Re: RFC: Hosting mailing lists of 3rd party projects

Over the last few years, postgresql.org only hosted pgsql-* and pgadmin*
mailing lists. A few weeks before, we added psycopg2, too, because the
project needed a mailing list (since their machine died and data was not
recovered).

Before we add more, I think we need to define a policy for hosting
mailing lists of 3rd party projects.

Some of the 3rd party projects already have their own server (like
slony.info), and some of them host their lists on pgfoundry (like
pgpool) -- and we have been hosting pgadmin mailing list for a long
time.

However, there are some more projects, like postgres-xc, need only
mailing list -- not web space, etc. The current issue with postgres-xc
mailing lists is that we see some RAC advertisements appended to the
emails, which is embarrassing.

IMHO, postgresql.org can provide mailing list service to such projects,
unless they have their own domain already, or they are not hosted at
pgfoundry.

Comments?

--
Devrim GÜNDÜZ
EnterpriseDB: http://www.enterprisedb.com
PostgreSQL Danışmanı/Consultant, Red Hat Certified Engineer
Community: devrim~PostgreSQL.org, devrim.gunduz~linux.org.tr
http://www.gunduz.org Twitter: http://twitter.com/devrimgunduz

On Tue, 2011-02-22 at 00:41 +0530, Devrim GÜNDÜZ wrote:
> Over the last few years, postgresql.org only hosted pgsql-* and pgadmin*
> mailing lists. A few weeks before, we added psycopg2, too, because the
> project needed a mailing list (since their machine died and data was not
> recovered).
>
> Before we add more, I think we need to define a policy for hosting
> mailing lists of 3rd party projects.
>
> Some of the 3rd party projects already have their own server (like
> slony.info), and some of them host their lists on pgfoundry (like
> pgpool) -- and we have been hosting pgadmin mailing list for a long
> time.
>
> However, there are some more projects, like postgres-xc, need only
> mailing list -- not web space, etc. The current issue with postgres-xc
> mailing lists is that we see some RAC advertisements appended to the
> emails, which is embarrassing.
>
> IMHO, postgresql.org can provide mailing list service to such projects,
> unless they have their own domain already, or they are not hosted at
> pgfoundry.
>
> Comments?
>

I think any third party project that wants to utilize the .org
infrastructure should use pgfroundry.

JD

--
PostgreSQL.org Major Contributor
Command Prompt, Inc: http://www.commandprompt.com/ - 509.416.6579
Consulting, Training, Support, Custom Development, Engineering
http://twitter.com/cmdpromptinc | http://identi.ca/commandprompt

> I think any third party project that wants to utilize the .org
> infrastructure should use pgfroundry.

So they should create a whole pgFoundry project just to have a mailing
list? -1

--
-- Josh Berkus
PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
http://www.pgexperts.com

2011/2/21 Devrim GÜNDÜZ <devrim(at)gunduz(dot)org>:

> However, there are some more projects, like postgres-xc, need only
> mailing list -- not web space, etc. The current issue with postgres-xc
> mailing lists is that we see some RAC advertisements appended to the
> emails, which is embarrassing.
>
> IMHO, postgresql.org can provide mailing list service to such projects,
> unless they have their own domain already, or they are not hosted at
> pgfoundry.
>
> Comments?

+1 with a couple requests.

* Can we identify who the people with mailing list creation power are,
and make an announcement somewhere as they are created? If that's here
(pgsql-www), fine.

* Can we make it easier to change who is the mailing list
administrator, or have a policy about who is the administrator for
these lists? I'm guessing that this may change more frequently in the
side projects than it does in the core pgsql lists. I've asked to be
removed as an administrator from a few lists multiple times, with no
response.

-selena

--
http://chesnok.com

On Mon, 2011-02-21 at 15:35 -0800, Josh Berkus wrote:
> > I think any third party project that wants to utilize the .org
> > infrastructure should use pgfroundry.
>
> So they should create a whole pgFoundry project just to have a mailing
> list? -1

Actually that isn't a requirement. PgFoundry just uses mailman.

JD

>
>
> --
> -- Josh Berkus
> PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
> http://www.pgexperts.com
>

--
PostgreSQL.org Major Contributor
Command Prompt, Inc: http://www.commandprompt.com/ - 509.416.6579
Consulting, Training, Support, Custom Development, Engineering
http://twitter.com/cmdpromptinc | http://identi.ca/commandprompt

Excerpts from Devrim GÜNDÜZ's message of lun feb 21 16:11:32 -0300 2011:
>
> Over the last few years, postgresql.org only hosted pgsql-* and pgadmin*
> mailing lists. A few weeks before, we added psycopg2, too, because the
> project needed a mailing list (since their machine died and data was not
> recovered).
>
> Before we add more, I think we need to define a policy for hosting
> mailing lists of 3rd party projects.

