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Mailing Lists & Mail Aliases

Mailing lists provide a method to send e-mail messages to groups of users who have subscribed to the list.  Mailing lists can be controlled by a moderator or open to all messages.  Mail aliases provide for alternative e-mail addresses for a group or an individual.  Aliases can also work as a distribution list to send e-mail, usually to a small number of addresses.

Group and Mass Mailings

E-Mail can be a useful way to communicate with individuals, small groups, and large groups.  It is often misused, however, because it is easy to use and perceived to be free.  But it isn't free.  It consumes resources and shifts costs to different areas.  Many people consider it to be intrusive.  The Computing Center receives many complaints about inappropriate e-mail sent to various lists.  One person's vital information is another's junk mail so please use the  guidelines below if you are considering sending a mailing to a group list or alias, especially a large one.

Guidelines for Sending E-mail to Lists and Aliases

Use discretion in sending any message to an e-mail list whether it is on or off campus! 

Campus mailing lists are not to be used for any commercial or personal advertising purpose. This includes apartment and house rentals, roommate searches, garage sales, cars and other items for sale. Please use the Mines Campus e-Classifieds system for these types of announcements. The Campus e-classifieds system is available from on-campus, modem, and VPN connections only. To connect to the e-Classifieds system now, go to http://www.mines.edu/classifieds

• Consider first whether this is an appropriate method to communicate this message.  Is the message so urgent that everyone on the list must see it, or would want to receive it?

• For large lists, limit the size of your message or each item in your message to no more than two sentences and provide a web page address for the reader to get more information.  This will likely get a better response from readers and improve chances that your messages will be read.

• Avoid sending messages with attachments to larger mailing lists.  Our lists are configured to limit the size of messages which can be sent to a list. A message containing an attachment with a fairly basic MS Word document will likely be rejected. If you must attach a file, it should be a pdf document or basic html, and it must be small. Using Webmail's "linked attachment" feature is an acceptable solution.
  
  Some systems will refuse attachments because they make your message too big and others may refuse to process attachments for group mailings because they easily spread viruses or consume too many system resources.  Many people also refuse to open attachments that are sent to them via a mailing list.  Others may not have the application software (such as Word or Excel) on their system, or may have an earlier version, or may be using a different operating system (such as Unix), so will not be able to read the attachment.  Still others choose to use mail readers that don't process attachments.

• Mass mailings can impact central system and network resources.  Disk space, CPUs, and networks can become bogged down processing thousands of messages.

• Check your spelling and grammar and verify that any web addresses you put in your message are correct and actually work.

Current Campus Mailing Lists & Common Aliases

General campus mailing lists for faculty, staff, and students are as follows. The lists are configured so that messages only from authorized senders will be automatically sent to the lists.
 

Moderated	Unmoderated
faculty@mines.edu	faculty-announce@mines.edu
classified@mines.edu	classified-announce@mines.edu
ugrad-students@mines.edu	ugrad-students-announce@mines.edu
grad-students@mines.edu	grad-students-announce@mines.edu

• CSM employees are added to the appropriate moderated list as the information is received from Human Resources and other departments. New employees wishing to subscribe to unmoderated lists and other optional e-mail lists may do so via the web if they have a slate username and password. To subscribe to optional campus e-mail lists, select the following self-signed secure ssl link:
  
  Mailman listinfo page
  
  If you wish to subscribe through e-mail, send an e-mail message with no subject line and one of the following lines in the To: field, depending on which list you wish to subscribe to:
  
      faculty-announce-subscribe@mailman.mines.edu
      classified-announce-subscribe@mailman.mines.edu
  
  You should receive a confirmation message back telling you if your request to subscribe to the list has succeeded or to confirm the subscription request.

• You may unsubscribe from unmoderated lists by following the instructions included with all messages sent to unmoderated lists.  Employees may resubscribe at any time using the same method (or via the web) except you should use the word unsubscribe in your message. To unsubscribe through e-mail, send an e-mail message with no subject line and one of the following lines in the To: field, depending on which list you wish to unsubscribe from:
   
     faculty-announce-unsubscribe@mailman.mines.edu
     classified-announce-unsubscribe@mailman.mines.edu
  

• Most messages should be sent to unmoderated lists.  Messages sent to both unmoderated and moderated lists will be intercepted and delivery delayed until approved by the administrator of the list. Criteria used to determine whether a message can be sent to a unmoderated or moderated list include whether the message is urgent and time critical, what other methods of communicating the information are available, and whether the message, in the judgment of the list administrator, must be seen by all or almost all employees or students on that list. You can appeal the rejection of a message sent to a moderated list to the appropriate Vice President.

Other mailing lists and aliases exist for departments, groups, and clubs.  Information about those lists is available via the web page at https://mailman.mines.edu/mailman/listinfo or from the Computing Center, your department, or organization.  

Departments, programs, and organizations can request mailing lists or aliases by sending a request to postmaster at Mines.EDU and by submitting the following information:

http://www.mines.edu/academic/computer/email/mailman/#3

A department faculty or staff member, or organization officer, must agree to manage the requested list.  Computing Center staff, including extended support staff assigned to other departments, will not perform this function. Each Mailman list must have a minimum of one list administrator or the list will be disabled.