Posting to Forum Only, not mailing list

[David (EVDL Admin)]

We have a forum linked to a Mailman mailing list (Electric Vehicle Discussion List).  Is there a "canonical" way to post an item only in the Nabble forum, and specifically direct that it not appear on the mailing list?

I realize that a user could simply register for Nabble and not for our mailing list, but as I understand it, then he will receive email notice that his post is pending.

Also, I'm concerned that a pending post may eventually be deleted, even though I wasn't able to find any specific documentation on whether Nabble deletes pending posts.  Everything I found seems to assume that a post NOT being sent to the linked mailing list is always an undesirable outcome, to be corrected as soon as possible.

Thanks for any information that you can provide.

[GregChapman]

David (EVDL Admin) wrote

We have a forum linked to a Mailman mailing list (Electric Vehicle Discussion List).  Is there a "canonical" way to post an item only in the Nabble forum, and specifically direct that it not appear on the mailing list?

The only way I can think of that comes close to your requirement would be to create a new forum and then move the mail list forum to be a sub-forum of the new forum. You could then post a message at the top-level forum that would not be sent to the mail list.

It very much depends on what your purpose is in dividing the posts between forum-only and forum-plus-list. It's always better to specify the issue than ask how can my proposed solution be made to work?

I realize that a user could simply register for Nabble and not for our mailing list, but as I understand it, then he will receive email notice that his post is pending.

Yes! Registering for Nabble without also subscribing to your mail list, would mean that his posts could not be accepted.

Also, I'm concerned that a pending post may eventually be deleted, even though I wasn't able to find any specific documentation on whether Nabble deletes pending posts.  Everything I found seems to assume that a post NOT being sent to the linked mailing list is always an undesirable outcome, to be corrected as soon as possible.

I've not actually used the mail list archive facility so can't report on that, but I agree that Nabble documentation is weak in places. The trouble is, as with so many coders, they take the view, "We'll fix that when the system is stable"  but with almost daily upgrades it never is stable, leaving us users without definitive answers.

[David (EVDL Admin)]

Greg, many thanks for the response.  Here is the situation.  I hope I can explain it clearly.

One of our users is looking for a way to post material which isn't off topic, but is still of interest to only a subset of the mailing list membership.  

He thought that if he posted it on Nabble ONLY, by using a Nabble ID that wasn't linked to a mailing list sub, his posts would be available for those who went looking for them - but not sent to the wider mailing list membership.  (I hope that makes some sense.)

His main question was, will my posts be deleted after a while if they remain in a pending status?

And if so, how long will they stay?

I haven't been able to find the answer to those questions.

Another question from me: Would it work to create a sub-forum for his posts?  Or are sub-forum posts also sent to the mailing list with a list-archive forum?

Come to that, a possible different solution might be to create a completely separate Nabble forum for his posts.  I might even be able to link it to a separate mailing list.

Thanks again for all your help!

[GregChapman]

I can't answer the questions about about pending periods because I have no experience of that.

I think your last idea is the closest to the best solution.

Try this:
1. Create a new-forum
2. Change the parent of your existing forum to be that of the new forum
3. Create a another sub-forum in the new forum for posting sub-set material.

Your existing subscriptions will continue to work as subscriptions to the original forum only.

Get those who are interested in the subset to subscribe at the new top-level forum. They will automatically get material posted in both sub-forums.

My understanding is that those subscribing at the top-level could then unsubscribe from the original forum, but would continue to receive mail for it by virtue of their top-level subscription (but I have not tested this. I would welcome a report to confirm it!)

Doing it this way, under a parent forum, means that you don't have the complication of requiring separate, and different, usernames at Nabble for the main list and sub-set.