So what policy do you propose?

I would suggest the following:

1 Use common sense to determine whether a project belongs into the
postgresql.org list infrastructure. Strong majority is needed to
accept a project.

2 Projects already on pgfoundry do not apply.

3 Lists for anything other than PostgreSQL core need to be categorized
under "project lists" (not "user lists"). If some project has too many
lists, a new category may be needed.

Thus, under rule (3) above, I think we should move pgsql-jdbc and
pgsql-odbc from "user lists" to "project lists". (Not a big deal --
they just change group under which they are listed, in the
archives.pg.org pages).

--
Álvaro Herrera <alvherre(at)commandprompt(dot)com>
The PostgreSQL Company - Command Prompt, Inc.
PostgreSQL Replication, Consulting, Custom Development, 24x7 support

2011/2/21 Devrim GÜNDÜZ <devrim(at)gunduz(dot)org>:
> IMHO, postgresql.org can provide mailing list service to such projects,
> unless they have their own domain already, or they are not hosted at
> pgfoundry.

I'm generally in favor of us helping out adjacent development
communities, if we can.

--
Robert Haas
EnterpriseDB: http://www.enterprisedb.com
The Enterprise PostgreSQL Company

2011/2/22 Selena Deckelmann <selena(at)chesnok(dot)com>:
> 2011/2/21 Devrim GÜNDÜZ <devrim(at)gunduz(dot)org>:
>
>> However, there are some more projects, like postgres-xc, need only
>> mailing list -- not web space, etc. The current issue with postgres-xc
>> mailing lists is that we see some RAC advertisements appended to the
>> emails, which is embarrassing.
>>
>> IMHO, postgresql.org can provide mailing list service to such projects,
>> unless they have their own domain already, or they are not hosted at
>> pgfoundry.
>>
>> Comments?
>
> +1 with a couple requests.
>
> * Can we identify who the people with mailing list creation power are,

That would be Marc.

> and make an announcement somewhere as they are created? If that's here
> (pgsql-www), fine.

-www seems reasonable - and of course it goes on the website list too,
automatically.

> * Can we make it easier to change who is the mailing list
> administrator, or have a policy about who is the administrator for
> these lists? I'm guessing that this may change more frequently in the
> side projects than it does in the core pgsql lists. I've asked to be
> removed as an administrator from a few lists multiple times, with no
> response.

I don't think we can make it easier to change - at least not easily so
:) But there can certainly be a policy, if we feel the need.

--
 Magnus Hagander
 Me: http://www.hagander.net/
 Work: http://www.redpill-linpro.com/

On Tue, 2011-02-22 at 13:32 -0300, Alvaro Herrera wrote:
> >
> > Before we add more, I think we need to define a policy for hosting
> > mailing lists of 3rd party projects.
>
> So what policy do you propose?

In my previous email, I wrote:

"IMHO, postgresql.org can provide mailing list service to such projects,
unless they have their own domain already, or they are not hosted at
pgfoundry."

which is:

> I would suggest the following:
>
> 1 Use common sense to determine whether a project belongs into the
> postgresql.org list infrastructure. Strong majority is needed to
> accept a project.
>
> 2 Projects already on pgfoundry do not apply.
>
> 3 Lists for anything other than PostgreSQL core need to be categorized
> under "project lists" (not "user lists"). If some project has too
> many
> lists, a new category may be needed.

Pretty much what I have in my mind.

> Thus, under rule (3) above, I think we should move pgsql-jdbc and
> pgsql-odbc from "user lists" to "project lists". (Not a big deal --
> they just change group under which they are listed, in the
> archives.pg.org pages).

+1.

Cheers,
--
Devrim GÜNDÜZ
Principal Systems Engineer @ EnterpriseDB: http://www.enterprisedb.com
PostgreSQL Danışmanı/Consultant, Red Hat Certified Engineer
Community: devrim~PostgreSQL.org, devrim.gunduz~linux.org.tr
http://www.gunduz.org Twitter: http://twitter.com/devrimgunduz

On Mon, 2011-02-21 at 11:31 -0800, Joshua D. Drake wrote:
>
> I think any third party project that wants to utilize the .org
> infrastructure should use pgfroundry.

Well, as you know, it becomes PITA after some point.

Regards,
--
Devrim GÜNDÜZ
Principal Systems Engineer @ EnterpriseDB: http://www.enterprisedb.com
PostgreSQL Danışmanı/Consultant, Red Hat Certified Engineer
Community: devrim~PostgreSQL.org, devrim.gunduz~linux.org.tr
http://www.gunduz.org Twitter: http://twitter.com/devrimgunduz

On Tue, 2011-02-22 at 13:07 -0500, Robert Haas wrote:

> I'm generally in favor of us helping out adjacent development
> communities, if we can.

