[Mailman-Users] Difficulties with mailman 2.1.5

[Brad Knowles]

At 8:20 AM -0500 11/18/06, Alan McConnell wrote:

>  Now here is an "ignoramus" question, from one who knoweth not Python:
>  If mailman is "powered by Python", why is not an upgrade from mailman
>  2.1.5 to, say, 2.1.9, accomplished by simply grabbin the new python
>  scripts(hey, they are simply text files, right?) and dropping them
>  into place?  (of course the data -- the database of list members --
>  has to be backed up appropriately and restored, perhaps with new
>  fields added).    Yes, I know this is a dumb question<g>; but I hope
>  for an intelligent answer, letting me, and the Patriot Support staff,
>  know exactly what is involved in a real, non-Debian dependent upgrade.

The Debian guys have moved stuff around.  You can't just drop the 
2.1.9 code onto a Debian machine and expect it to work properly -- it 
won't be able to find any of the files from the Debian-hacked version 
of 2.1.5 that was previously installed.

When you take the current tarball and do a "make install" on that, it 
will put all the various files in the Mailman-standard locations, 
which are most definitely not the same as the Debian-standard 
locations for those kinds of things.  You could copy the respective 
list configuration and list archive files from the Debian-standard 
location to the Mailman-standard location, and if you do it right 
then you should be able to get your system upgraded from 2.1.5 to 
2.1.9.

But this isn't just a simple drop-in replacement.


What really needs to happen is the Debian guys need to get 2.1.9 and 
"Debian-ize" that codebase, and then ship that out to all their 
customers.  Problem is, the Debian project is well-known for being 
multiple years behind the current state-of-whatever, so $DEITY only 
knows when you might ever see this kind of update -- Maybe about the 
same time we're shipping Mailman3.

-- 
Brad Knowles, <brad at shub-internet.org>

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