Public Ada Library Email FAQ

Public Ada Library Email FAQ

[Prof R Conn]

Date of this FAQ: Friday, January 6, 1995
Public Ada Library (PAL) Email List Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

The Public Ada Library (PAL) is a library of Ada and VHDL software,
courseware, and documentation on the wuarchive.wustl.edu host computer
(VHDL stands for Very High Speed Integrated Circuit (VHSIC) Hardware
Description Language).  This FAQ addresses the following questions
regarding the electronic mailing lists managed by the PAL for its users:

 . What is New since the last PAL Email FAQ?
 . How Do I Use the PAL's List Server to Add and Remove Myself from a List?
 . What Electronic Mailing Lists Support the Users of the PAL?
 . What Should I Do When I Receive Bounced Messages from a PAL Email List?
 . Why Was I Removed from a PAL Email List?
 . Why Was My Response to a Message Sent to the Entire List?
 . Why Are These Lists Used Instead of USENET News?
 . How Can I Catch Up on Postings I Missed or Lost?

Questions about this FAQ?  Suggestions for improvement?  Gripes?
Contact:
  Richard Conn, Manager, Public Ada Library (PAL)
  conn@wuarchive.wustl.edu

=======================================================
Subject: What is New since the last PAL FAQ?
Removed writeup on PAL: 12 March 1995
=======================================================
Subject: How Do I Use the PAL's List Server to Add and
Remove Myself from a List?

WUNET.WUSTL.EDU is the electronic mail list server for users of the
Public Ada Library.  A separate computer from WUARCHIVE.WUSTL.EDU (on
which the PAL is located), WUNET's purpose in life from the point of
view of the PAL user is to manage the electronic mailing lists
supporting him.

The List Server is a program on WUNET which manages Lists (Electronic
Mailing Lists).  The user can send commands to the List Server, and it
will respond by performing actions for him (such as adding him to a
List, removing him from a List, and sending him a message naming all the
lists supported by the List Server).  The user can send email messages
to the List, and the subscribers to the List will receive these
messages.

To find out what commands the List Server can respond to, send an email
message to

  listserv@wunet.wustl.edu

which contains an empty subject line and one line in the body of the
message (starting in the first column):

  help

If you wish to subscribe to an electronic mailing list, send an
electronic mail message to:
 
  listserv@wunet.wustl.edu
 
Leave the subject line blank and place the following line into the body
of this message:
 
  subscribe <electronic mailing list name>

Example:
  subscribe pal-announce
 
Begin this line in column 1.  Your return address will be used as the
address to which announcements will be sent.  A list of the electronic
mailing lists for the PAL user community is included below.
 
You will receive a message back from the listserv software, telling you
of the success or failure of your request.
 
Once subscribed, a user can send electronic mail to all subscribers of a
List by sending email to the list's name at wunet.wustl.edu; example:

  ada-train@wunet.wustl.edu

This, of course, only works if the List is bidirectional.  The ANNOUNCE
Lists are unidirectional (read-only from the point of view of the
subscribers).  Subscribers cannot post email messages to the ANNOUNCE
lists - only the moderator of the ANNOUNCE lists can post messages.

If you later wish to remove yourself from an electronic mailing list,
send an email message to the List Server (NOT the list itself, since a
message to the list itself will automatically be routed to all the
readers of the list).  Like before, leave the subject line blank and
place one line in the body of the message:

  unsubscribe <electronic mailing list name>
  
Example:
  unsubscribe pal-announce

If you have changed your email address since the time you subscribed to
an electronic mailing list, the List Server will not let you unsubscribe
the old address.  This is a reasonable feature of the List Server, for
without it, users could go around unsubscribing other users at will. If
this happens to you, just send an electronic mail message to the
maintainer of the list.  Be sure to mention your old email address. He
will then unsubscribe the old address for you.

=======================================================
Subject: What Electronic Mailing Lists Support PAL Users?

These lists are for the PAL user community.  For a more complete list of
the mailing lists available to your site, send a mail message to
listserv@wunet.wustl.edu which contains the command "DIR/LISTS". 

    Wuarchive-Announce - Notification of any planned downtime or service
      changes for wuarchive.wustl.edu.  The only announcements from this
      list will be from local staff or archivers.

    Pal-Announce - Announcements concerning the Public Ada Library
      (PAL).  These include additions to, changes to and other
      announcements concerning the PAL.  You can not post messages here.

    Ada-Train - This list is for the discussion of topics concerning Ada
      training and education.  This is a general discussion list.

    EducationWG - This list is a bidirectional mailing list for those
      people interested in participating in the Education Working group
      of ACM/SIGAda.  It is used to exchange information about the
      activities of the working group and coordinate those activities.