Agreed.

Regards,

--
Devrim GÜNDÜZ
Principal Systems Engineer @ EnterpriseDB: http://www.enterprisedb.com
PostgreSQL Danışmanı/Consultant, Red Hat Certified Engineer
Community: devrim~PostgreSQL.org, devrim.gunduz~linux.org.tr
http://www.gunduz.org Twitter: http://twitter.com/devrimgunduz

Marc, please review this thread.

Excerpts from Selena Deckelmann's message of lun feb 21 20:49:35 -0300 2011:

> +1 with a couple requests.
>
> * Can we identify who the people with mailing list creation power are,

IIRC that's Marc, Stefan and Dave.

> and make an announcement somewhere as they are created? If that's here
> (pgsql-www), fine.

+1 on this.

> * Can we make it easier to change who is the mailing list
> administrator, or have a policy about who is the administrator for
> these lists? I'm guessing that this may change more frequently in the
> side projects than it does in the core pgsql lists.

+1 on this. Of course, we are not going to change admins for the core
mailing lists.

> I've asked to be removed as an administrator from a few lists multiple
> times, with no response.

Whom did you ask?

--
Álvaro Herrera <alvherre(at)commandprompt(dot)com>
The PostgreSQL Company - Command Prompt, Inc.
PostgreSQL Replication, Consulting, Custom Development, 24x7 support

2011/2/25 Alvaro Herrera <alvherre(at)commandprompt(dot)com>:
> Marc, please review this thread.
>
>
> Excerpts from Selena Deckelmann's message of lun feb 21 20:49:35 -0300 2011:
>
>> +1 with a couple requests.
>>
>> * Can we identify who the people with mailing list creation power are,
>
> IIRC that's Marc, Stefan and Dave.

Technically, yes (we have root in the right places). I'm not sure if
Stefan or I have any clue how to actually do so (I know I don't).

--
Dave Page
Blog: http://pgsnake.blogspot.com
Twitter: @pgsnake

EnterpriseDB UK: http://www.enterprisedb.com
The Enterprise PostgreSQL Company

> Technically, yes (we have root in the right places). I'm not sure if
> Stefan or I have any clue how to actually do so (I know I don't).

Personally, I think that if we're going to create additional project
lists, we should launch a mailman instance instead of adding them to
majordomo. That way we can spread admin duties around, since we have a
bunch of people who know mailman, and only one who understands majordomo.

--
-- Josh Berkus
PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
http://www.pgexperts.com

On Thu, Feb 24, 2011 at 4:53 PM, Josh Berkus <josh(at)agliodbs(dot)com> wrote:
>
>> Technically, yes (we have root in the right places). I'm not sure if
>> Stefan or I have any clue how to actually do so (I know I don't).
>
> Personally, I think that if we're going to create additional project
> lists, we should launch a mailman instance instead of adding them to
> majordomo.  That way we can spread admin duties around, since we have a
> bunch of people who know mailman, and only one who understands majordomo.

+1000

-selena

--
http://chesnok.com

On Thu, 2011-02-24 at 16:53 -0800, Josh Berkus wrote:
> > Technically, yes (we have root in the right places). I'm not sure if
> > Stefan or I have any clue how to actually do so (I know I don't).
>
> Personally, I think that if we're going to create additional project
> lists, we should launch a mailman instance instead of adding them to
> majordomo. That way we can spread admin duties around, since we have a
> bunch of people who know mailman, and only one who understands majordomo.

+1

>
> --
> -- Josh Berkus
> PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
> http://www.pgexperts.com
>

--
PostgreSQL.org Major Contributor
Command Prompt, Inc: http://www.commandprompt.com/ - 509.416.6579
Consulting, Training, Support, Custom Development, Engineering
http://twitter.com/cmdpromptinc | http://identi.ca/commandprompt

Excerpts from Josh Berkus's message of jue feb 24 21:53:35 -0300 2011:
>
> > Technically, yes (we have root in the right places). I'm not sure if
> > Stefan or I have any clue how to actually do so (I know I don't).
>
> Personally, I think that if we're going to create additional project
> lists, we should launch a mailman instance instead of adding them to
> majordomo. That way we can spread admin duties around, since we have a
> bunch of people who know mailman, and only one who understands majordomo.

We have two -- I do understand it. I just don't have the privs.

