--On March 7, 2006 12:09:01 PM -0500 Francoise Becker <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:
> On 7 Mar 2006 at 9:45, Michael Loftis wrote:
>
>> Well not in Linux there isn't. It's all completely un-documented. Near
>> as I can tell it only supports ODBC and then in windows. Still, no
>> documentation anywhere that's usable as far as I've ever found. Not to
>> mention how the heck does it manage a list in the database, etc. Since
>> we strictly enforce double-opt-in, etc.
>
> I really recommend you look at Maestro. It has all the database
> management built-in, i.e. maintaining opt-in lists with more data
> fields than just email and name. And then mail-merge messages are
> very easy to do, and targeting emails is also much easier (the
> "target group" wizard builds the necessary SQL query for you through
> a series of menus -- no SQL to learn).
We've no interest in doing *anything* related to email marketing, that's
most of the point. I was asking about Maestro for our FAQ/response
template for customers that want to. It's too much of a headache, there's
no such thing as a clean list, etc.
> But BTW, LISTSERV 14.5 on Linux DOES support unixODBC, as well as
> Oracle and DB2.
Ahh, that helps, didn't know.
> But still, why go to all the trouble of writing DISTRIBUTE jobs
> (which as we've seen in the "Mail-merge Format" thread is a
> challenge), when L-Soft has already gone to the trouble of writing a
> very easy to use and very powerful interface for it?
Because it's very expensive, as is ListServ. :) Besides, it's not our
line of business and we have no interest in it. Our customers often do,
and we want to provide them with a list of options.
> Frankly, I don't know why anyone except the L-Soft programmers
> working on Maestro would still be messing with DISTRIBUTE jobs.
> That's what Maestro is for.
Like I said, Maestro is expensive. Especially when you add on the cost of
ListServ, and if you want to get any sort of performance without a lot of
tweaking, LSMTP. Since there's no standard 'merge' format for SMTP
Daemons, well, except the return path standard of VERP/XVERP which ListServ
doesn't support either. I have to do masquerading on my outgoing mail to
make sure the ListServ probes can be processed when they come back.
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