    ASEET - The ASEET email list supports members of ASEET (The Ada and
      Software Engineering Education Team) and others interested in the
      activities of ASEET.  ASEET materials are available from the
      Public Ada Library (PAL), including an archive of previous messages
      posted to this list.

    Reuse - This list is a bidirectional mailing list for those people
      interested in software reuse technology.  This includes, but is
      not limited to, the fields of designing for reuse, object-oriented
      reuse methods, reuse tools and environments, generic code
      architectures, domain-specific kits, reuse education, technology
      transfer, formal methods, certification of reusable components,
      and management issues as they pertain to reuse.

    ReuseWG - This list is a bidirectional mailing list for those people
      interested in participating in the Reuse Working Group of
      ACM/SIGAda.  It is used to exchange information about the
      activities of the working group and coordinate those activities.

=======================================================
Subject: What Should I Do When I Receive Bounced Messages
from a PAL Email List?

When you post a message to a PAL email list (or any electronic mailing
list, for that matter), the List Server makes copies of your message and
sends them on to the various addresses of its subscribers. Occasionally,
people will change accounts, change jobs, etc., without thinking to
unsubscribe from the email lists they are reading.  When their accounts
go away, the electronic mail software of the hosts these people were on
will no longer recognize their addresses.  The usual response to this is
to send the message back to the originator with a note that an address
no longer exists.

With an email list like those maintained by the PAL, where there are
hundreds or thousands of subscribers, this problem of bounced messages
may come up fairly regularly.  To reduce this problem, the maintainer of
the PAL email lists periodically makes a post to them, checking for
bounced messages, and then unsubscribing the addresses which caused the
bounce.

If it is important to you that the bounced message is received by the
person to whom it was addressed, you may have to contact him by other
means, such as telephone, to resolve the communication problem.

Copies of all bounced messages are sent to the PAL email list
maintainer, who will act on them from time to time to remove
subscriptions that have bounced frequently.

=======================================================
Subject: Why Was I Removed from a PAL Email List?

Some time you may receive a message from a PAL List Server that you have
been removed from one of the PAL email lists.  This happens occasionally
when the electronic mail software on a host computer bounces an email
message accidentally.  Several cases have been reported where something
happens to a user's host computer to cause it to temporarily not
recognize the user's account.  Email sent to that account is sent back
to the originator in most cases, and, if this happens to a message
posted to a PAL email list, the subscription to the list may be removed
by the maintainer of the PAL email lists. This is done to remove
messages that are bouncing due to users changing or losing their
accounts.

If you find yourself in such a situation (having been removed from a PAL
email list without asking to be), simply subscribe to the list again.  I
apologize for any inconvenience.

See the previous question for more information on bounced email
messages.

=======================================================
Subject: Why Was My Response to a Message Sent to the Entire List?

The PAL email lists set the Reply-To fields of all messages they
transmit to themselves rather than the individuals to originally sent
the messages. This is so that conversations between all members of the
list can be easily carried on.  Someone posts a message, someone else
answers it, and everyone sees this answer.  Sometimes readers become
frustrated when someone inadvertently sends a message to the list rather
than the List Server, such as a request to unsubscribe from the list. 
Everyone gets a copy of the unsubscription request and the List Server
never sees it.  If a reader decides to flame the person who did this by
simply replying to the message, the flame goes out to the entire list
again, rather than to just the person.

So, care should be taken to realize that responding to a message from a
list posts the response to the entire list.

=======================================================
Subject: Why Are These Lists Used Instead of USENET News?

The USENET News service is an outstanding facility that gets around many
of the problems associated with email lists such as these.  However,
USENET News service is not universally available, while electronic mail
is much more standardized between all platforms and more universally
available.  Hence, these lists are used instead of setting up additional
USENET newsgroups in order to reach a wider audience.

=======================================================
Subject: How Can I Catch Up on Postings I Missed or Lost?

All of the PAL Email List postings are stored in the directory
languages/ada/userdocs/internet/email in the PAL.  The postings are
updated on a monthly basis.  Each year, the postings are collected into
a single ZIP file for the entire year.

For example,
  the file 1993.zip contains all email postings to all PAL Email Lists
    during 1993
  the file mail9412.zip contains all email postings to all PAL Email
    Lists during December 1994

See the PAL Catalog and PAL Card Catalog entry on this service for more
details (look under User Toolkit/User Documents/Internet/Email Archives).
Richard Conn, PAL Manager  |  conn@wuarchive.wustl.edu
Opinions expressed herein are my own and not necessarily those of anyone else.
==============================================================================