--
Álvaro Herrera <alvherre(at)commandprompt(dot)com>
The PostgreSQL Company - Command Prompt, Inc.
PostgreSQL Replication, Consulting, Custom Development, 24x7 support

On Thu, 24 Feb 2011, Josh Berkus wrote:

>
>> Technically, yes (we have root in the right places). I'm not sure if
>> Stefan or I have any clue how to actually do so (I know I don't).
>
> Personally, I think that if we're going to create additional project
> lists, we should launch a mailman instance instead of adding them to
> majordomo. That way we can spread admin duties around, since we have a
> bunch of people who know mailman, and only one who understands majordomo.

Actually, two that know majordomo .. Alvaro does as well ... hadn't
thoguht of it before, but would it make sense to provide Alvaro actual
access to the admin side of majordomo? I personally have no issues with
that ... thoughts?

----
Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Hosting Solutions S.A.
scrappy(at)hub(dot)org http://www.hub.org

Yahoo:yscrappy Skype: hub.org ICQ:7615664 MSN:scrappy(at)hub(dot)org

Excerpts from Josh Berkus's message of jue feb 24 21:53:35 -0300 2011:

> Personally, I think that if we're going to create additional project
> lists, we should launch a mailman instance instead of adding them to
> majordomo. That way we can spread admin duties around, since we have a
> bunch of people who know mailman, and only one who understands majordomo.

Managing a single set of archive files is already enough trouble.

... hey, but then, I think Mailman has an option to not do the pipermail
stuff and just stash the archives in mboxes just like Majordomo. That
would let us handle both things together. If that really works, maybe
the archive part wouldn't be that problematic after all. (But I'm not
gonna moderate any Mailman crap.)

--
Álvaro Herrera <alvherre(at)commandprompt(dot)com>
The PostgreSQL Company - Command Prompt, Inc.
PostgreSQL Replication, Consulting, Custom Development, 24x7 support

On Thu, 24 Feb 2011, Alvaro Herrera wrote:

> Marc, please review this thread.
>
>
> Excerpts from Selena Deckelmann's message of lun feb 21 20:49:35 -0300 2011:
>
>> +1 with a couple requests.
>>
>> * Can we identify who the people with mailing list creation power are,
>
> IIRC that's Marc, Stefan and Dave.

And, purely by oversight, you should be part of that list as well, I think
... unless there is a reason you *wouldn't* want it ...

>> and make an announcement somewhere as they are created? If that's here
>> (pgsql-www), fine.
>
> +1 on this.

+1 on this too ... note that the only lists that I've created of late have
been pugs related lists, as required by Selena (usually) ... I just
figured there was a reason why nothing was announced publicly *shrug*

>> * Can we make it easier to change who is the mailing list
>> administrator, or have a policy about who is the administrator for
>> these lists? I'm guessing that this may change more frequently in the
>> side projects than it does in the core pgsql lists.
>
> +1 on this. Of course, we are not going to change admins for the core
> mailing lists.

'k, what do you mean by 'change who is the mailing list admin'? if you go
to http://mail.postgresql.org/mj/mj_wwwadm and login with your password,
you can go under Configuration -> Passwords and add / remove
administrators for those lists you are already an admin for ...

... I realize this was never mentioned before, but, honestly, nobody had
ever asked about it either ... its something all list admins (from what I
can tell from here) have access to ...

>> I've asked to be removed as an administrator from a few lists multiple
>> times, with no response.
>
> Whom did you ask?

+1 ... I try and respond to any requestions you (selena) have made
directly to me in timely manners ... dont' recall any request to removce
as admin :(

Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Hosting Solutions S.A.
scrappy(at)hub(dot)org http://www.hub.org

Yahoo:yscrappy Skype: hub.org ICQ:7615664 MSN:scrappy(at)hub(dot)org

On Fri, 25 Feb 2011, Alvaro Herrera wrote:

> Excerpts from Josh Berkus's message of jue feb 24 21:53:35 -0300 2011:
>
>> Personally, I think that if we're going to create additional project
>> lists, we should launch a mailman instance instead of adding them to
>> majordomo. That way we can spread admin duties around, since we have a
>> bunch of people who know mailman, and only one who understands majordomo.
>
> Managing a single set of archive files is already enough trouble.
>
> ... hey, but then, I think Mailman has an option to not do the pipermail
> stuff and just stash the archives in mboxes just like Majordomo. That
> would let us handle both things together. If that really works, maybe
> the archive part wouldn't be that problematic after all. (But I'm not
> gonna moderate any Mailman crap.)

My experience with Mailman is exactly that also ... it is great for the
end user, but crap from an admin side fo things, especially if you want to
do sstuff from the command line ...

there really is no reason why things for majordomo are "pivoting" on me,
since, as Alvaro has admitted, and I have, there is more then one of us
that knows the system ...

