Chapters 3 : Basic Internet Services

Sections 2 : Infromation on the Internet

Mailing Lists and Listserv

Mailing lists are a special form of e-mail. These are message to which you subscribe. There are a large amount of mailing list on various topics. The mailing list is controled by the list administrator. The administrator is the person that monitors and ensures the mailing list is working. The mailing list is run on a machine referred to as the list server or 'listserv' All messages are sent to the list server. The list server then mails a copy of the message to every one who has subscribed, directly to your personalized mailbox. maintained list of mailing lists is at http://alpha.acast.nova.edu/cgi-bin/lists A Listserv is a program the mailing list administrator uses to help manage the mailing list. It helps users to subscribe and unsubscribe automatically without human contact. The list administtator has subsciption options that can be set. The listserv also allows the subscriber to setup options on how to send the mailing list message to them. An additional advantage of listserv is it can provide a block of messages to the subscriber at one time instead of individually. This block of messages is often referred to as the digest format. Lastly listserv provides the mailing lists information in an organized format making it easier to quickly find information about the lists topics.


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