Hi Bill. My responses to your questions are below.

-Jim
--
Jim Serwinowski                 [log in to unmask]
UB Listserv Administrator       http://listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu


On Mon, 13 May 2002, Bill Verity wrote:

> I'm curious about what other sites do with lists for classes.  Here at
> Penn State we normally:
>
> 1. Set up list for one semester.  After the semester is over, we delete
> the lists and archives after reminding the owners that we are doing it.

We set the lists up for two years, so now I'm removing everything up to
Summer 2000. When it does come time for cleanup, we email the owners, they
have the right to request that it stays if they need it.

> 2. Require the owners to populate the lists.  They can get the addresses
>and names on the web from a page that the registrar maintains.

We do an auto population at list creation time if they request it. In our
"new list request form" we have a spot where they can enter the  reg.#
for the class which, through a call to an oracle database, gets a list of
email addresses, and appends it to the email we use for list creation. We
are not responsible in keeping them up to date. After the list is created,
if they want their list update, then they go to a simple form where they
enter in the list name and reg.# which queries that oracle database again,
and sends me an email preformatted with a quiet del listname *@* and all the
quiet adds. All I need to do is verify they are the list owner and then I
send off  the email.

> 3. Name the lists with course name, number and section.  We begin local
> lists with an L-, so a typical name might be L-ANTHY100-2.

Similarly we do name, number, section, then semester, then -list, for
example:

ENG101B2-SU02-LIST would be English 101, Section B2, Summer 02

However, in place of the semester, we also sometimes go by username. Say
for example Professor Smith, username smith, teaches ENG101 evey semester.
Instead of making him request a new list each semester, we just name the
list ENG101-SMITH-LIST and then let him fill out the east repopulation
form to keep it updated.

Of course using semesters and usernames in the listname came out of
necessity to reduce naming collisions. For some reason every single
professor in the english dept feels a good name for their class list would
be "english-list", and then they're shocked when I tell them they're about
10 years late in getting that one. :)

> How do other schools handle this task?  I'm curious whether you put the
> semester and year in the name - SP02-ANTHY100-2.
>
> Do you offer to populate the lists?  If so, do you keep them up to date as
> drop/adds occur.
>
>
> --
> BE ALERT!!!!  (The world needs more lerts ...)
>
> Bill Verity - 814-865-4758 Fax: 814-863-7049 215A Computer Building -
> Information Technology Services, Penn State University At the office - on my
> Mac, of course ;-)
>
>
>