----
Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Hosting Solutions S.A.
scrappy(at)hub(dot)org http://www.hub.org

Yahoo:yscrappy Skype: hub.org ICQ:7615664 MSN:scrappy(at)hub(dot)org

On Fri, 25 Feb 2011, Alvaro Herrera wrote:

> Excerpts from Josh Berkus's message of jue feb 24 21:53:35 -0300 2011:
>>
>>> Technically, yes (we have root in the right places). I'm not sure if
>>> Stefan or I have any clue how to actually do so (I know I don't).
>>
>> Personally, I think that if we're going to create additional project
>> lists, we should launch a mailman instance instead of adding them to
>> majordomo. That way we can spread admin duties around, since we have a
>> bunch of people who know mailman, and only one who understands majordomo.
>
> We have two -- I do understand it. I just don't have the privs.

Let's shorten the conversation ... can you send me your public dsa (or
rsa) key, and I'll add it to the majordomo account on mail.postgresql.org
so that you are able to login? I have no qualms about continuing to be
primary, but having a backup with knowledge would definitely be "a good
thing" ...

----
Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Hosting Solutions S.A.
scrappy(at)hub(dot)org http://www.hub.org

Yahoo:yscrappy Skype: hub.org ICQ:7615664 MSN:scrappy(at)hub(dot)org

On Fri, 2011-02-25 at 00:21 -0300, Alvaro Herrera wrote:
> Excerpts from Josh Berkus's message of jue feb 24 21:53:35 -0300 2011:
>
> > Personally, I think that if we're going to create additional project
> > lists, we should launch a mailman instance instead of adding them to
> > majordomo. That way we can spread admin duties around, since we have a
> > bunch of people who know mailman, and only one who understands majordomo.
>
> Managing a single set of archive files is already enough trouble.
>
> ... hey, but then, I think Mailman has an option to not do the pipermail
> stuff and just stash the archives in mboxes just like Majordomo.

mailman archives are generated from an mbox. So you can do whatever you
want.

JD

--
PostgreSQL.org Major Contributor
Command Prompt, Inc: http://www.commandprompt.com/ - 509.416.6579
Consulting, Training, Support, Custom Development, Engineering
http://twitter.com/cmdpromptinc | http://identi.ca/commandprompt

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> Personally, I think that if we're going to create additional project
> lists, we should launch a mailman instance instead of adding them to
> majordomo. That way we can spread admin duties around, since we have a
> bunch of people who know mailman, and only one who understands majordomo.

>> We have two -- I do understand it. I just don't have the privs.

Make that three. But like Alvaro, I have limited privs.

- --
Greg Sabino Mullane greg(at)turnstep(dot)com
End Point Corporation http://www.endpoint.com/
PGP Key: 0x14964AC8 201102242239
http://biglumber.com/x/web?pk=2529DF6AB8F79407E94445B4BC9B906714964AC8
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On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 04:19, Marc G. Fournier <scrappy(at)hub(dot)org> wrote:
> On Thu, 24 Feb 2011, Josh Berkus wrote:
>
>>
>>> Technically, yes (we have root in the right places). I'm not sure if
>>> Stefan or I have any clue how to actually do so (I know I don't).
>>
>> Personally, I think that if we're going to create additional project
>> lists, we should launch a mailman instance instead of adding them to
>> majordomo.  That way we can spread admin duties around, since we have a
>> bunch of people who know mailman, and only one who understands majordomo.
>
> Actually, two that know majordomo .. Alvaro does as well ... hadn't thoguht
> of it before, but would it make sense to provide Alvaro actual access to the
> admin side of majordomo?  I personally have no issues with that ...
> thoughts?

+1, assuming he actually wants to get stuck with that ;)

--
 Magnus Hagander
 Me: http://www.hagander.net/
 Work: http://www.redpill-linpro.com/

On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 04:27, Marc G. Fournier <scrappy(at)hub(dot)org> wrote:
> On Fri, 25 Feb 2011, Alvaro Herrera wrote:
>
>> Excerpts from Josh Berkus's message of jue feb 24 21:53:35 -0300 2011:
>>
>>> Personally, I think that if we're going to create additional project
>>> lists, we should launch a mailman instance instead of adding them to
>>> majordomo.  That way we can spread admin duties around, since we have a
>>> bunch of people who know mailman, and only one who understands majordomo.
>>
>> Managing a single set of archive files is already enough trouble.
>>
>> ... hey, but then, I think Mailman has an option to not do the pipermail
>> stuff and just stash the archives in mboxes just like Majordomo.  That
>> would let us handle both things together.  If that really works, maybe
>> the archive part wouldn't be that problematic after all.  (But I'm not
>> gonna moderate any Mailman crap.)
>
> My experience with Mailman is exactly that also ... it is great for the end
> user, but crap from an admin side fo things, especially if you want to do
> sstuff from the command line ...

