[Mailman-Users] TIMED RELEASE

[Christopher Greaves]

I couldn't find anything that looks like this when I browsed the help/faq 
on the web site. I'd be interested to hear the following example of a 
mailing list can be supported:

I want to issue a series (perhaps 200, maybe never-ending) of emails to 
subscribers, let's say "Writing VBA for Word from scratch". You can imagine 
that the first email would be "Recording & running a macro" followed by the 
next mailing "Editing a macro", then "Writing a macro from scratch", 
gradually working my way up to "Developing an application that manages 
source code VBA libraries" and beyond. Truly MASSIVE stuff out the back end.

A subscriber to this correspondence course (for that is what it is) would 
want to start at lesson 1 and do that lesson before progressing to lesson 
2, no matter that the rest of the crowd are variously as far as lessons 37, 
48, 152 and right up there with me at lesson 1,217 (I know, that's 60 years 
down the road, but you get the idea).


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TIMED RELEASE
=============

A subscriber to the corrsepondence course (or release of chapters of an 
on-line story or ...) wants to say "I know I've started late, but anyway, 
send me an email just once a week", (or once every ten days, or on the 27th 
of each month after my company's year-end is complete).

Or a subscriber wants to say "Send me the next lesson as soon as I've 
issued a reply saying that I've completed this one". Bright students can 
work through the material at their own pace and quickly join the people on 
the cutting edge.


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As far as I can see, mailing lists IN GENERAL release mail as soon as it is 
posted or moderated, exceptions for vacations notwithstanding. I don't see 
anything that allows the SUBSCRIBER to work through existing material at 
their own pace.


I believe that the need for some sort of paced reading will accelerate as 
more people work from home, or train in their own time.

 From the technical point of view there would probably be more load on your 
end. Your off-peak processing would include a review of what's scheduled to 
go out today. That would involve accumulating a list of all automatic timed 
release mesages scheduled to go to individuals, together with any messages 
resulting from the "reply with the next one" suggested above.


However, if it's true that no-one else is doing it, it's a niche that might 
explode.


http://www.realage.com/ (RealAge) is a web site that issues tips for 
healthy living. I wouldn't mind working my way through from the get-go, but 
at my own pace. I'm 56 last week, and can't suddenly switch to chewing 
lettuce and climbing the stairs while massaging my scalp, after a lifetime 
eating cheap ice-cream while writing programs in front of a 17" monitor, 
but I can take on a small increment in change every few days.





If you'd like a guinea-pig, I'd be happy to be it. As you might guess I 
have scads of training material in Word/VBA (amongst others) and a contact 
list of over 1,500 people. I'd leap at the chance to start a 
SUBSCRIBER-TIMED  correspondence course.

Christopher Greaves (416) 621-9348
email: cgreaves at vif.com
web http://www.vif.com/users/cgreaves/homepage.htm