LISTSERV Commands and List Defaults

Following is a list of commonly used LISTSERV commands, all of which should be placed in the body of your email message and mailed to "listserv@listserv.aol.com" (no quotes) for processing. The command itself is followed here by a brief description of what it does.

Also, when you subscribe to the list, you are automatically set up by the system defaults to receive a daily digest version of the postings, with short headers. You will also receive a copy of your own post, and receive no receipt acknowledgement from the listserv. You are completely welcome to change any of these defaults by using the commands below. Subscription changes will be followed by a validation check -- you will receive a message from listserv to which you only need to hit "reply" and type "ok" (no quotes) in the body of the message to confirm.

SUBSCRIBE merelewis Your Name -- subscribes you to the list

SIGNOFF merelewis -- unsubscribes you from the list

SET merelewis ack -- system will send you a system receipt acknowledgement of your posting. The default is "NoAck" which means you will not be notified.

SET merelewis nodigest subjecthdr-- sets your subscription so that you receive the reflector version of the list, in which you receive the postings one at a time, and puts "MERELEWIS" in the subject line to identify list posts. The default is "digest."

SET merelewis index -- sets your subscription so that you only receive a table of contents from each day's digest. To revert back from this, use "set merelewis noindex."

SET merelewis nomail -- suspends your mail delivery without unsubscribing you. (Used to stop mail during vacations, temporary absences, etc.) When you wish to resume mail delivery, send the command "set merelewis mail."

SET merelewis norepro -- sets your subscription so that you will not receive a copy of your own posting. Default is set to "repro."

SET merelewis fullh -- provides full headers. Default is set to short headers. You can also replace "fullh" with "dualh" (repeats the headers within the body of the message) or "ietf" (provides Internet-style headers).

INDEX merelewis -- sends you a directory of available archive files, which are processed weekly. To retrieve the file, use the command "GET merelewis logyymmw" replacing "yymmw" with the year, month, and week of the file. Weeks are labeled from A-E, with A being the first week, and E being the fifth. For example, the archive from the second week of February, 1996, would be log9602B.

QUERY merelewis -- sends you a file showing your subscription settings.

HELP -- sends a list of listserv commands.