Provision has  been made to allow  each postmaster to define  a local remote
installation password for his server, in  addition to the global one. That is,
each automatic shipment  installation must be validated by a  password that is
unique to the server  and cannot be known to other  LISTSERV owners. There are
three possible options:
 
- No local installation  password. Only the global password  is required. This
  will  be the  default as  the LISTSERV  software package  is not  customized
  before being sent, and I can't therefore provide unique individual passwords
  for new sites.
 
- Local installation password  which is known only to the  local system staff.
  The shipment  will remain held until  the password is provided  to LISTSERV.
  The LISTSERV operation staff must periodically issue an INSTALL STAT command
  to  check for  new shipments  when these  are announced,  and then  issue an
  INSTALL PASSWORD command  to confirm the installation. Note that  it is then
  the responsibility of the local staff to install the shipments in time. This
  option might be selected by sites which had contemplated disabling automatic
  updates as it  ensures proper installation of the  shipment while completely
  removing security  problems and making sure  that a human person  is present
  when the shipment is installed.
 
- Local installation  password which is  given to me. In  that case I  send an
  individual  2-records file  to each  site with  the appropriate  password to
  confirm the installation of the shipments I send, with the major bulk of the
  shipment being  sent out via  DISTRIBUTE with  the common password.  This is
  negligible network load compared to the security benefits.
 
Regards, Eric