On Mon, 20 Aug 2001 17:39:05 -0400, Elizabeth Poole <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>I'm trying to create my first listserv lists.  The server is active, I can
>create lists, I can subscribe people to them, but when subscribers send
>mail to the list name (TESTER-L, my that's original) it goes into a black
>hole.  The listserv.log file tracks the creates and the subscribes just
>fine, but nothing at all is written to the log when mail is sent to the
>list.

Actually this is an Admin question better addressed to LSTSRV-L.  However, the
following outline of mail flow should make the answer of where to look, what to
do, pretty clear.

Mail flow to/from LISTSERV
--------------------------

Inbound
=======

1) I create a message addressed to [log in to unmask]

2) my computer actually sends the message to a mail gateway (mail.example.com)
which receives all mail from our company (or ISP) and forwards it to wherever it
needs to go.

3) mail.example.com looks up a DNS entry for listserv.example.com, finds it, and
connects to listserv.example.com port 25 and sends the message using the SMTP
protocol.  The LSMTP (or other mail program) on listserv.example.com receives
the mail message.

4) LSMTP creates a *.job file in LISTSERV's spool directory.

5) LISTSERV reads the *.job file and acts on it, recording the
activity in its log file (located in listserv\log\).

If you send a message and no *.job file appears or there is no entry in the log
file, then the message has not got this far.  Retrace the above steps until you
find the missing mail, or an error message indicating some problem with it.

Outbound
========

6) LISTSERV writes any mail generated by step 5 to *.mail files in the
listserv\spool\ directory.

7) LISTSERV's SMTP workers open the *.mail files and hand them off to
LSMTP.  (If this step fails you'll see *.mail files accumulating in
the listserv\spool\ directory and the error will be recorded in the
listserv\log\SMTPS#1-yyyymmdd.LOG file.)

8) LSMTP opens a connection on port 25 to the mail server of the
recipient email address and delivers the mail (in this case back to
mail.example.com) to your mail gateway which receives and stores mail
for later POP3 mail pickup.

9) Whenever you want (or after a certain time) your email program polls
the gateway server for any mail waiting for you, and transfers it back to your
'Inbox' in your mail program on your computer.


If LISTSERV's log file indicates that it's sent you a message and you
haven't received it, you'd look to see if there are *.mail files in
the spool directory.  If there aren't then the mail at least made it
as far as LSMTP.  You can then look in LSMTP's queue to see if the
mail is hung up somewhere, etc.  If they aren't there either, then you
must look at the gateway server where your mailbox is.