>> Subject: DOCUMENTATION: DIGEST Command >> Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1993 22:41:24 -0500 (CDT) Listserv Automatic Digest This message is 6,800 bytes long, contains the LISTSERVer Documentation about the new DIGEST command. The LISTSERV now has an option to allow a subscriber to receive mail in a digest form from the different Mailing Lists, in a digest format - once per day. If your mail system has a limit on the number of messages allowed in the mailbox, this option might be very helpful. This new command may be activated by sending the following command to LISTSERV@mail.eworld.com set roots-l digest PLEASE - DO NOT send this command to the ROOTS-L address. For those of you who want to see more about these new options, and information about the DIGEST command, Please read this. Description of some changes for release 1.7f of LISTSERV (DIGEST) ----------------------------------------------------------------- * Usability/Productivity: Digests and indexes * Release 1.7f introduces an automatic digestification function allowing subscribers who do not have the time to read large numbers of messages as they arrive to subscribe to a digestified or indexed version of the list. The list owner decides whether digests are available or not, the frequency at which they are issued and the day of week or time of day when the digest should be distributed. The digests conform to RFC1153 with an acceptable deviation from the recommended subject line (verified with the RFC author). Digests are larger messages containing all the postings made by list subscribers over a certain period of time. Unlike real-world digests, LISTSERV digests are not edited; what you see is exactly what was posted to the list. The only difference is that you get all the messages for a given day, week or month in a single batch. This is mostly useful if you are just "listening in" to the list and prefer to read the postings at your leisure. Digests are kept separately from list archives and can be made available for mailing lists which do not archive postings (ie which run with "Notebook= No"). Indexes, on the other hand, only provide a few lines of information for each posting: date and time, number of lines, name and address of poster, subject. The actual text is not included. You select just the messages you are interested in, and order them from the server. This is useful for mailing lists where most messages really don't interest you at all, or as an alternative to SET NOMAIL: when you come back from vacations, you can quickly order the messages you are most interested in. Note that, since indexes are not useful without the ability to order a copy of the messages you do want to read, they are not made available unless the list is archived and digests are enabled. Users sign up for digestified rather than immediate delivery with 'SET listname DIGests', while indexes are selected with 'SET listname INDex'. These two new options are alternatives to MAIL and NOMAIL. When switching around between these delivery options, users will observe the following behaviour (digests will be assumed to be daily for the sake of clarity): - When switching to NOMAIL: delivery stops immediately. The day's digest is not sent, as the user is assumed to request immediate termination of traffic from the list. - When switching from any option to DIGESTS or INDEX: mail delivery stops immediately, and the first index or digest may contain some items the user has already seen (if switching from MAIL to DIGESTS/INDEX). This is because the digests and indexes are global to the list - they are the same for everyone, just like regular issues of newspapers. - When switching from DIGESTS or INDEX to MAIL, the current, unfinished digest or index is immediately mailed to the user. New messages are delivered normally, as they arrive. Thus, a "trick" to get a copy of the current digest is to switch to MAIL and then back to DIGESTS. You can send both commands in the same mail message to make sure they are executed together. The list owner controls the availability and frequency of digests through the new "Digest=" list header keyword, which defaults to "Digest= No" for lists without an archive and "Digest= Yes,Same,Daily" for archived lists. Again, it is not necessary for the list to be archived to keep a digest; LISTSERV just attempts to avoid having to store large amounts of digest data on its A-disk for lists which, lacking a "Notebook= Yes,xxx" keyword, do not specify any suitable filemode for the digest data. Conversely, having daily as the default frequency keeps the additional cost in disk space to a minimum. The syntax of the keyword is "Digest= Yes,where,frequency,when,max" when digests are enabled, or then "Digest= No". The second parameter is a disk or directory specification, just as with the "Notebook=" keyword, or "Same", which means that the digest must be stored on the same disk as the list archives. The third parameter is either "Daily" (the default), "Weekly" or "Monthly". The third parameter is optional and specifies when the digest is to be actually distributed. For daily digests, specify 'hh:ss' or just 'hh' in the usual 00-23 scale (24 is also accepted for midnight). For weekly digests, specify a weekday such as "Tuesday". For monthly digests, you may specify a number from 1 to 31 corresponding to the day of the month when the digest will be distributed, although this is not recommended. The purpose here is to make it possible for digests to be issued at mid-month rather than on the first of the month - if you code a number larger than 28, you may not get a digest every month. Finally, the last and optional parameter takes the form "Size(nnnn)" and specifies the maximum size the digest is allowed to reach before a "special issue" is cut. Bear in mind that most unix systems do not accept messages larger than 100 kilobytes, so values larger than 1500 should be avoided. The default is to have virtually no limit - 10,000 lines. The list owner must take special care when disabling digests for a list, as LISTSERV does not presently have any facility which would allow it to alter subscription options automatically on the basis of changes to the list header. Subscribers who had opted for digests would continue not to receive mail as it arrives, but will not get the digests either. The best way to solve this problem is to announce the change long enough in advance, so that people can switch back before digests are suspended. The reason nothing has been done to remove this limitation is that it is not expected to be a frequent condition. Daily digests take up very little disk space and there is no reason to disable them for a typical list. /end/ -- Cliff Manis K4ZTF Manis/Manes Family History Researching: MANIS MANES MANESS MANAS WHITEHORN CANTER BIRD CORBETT NEWMAN USMAIL: P. O. Box 33937, San Antonio, Texas 78265-3937 INTERNET: cmanis@csoftec.csf.com I'll share my research info more in 93, in hopes of finding more data ! Standard Disclaimer: We are not associated with anyone. (PERIOD). (.) --