd (pid 16048 15905 15904 15903 15902 15901 15898) is running…

I haven’t gotten any mail from mailan, however. and when I go to

lists.transwarphosting.net

I get

ERROR OR 403 FORBIDDEN

You do not have permission to access / on this server

Any ideas? Do I have to start the mailman runner by hand? Will this error go away if I put an index.html in that directory?

Any advice would be welcome. Thanks

Tim

2

I removed the /lists/ from the end of it and I still get the error 403.

3

I put an index.html in

/home/mailman/transwarphosting.net/

and it works.

Now for the mailman daemon

4

lists.transwarphosting.net isn’t resolving for me at all, so I’m a bit confused. I assume that’s why the IP address didn’t show up in the vhost block it printed for you, it couldn’t resolve the domain.

Paul

5

It works just fine for me now:

http://lists.transwarphosting.net/mailman/listinfo

I’ve created two lists int he web interface above but thus far not a peep out of mailman itself.

I’ve reastarted the runner

[root@centos bin]# ./mailmanctl restart
Restarting Mailman’s master qrunner
[root@centos bin]#

a couple times now to no avail.

I had this problem on the other server as well and you fixed it for me. Do you remember what you did?

Thanks

6

Looks like it’s working now. I’ve gotten a whole slew of mail from mailman about the lists I’ve created.

I’m showing that you logged into my server. Thanks. Just out of curiosity, what did you do to make it work?

7

Hi Tim,

Sorry I missed this post for so long.

There were two problems. First of all, DNS entries we’re getting exported because of a bug that was introduced in the middle of all the “making backup/restore work” beta’ing. I’m still pretty baffled how you were able to resolve the domain in question. Unless perhaps you had edited your computer’s hosts file? I guess it’s moot now, but still baffling :).

The other issue was that the mailman script apparently created a .qmail file in the domain mail folder, but what it really needed to be .qmail-default.

Once I changed those two things, you reported shortly thereafter that things were fixed.

Paul

8

NP Paul, better late than never.

There were two problems. First of all, DNS entries we’re getting exported because of a bug that was introduced in the middle of all the “making backup/restore work” beta’ing. I’m still pretty baffled how you were able to resolve the domain in question. Unless perhaps you had edited your computer’s hosts file? I guess it’s moot now, but still baffling :).

That is odd. I didn’t edit my computer’s DNS, Socheat tried to tell me how to do that but I couldn’t fine the fike I needed to edit, and the subdomain in question had been in place for several days so it had prlenty of time to propogate… I guess it’s just one of those things.

The other issue was that the mailman script apparently created a .qmail file in the domain mail folder, but what it really needed to be .qmail-default.

Once I changed those two things, you reported shortly thereafter that things were fixed.

Paul

Thanks, Paul.