ARCHIVED: With Majordomo, how do I restrict or close subscription to my mailing list?

This content has been archived, and is no longer maintained by Indiana University. Information here may no longer be accurate, and links may no longer be available or reliable.

UITS has retired the Majordomo list server at Indiana University Bloomington. If you were the primary owner of an IUB Majordomo list, you can no longer use it to send mail. If you'd like to create a new mailing list, anyone with an IU Network ID username and passphrase can request a LISTSERV list. For instructions, see ARCHIVED: At IU, how do I request a new LISTSERV list? Also, for a collection of documents with general LISTSERV information, and information about owning and subscribing to LISTSERV lists at IU, see the Knowledge Base menu ARCHIVED: LISTSERV, distribution lists, and mass mailing.

To control who can subscribe to a Majordomo mailing list, you must modify your list's configuration file. For instructions on how to do this, see the Knowledge Base document ARCHIVED: Using Majordomo, how do I see or change the configuration of my mailing list?

Open your config file and locate the following line:

  subscribe_policy  =   open

Replace open with closed, so that the line now looks like the following:

  subscribe_policy  =   closed

Mail the modified configuration file back to your list's administrative address as instructed in the Knowledge Base document ARCHIVED: Using Majordomo, how do I see or change the configuration of my mailing list? Majordomo will confirm that your configuration file has been changed, or provide error messages explaining why it was not changed.

Note: You should never send commands to the address of the Majordomo mailing list (e.g., to listname@host.domain, where listname is the name of the list, and host.domain is the name of the computer where the list resides); only messages intended for members of the list should be sent to the list's address. Rather, send commands to the administrative address of your Majordomo list (e.g., to majordomo@host.domain). Additionally, send all commands in the body of the message; commands in the "Subject:" line of messages are ignored.