To be honest, I find both mailman and majordomo2 to be very
user-unfriendly towards end users. Mailman sucking slightly less, but
still definitely sucking.

Mailman has much less sucky web interface, but a much more sucky mail
interface. I assume it's the sucky mail interface that makes you
(alvaro) say you won't moderate it?

AFAICT, that's workflow dependent really - I wouldn't touch the mj2
moderation stuff because it was horribly annoying, and would only do
the mailman moderation if forced to. Prior, that is, to developing an
actual android app to make the process acceptable *to me*. At which
point it's equally acceptable for mj2 and for mailman, except
everything is a lot slower for mj2 (because it's built off the web
interface, and the mj2 web interface is crap)

You can do reasonable stuff from the commandline in mailman as well,
but it's ugly and not necessarily well documented. OTOH, *all* of
majordomo2 is badly documented, AFAIK.

I don't think that would make a big difference.

What I am more worried about is that there seems to be no upstream
maintenance of mj2. I mean, their website hasn't been touched in more
than 10 years! And given the *huge* security hole that was found in it
recently (taht AFAIK was patched manually by Marc?), it's rather
obvious there is no maintenance. And that worries me a lot.

Mailman certainly has it's own share of issues with that. It seems
that the legendary mailman3 is actually going to get beaten to the
punch by Duke Nukem Forever, which says something.. But the larger
linux distributions (fedora, debian etc) at least seem to be doing
active work on maintaining the version they ship. Which makes me feel
a lot more comfortable with that product.

Do we really know the system well enough to be comfortable maintaining
*all* of it? Or is there actually some top secret upstream
maintainenance that just missed a *huge* security hole for 10 years?

--
 Magnus Hagander
 Me: http://www.hagander.net/
 Work: http://www.redpill-linpro.com/

On Fri, 25 Feb 2011, Magnus Hagander wrote:

> What I am more worried about is that there seems to be no upstream
> maintenance of mj2. I mean, their website hasn't been touched in more
> than 10 years! And given the *huge* security hole that was found in it
> recently (taht AFAIK was patched manually by Marc?), it's rather
> obvious there is no maintenance. And that worries me a lot.

Actually, apparently that bug was patched earlier then we found it ... the
thing mj2 is lacking is a proper commit mailing list, so I wasn't aware of
hte patch :(

> Do we really know the system well enough to be comfortable maintaining
> *all* of it? Or is there actually some top secret upstream
> maintainenance that just missed a *huge* security hole for 10 years?

Again, that was more a communications issue with the mj2 devs then an
oversight on their part ... as Alvaro can attest, when I posted to the mj2
list about it, the firts rsponse I got out of Jason (core deeveloper) was
"already fixed in CVS" ...

Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Hosting Solutions S.A.
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On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 15:26, Marc G. Fournier <scrappy(at)hub(dot)org> wrote:
> On Fri, 25 Feb 2011, Magnus Hagander wrote:
>
>> What I am more worried about is that there seems to be no upstream
>> maintenance of mj2. I mean, their website hasn't been touched in more
>> than 10 years! And given the *huge* security hole that was found in it
>> recently (taht AFAIK was patched manually by Marc?), it's rather
>> obvious there is no maintenance. And that worries me a lot.
>
> Actually, apparently that bug was patched earlier then we found it ... the
> thing mj2 is lacking is a proper commit mailing list, so I wasn't aware of
> hte patch :(

Eek. But you're at least saying they have a source code repository
somewhere? :D Do they actually make releases as well?

>> Do we really know the system well enough to be comfortable maintaining
>> *all* of it? Or is there actually some top secret upstream maintainenance
>> that just missed a *huge* security hole for 10 years?
>
> Again, that was more a communications issue with the mj2 devs then an
> oversight on their part ... as Alvaro can attest, when I posted to the mj2
> list about it, the firts rsponse I got out of Jason (core deeveloper) was
> "already fixed in CVS" ...

Hmm. Last I checked I wasn't even able to find a working mailinglist
for it :-) At least not one with archives. Can you give me a pointer
to where I find that - it would be good to have around for
reference...

--
 Magnus Hagander
 Me: http://www.hagander.net/
 Work: http://www.redpill-linpro.com/

On Fri, 25 Feb 2011, Magnus Hagander wrote:

> Eek. But you're at least saying they have a source code repository
> somewhere? :D Do they actually make releases as well?

CVS repo, yes, that is where we pull our code from ... releaeses, no ...

> Hmm. Last I checked I wasn't even able to find a working mailinglist
> for it :-) At least not one with archives. Can you give me a pointer
> to where I find that - it would be good to have around for
> reference...

mj2-dev(at)lists(dot)mj2(dot)org is what both Alvaro and I are on ...

