[Techtalk] Checking if a mailing list is active

[Terri Oda]

>And where is the newchix mailing list? Is this active? Cause so far 
>haven't got anything from them.

I was going to answer this just privately, but then I thought other people 
might want to know.

If you want to know if a list is active, check the archives.  The archives 
are as close as you can get to a log if you're not on the machine and able 
to view the actual logs.  They're good enough that, as a list 
administrator, I usually check the archives as well as the logs when I 
suspect that something's not working.

The archives will tell you two important things: if mail is being sent and 
when mail is being sent.  A quick look through the archives will give you 
an idea of the current frequency of messages, so you know how active the 
list is.

So, a quick check of the archives for newchix 
<http://mailman.linuxchix.org/mailman/private/newchix/> says that the last 
message was sent on Feb 7th.  So if you subscribed after that was sent, you 
shouldn't expect to have any new mails yet, but since messages have been 
sent in the past 10 days, it's probably active in general.

Of course, if you suspect the list is *broken* that's something else 
entirely.  You'd check the archives, check your own subscription options, 
maybe send a test message or ask a list administrator, who can check the 
logs and see if you're bouncing mail for some reason.  (generally, if 
you're getting mail  to the same email address from other lists on the same 
server, you're not going to be bouncing just one list).

  Terri