Placing a Temporary Stop on E-mail List Messages

by Allen Porter, Academic Computing

Wouldn't it be nice to not have your electronic mailbox cluttered with outdated messages after you return to the office from an absence? If the messages come from an ITC-managed list server, then you can very easily place a "stop" on new messages and resume delivery when you are ready. This feature allows you to control the message flow without unsubscribing and resubscribing to the list.

To stop message delivery from a list simply send an e-mail message containing the appropriate command to listserv@listserv.montana.edu.

For example, for John Bozeman to stop his delivery from the FOUNDERS list, he would send these commands:

set founders nomail
quit

To resume delivery, John would send these commands:

set founders mail
quit

These commands should be the only text in the body of the message.

This feature may or may not work with lists that are run at other sites -- but it won't hurt anything to try it. At worst you will get an error message telling you that the request could not be honored. Make sure that you send the message to the administrative address of the list server, and not to the list itself. The administrative address would be the same one that you used to subscribe to the list in the first place.

Updated September 25, 2000
Questions may be directed to Allen Porter