----
Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Hosting Solutions S.A.
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Hi!

2011/2/24 Marc G. Fournier <scrappy(at)hub(dot)org>:
> On Thu, 24 Feb 2011, Alvaro Herrera wrote:
>> Excerpts from Selena Deckelmann's message of lun feb 21 20:49:35 -0300
>> 2011:
>>
>>> and make an announcement somewhere as they are created? If that's here
>>> (pgsql-www), fine.
>>
>> +1 on this.
>
> +1 on this too ... note that the only lists that I've created of late have
> been pugs related lists, as required by Selena (usually) ... I just figured
> there was a reason why nothing was announced publicly *shrug*

Cool! Then everyone agrees announcing new lists here is good.

I started a wiki page to document this discussion:

http://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/Mailing_List_Creation_Policies

>>> * Can we make it easier to change who is the mailing list
>>> administrator, or have a policy about who is the administrator for
>>> these lists? I'm guessing that this may change more frequently in the
>>> side projects than it does in the core pgsql lists.
>>
>> +1 on this.  Of course, we are not going to change admins for the core
>> mailing lists.
>
> 'k, what do you mean by 'change who is the mailing list admin'?  if you go
> to  http://mail.postgresql.org/mj/mj_wwwadm and login with your password,
> you can go under Configuration -> Passwords and add / remove administrators
> for those lists you are already an admin for ...

Hmm, maybe I just didn't know how to do that. I am the admin for lists
which I don't need to be part of, so I will try that and report back
if I can't make the change.

> ... I realize this was never mentioned before, but, honestly, nobody had
> ever asked about it either ... its something all list admins (from what I
> can tell from here) have access to ...

I asked a while back, but no big deal, Marc. :) We'll sort it all out now.

I asked for the pgus-board list to be deactivated, but didn't
specifically CC Marc:

http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-www/2010-04/msg00017.php

My request for admin rights to be removed probably wasn't cc'd to the
list. But like I said, it's not a big deal, obviously, since I hadn't
bothered to ask about it since April. :)

I do think that non-core pgsql lists will require a little more
frequent management, but as long as more than just one person has the
ability to make changes or point people to the right places to
reconfigure things themselves, I think we'll be totally fine.

-selena

--
http://chesnok.com

On Thu, 2011-02-24 at 23:27 -0400, Marc G. Fournier wrote:

> > ... hey, but then, I think Mailman has an option to not do the pipermail
> > stuff and just stash the archives in mboxes just like Majordomo. That
> > would let us handle both things together. If that really works, maybe
> > the archive part wouldn't be that problematic after all. (But I'm not
> > gonna moderate any Mailman crap.)
>
> My experience with Mailman is exactly that also ... it is great for the
> end user, but crap from an admin side fo things, especially if you want to
> do sstuff from the command line ...'

That isn't my experience at all. I can do anything from the command
line, from templates, to archive management, to manual subscription
etc... and we (CMD) have hundreds of mailman lists.

JD

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On Fri, 25 Feb 2011, Joshua D. Drake wrote:

> On Thu, 2011-02-24 at 23:27 -0400, Marc G. Fournier wrote:
>
>>> ... hey, but then, I think Mailman has an option to not do the pipermail
>>> stuff and just stash the archives in mboxes just like Majordomo. That
>>> would let us handle both things together. If that really works, maybe
>>> the archive part wouldn't be that problematic after all. (But I'm not
>>> gonna moderate any Mailman crap.)
>>
>> My experience with Mailman is exactly that also ... it is great for the
>> end user, but crap from an admin side fo things, especially if you want to
>> do sstuff from the command line ...'
>
> That isn't my experience at all. I can do anything from the command
> line, from templates, to archive management, to manual subscription
> etc... and we (CMD) have hundreds of mailman lists.

Its all what one gets used to, I guess .. I can do alot of stuff with
mysql that I can't with postgresql (ie. run wordpress) ... doesnt' mean
I'm going to start a general adoption of that ...

We run Mj2 here ... we have for 15 years now and it works ... we have two
ppl here that know it, and the documentation for Mj2 is such that anyone
with half a clue could get up to speed on it fairly fast ...

Due to lack of foresight on my part, I hadn't offered/given Alvaro access
... not through lack of confidence in his ability to manage it, only
because I never thought of it, and nobody else mentioned it before ... am
working to rectify that ...

----
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On Fri, 25 Feb 2011, Selena Deckelmann wrote:

> I started a wiki page to document this discussion:
>
> http://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/Mailing_List_Creation_Policies

New lists should be announced (and requested) through
sysadmins(at)postgresql(dot)org ... it is not a web related activity, nor
maintained by the Web Team :)

Also, it should be announced to pgsql-announce if you want to get broader
distribution ...

