[Mailman-Users] MailMan & External Archiver

[Olivier Carmona]

Richard Barrett wrote:

>
> On Thursday, July 17, 2003, at 06:10 PM, Olivier Carmona wrote:
>
>>
>> I am using MailMan 2.1.2 and Python 2.2.3 under Redhat 6.2 . I do 
>> not  think that the kind of external archiver I use matters.
>>
>> When using external archiver options, I found that if the command  
>> stdout is not redirected then the archiver returns status OK and on  
>> stderr a SIGPIPE signal caught.
>>
>> PRIVATE_EXTERNAL_ARCHIVER = '/path/to/myarchiver 
>> >/tmp/myarchiver.log'  -> WORKS
>> PRIVATE_EXTERNAL_ARCHIVER = '/path/to/myarchiver 
>> >/tmp/myarchiver.log'  -> DO NOT WORK
>>
>> I am not a python expert so it might that the following 
>> recommendation  in Default.py, implicitly warns about it, and if this 
>> is the case, it  would be very much appreciable to write it down 
>> explicitly.
>>
>> ># being archived will be substituted for this.  Please note that  
>> os.popen() is
>> ># used.
>>
>
> Mailman simply run the external archiver command you supply using  
> os.popen() with a single pipe connected to the STDIN of the that  
> process through which MM pushes the message to be archived before  
> closing the pipe. It doesn't come any more basic than that.
>
> The behaviour of the command you supply and its desires or needs for  
> its STDOUT or STDERR to be handled in some particular way are not  
> determined by either Mailman or Python except that, from a practical  
> standpoint, neither can be assumed to provide an intelligent  
> termination of the subprocess output file descriptors. 

Sorry my English is too bad.

I do not care about logging to STDOUT or STDERR my external archiver 
activity.

I just meant that without redirecting STDOUT, external archiver simply 
do not work. It stops caught by a SIGPIPE and absolutely, nothing is 
done. Whatever the command (/bin/ls,..) is inserted in 
PRIVATE_EXTERNAL_ARCHIVER, if you do not redirect STDOUT, it just stops 
without executing the command.

If I am the only one to see that, I am afraid that Python os.open does 
not behave correctly on my kernel 2.2.

>
>
> When you choose an external archiver you take on the responsibility 
> for  understanding how to use it and, if it is going to generate 
> output to  STDOUT and/or STDERR, deciding what to do with that; > 
> /dev/null 2>&1  comes to mind.
>
>> By the way, it would be great to mention in INSTALL that Default.py  
>> can be changed but that any change to Default.py imply to restart  
>> mailman init script in order for the changes to be taken into account.
>>
>
> Also you should not make changes in Defaults.py but in mm_cfg.py,  
> unless you want to lose your site specific changes the next time you 
> do  an upgrade. It is worth reading all of the comments in Defaults.py 

Thanks for the info.

>
>
> As for commenting on the need to restart a server daemon after 
> changing  its configuration file; it would be quicker to list the 
> number of  server programs that do _not_ have to be restarted under 
> these  circumstances! Try changing httpd.conf without restarting 
> Apache and  see how far it gets you. 

I am not sure your comparison is OK because httpd.conf mention more 
clearly that " After this file is processed, the server will look for 
and process...." meaning clearly that the program is interpreted on launch.

>
>
>> Best regards,
>>
>> --  Olivier
>>
>>
>>
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>>


-- 
Olivier Carmona
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