On Thu, 6 Aug 2009 09:26:33 -0400, Steven Eckard <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>Is there some practical way of cleaning up old lists besides just going through each list. We probably have around 900 lists, some of which have not been used in years and/or the owners have long since left the University. Thanks for any input.

It won't help now, but for the future, I date all lists at time of creation
with a note in the List Header, so you at least know how long ago it was
created.  If you put that together with Liam's suggestions on monitoring active
use, it will help you identify un-used lists.

If you create all lists by the templates stored in the WWW interface to
LISTSERV, then you can add this line to automatically fill in the date created:

* Created: &+ISODATE;  by: xx  Approved_by: yy
*  Class-List:  Will expire in 9 months from above date


You can add additional lines to the template to customize your lists to your
site needs as necessary:

* Change-log= Yes,yearly
* Validate= Yes, confirm
* Default-Options= Repro, NoAck
* Subscription= Open,Confirm        (strongly recommended)
* Reply-To= List,Ignore
* Auto-Delete= Yes,Full-Auto,Delay(4),max(25),Probe(10)
* Errors-To= Owners
* Attachments= No
* Sizelim= 200

You can make several templates customized to your site needs.  For example, you
might have class/dept discussion lists and general announcement (one-way)
lists.