> Hmm, maybe I just didn't know how to do that. I am the admin for lists
> which I don't need to be part of, so I will try that and report back if
> I can't make the change.

Let me know ... I've always done config changes through command line
myself ... I believe you can also do this through email, but I really
don't know how the syntax for *that* works, although, if you find that
that might be useful, I can figure it out and let you know ...

> I asked a while back, but no big deal, Marc. :) We'll sort it all out now.
>
> I asked for the pgus-board list to be deactivated, but didn't
> specifically CC Marc:
>
> http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-www/2010-04/msg00017.php

Ah, see, that would explain it ... I'm not on pgsql-www, since I don't
have anyting to do with Web related activities ... mail server related
requests should go through sysadmins(at)postgresql(dot)org, where I am subscribed
... that would explain why I never saw that request :(

> I do think that non-core pgsql lists will require a little more
> frequent management, but as long as more than just one person has the
> ability to make changes or point people to the right places to
> reconfigure things themselves, I think we'll be totally fine.

And make sure you send your requests to the right mailing list :)

mail != www, therefore not relevant to pgsql-www ...

----
Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Hosting Solutions S.A.
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On Fri, 2011-02-25 at 13:26 -0400, Marc G. Fournier wrote:

> Its all what one gets used to, I guess .. I can do alot of stuff with
> mysql that I can't with postgresql (ie. run wordpress) ... doesnt' mean
> I'm going to start a general adoption of that ...
>
> We run Mj2 here ... we have for 15 years now and it works ... we have two
> ppl here that know it, and the documentation for Mj2 is such that anyone
> with half a clue could get up to speed on it fairly fast ...

I wasn't suggesting we change .org proper.

JD

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All,

If Greg, Alvaro, and Marc all have the ability to create new lists and
retrieve admin's lost passwords, then I withdraw my suggestion that we
use mailman for the new lists.

--
-- Josh Berkus
PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
http://www.pgexperts.com

On Fri, 25 Feb 2011, Josh Berkus wrote:

> All,
>
> If Greg, Alvaro, and Marc all have the ability to create new lists and
> retrieve admin's lost passwords, then I withdraw my suggestion that we
> use mailman for the new lists.

Alvaro sent me his rsa/dsa key today, just haven't had a sec yet to plug
it in ... on todo for this weekend ... as for greg ... Greg who?

----
Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Hosting Solutions S.A.
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Yahoo:yscrappy Skype: hub.org ICQ:7615664 MSN:scrappy(at)hub(dot)org

On Sat, Feb 26, 2011 at 05:03, Josh Berkus <josh(at)agliodbs(dot)com> wrote:
> All,
>
> If Greg, Alvaro, and Marc all have the ability to create new lists and
> retrieve admin's lost passwords, then I withdraw my suggestion that we
> use mailman for the new lists.

agreed in principle.

One other thing we might *want* to consider, however, is if we
actually *want* to host these on the main mailinglist server, or if we
want a separate instance for "third party lists" or whatever we'd call
them. To separate services and make sure we don't "risk" our main
lists in any way, maintenance-way.

(regardless of what software is used)

--
 Magnus Hagander
 Me: http://www.hagander.net/
 Work: http://www.redpill-linpro.com/

On Sat, 2011-02-26 at 12:12 +0100, Magnus Hagander wrote:
> On Sat, Feb 26, 2011 at 05:03, Josh Berkus <josh(at)agliodbs(dot)com> wrote:
> > All,
> >
> > If Greg, Alvaro, and Marc all have the ability to create new lists and
> > retrieve admin's lost passwords, then I withdraw my suggestion that we
> > use mailman for the new lists.
>
> agreed in principle.
>
> One other thing we might *want* to consider, however, is if we
> actually *want* to host these on the main mailinglist server, or if we
> want a separate instance for "third party lists" or whatever we'd call
> them. To separate services and make sure we don't "risk" our main
> lists in any way, maintenance-way.
>
> (regardless of what software is used)

May I just note that I strongly disagree with any of this unless we get
a written procedure (you know, documentation!) out of how to handle
this?

JD

>

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> Alvaro sent me his rsa/dsa key today, just haven't had a sec yet to plug
> it in ... on todo for this weekend ... as for greg ... Greg who?

Me. Sorry for not cc'ing you on my response to this thread. Keep forgetting
you are not subscribed to -www. Although for the project's sanity, I
would like you to consider subscribing. It's pretty low volume, and
we seem to end up Cc'ing quite a bit about things like this. :)

- --
Greg Sabino Mullane greg(at)turnstep(dot)com
PGP Key: 0x14964AC8 201102261559
http://biglumber.com/x/web?pk=2529DF6AB8F79407E94445B4BC9B906714964AC8
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