A short link to this page is https://wiki.list.org/x/4030512

Clear message

1.7. I've set up Mailman, created a list, and added myself to the list, but I don't get any messages!

Start out by checking the Mailman and MTA logs. (MTA means Message Transfer Agent e.g., Sendmail.) They are your best guide and will, every time, contain the necessary clues as to both the exact definition of the problem and its solution.

The most frequent reasons for this are:

a) You didn't setup the cronjobs needed by Mailman

– Check the crontab for the mailman user (or whatever user your Mailman installation runs as) and make sure the Mailman entries are there. If necessary restart cron to pick up the changes.

b) You haven't properly setup the aliases for your list.

– The newlist command prints out the necessary aliases for the list. You will need to copy/add them to the alias file you are using for your list setup (often ~mailman/data/aliases).

c) You haven't run `newaliases` to "compile" the new aliases into a hash table or DBM. (Sendmail and Postfix)

– Run newaliases as root. For postfix you'll also need to do a postfix reload for Postfix to pick up the changes.

d) You haven't configured your MTA to find the alias file you are using for your lists.

– See the documentation for your MTA.

e) You haven't run the Mailman qrunner daemon (~mailman/scripts/mailman or ~mailman/bin/mailmanctl). (You have to do this regardless of your MTA.)

– This is explained in the installation documentation. Remember to configure your system to run the daemon when it boots!

f) The message you sent is being held for moderation by the list.

– Check into the administrative interface for your list and then check the moderation queue.

g) Make sure that you have set these variables:

DEFAULT_EMAIL_HOST = 'your.host.name'

DEFAULT_URL_HOST = 'your.url.addess'

as well as added:

add_virtualhost(DEFAULT_URL_HOST, DEFAULT_EMAIL_HOST)

in mm_cfg.py (default /usr/local/mailman/Mailman/mm_cfg.py). If these have not been set Mailman may be sending pending requests from %list%-owner@127.0.0.1 which could be bounced.

See also 4.78 Troubleshooting- No mail going out to lists members and 4.07 How can I rotate my Mailman logs?.

Converted from the Mailman FAQ Wizard

This is one of many Frequently Asked Questions.