On Wed, 12 Jun 2002, Benjamin D. Skarp wrote:
> Hi everybody! Being relatively new to listserv administration, I have a
> couple questions regarding the locking of a list. How, exactly, does a
> list get locked?

The listowner, or the LISTSERV site admin., explicitly "locks" the list
LOCK listname
or, the list is implicitly locked due to a GET command lacking options
GET listname

A locked list is one to which no one can subscribe, nor can those
subscribed unsub, change options, etc.  I don't think that is what you
are asking about, though.

> Presumably, it would be from sending a certain number
> of wrong commands to the list, or possibly from a non-listowner
> attempting to send commands to the list.

That isn't a "lock," it is an auto-serve-out.  Has nothing to do with the
list, has to do with LISTSERV refusing to pay any attention to an address
which repeatedly sends nonsense.  Serve-out is for a specific address
which is causing problems, regardless of list; lock is for preventing
anyone from subing, or unsubing, to/from a list.

A serve-out is not list specific, but LISTSERV site specific and has
nothing to do with lock.

> Is it possbile to find out if a
> list is locked, other than sending a command to it and the command being
> rejected by an email stating "the xxxx-l list is locked"?

Confusing questions.  Are you asking about lock, or serveout?  Are you
confusing the two?  In the earlier part of your question you were clearly,
least so it seemed to me, asking about serve-out, despite calling it
"lock", yet here you seem to asking about lock as lock.

I assume you are realy asking about lock.  No, you cannot lock a list
by sending to many nonsense commands, but you can get your address
served out.

If you are the listowner, you could try UNLOCK listname , though I would
be cautious about doing that if I had no idea why the list was locked.

Oh, umm, do you have a limited license, or you are renting space from
L-SOFT?  If that is the case, well, you fork over a few more bucks to
L-SOFT and they'll unlock your list, or send you upgrade software.

Douglas [log in to unmask]