[270] in IS Home Pages
Changes in the is-www list
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Kevin M. Cunningham)
Fri Oct 30 12:45:44 1998
Date: Fri, 30 Oct 1998 11:35:09 -0500
To: is-www@MIT.EDU
From: "Kevin M. Cunningham" <kcunning@MIT.EDU>
Cc: kcunning@MIT.EDU
Howdy all,
You are receiving this letter because you are currently on the list "is-www". Please read this message, because the list function is changing. (You may not have to do anything, unless you've actively participated in answering email to "is-www@mit.edu". But read on to find out.)
Up to now, the is-www list has served two functions:
* is-www has been an "access control list", giving you permission
to edit files in various directories in the "is" locker on Athena.
* is-www has been a "mailing list" (i.e., is-www@mit.edu), allowing you
(forcing you ;-) to receive email from people needing help (mostly
about the IS web pages).
For some of you, these two functions both applied (i.e., you needed access to certain directories, and you also wanted to receive IS email). For others of you, the two functions were overkill: you really only wanted file access and could care less about the IS email; or you wanted to answer user questions, but you didn't need access to the files on Athena. This mixing of two separate functions was never the best solution, but we lived with it for several years.
Now that the IS Home Page team is up and running and committed to answering (or appropriately redirecting) user questions prompted by the newly-revised IS Home Pages, the time has come to separate the email and access functions. Specifically,
* In terms of accessing Athena files, all the members of the old
"is-www" list are now on an access control list named "is-acl".
Note that this is an access list ONLY, NOT a mailing list. (Also,
everything should work just as before in terms of accessing files;
no special action is required on your part to activate this.)
* In terms of the mailing list, the old "is-www" list has been changed
to be a MAILING LIST ONLY, and all of you have been REMOVED from that
mailing list unless you are on the IS Home Team. (Technically, the
member list for is-www has been changed to one entry: LIST:is-home.)
The plan is to replace all web references to "is-www@mit.edu" by whatever the appropriate email list might be. In many cases, this will simply be "is-home@mit.edu". Email sent to the old "is-www@mit.edu" address will go to same destination as "is-home@mit.edu", but use of "is-www@mit.edu" as the To: field will fade out..
*** ACTION ITEM:
If you believe you should be receiving email destined for
is-www@mit.edu (now is-home@mit.edu), please let me know and
I can add you back to is-www (or, actually, is-home).
For example, if you used to answer certain questions that
got sent to is-www and think you still need to be in the loop,
let me know. Otherwise, is-home will process the mail (answering
directly, or forwarding it to the appropriate consulting group).
Many of you were on is-www for access control and probably found the email traffic, though small, somewhat annoying. This is the chance to separate these functions.
Similarly, some of you were on is-www because we were receiving questions about certain topics which you felt obliged to answer. This is a time for us to reconsider where those questions should be sent (since "is-www@mit.edu" was put on the web pages as a stop-gap measure...)
Summary:
1) Access to certain Athena directories in the is locker will work
for you exactly as before (now under the list name "is-acl").
2) You will NOT receive email sent to "is-www@mit.edu" anymore
(well, after tonight), unless you are on the IS Home Pages team,
or you contact me.
Thanks,
--Kevin
