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General FAQ

Can I subscribe to a Project Wombat list without being a librarian?

Yes.

Can I submit a question to Project Wombat without subscribing?

Yes. But we can’t force people to address their replies to you—by default, replies are sent back to the list. So you may need to watch the archives for a while if you do this.

Will I be kicked out if I don’t answer any questions?

No. Lurkers are encouraged. Just because you can’t answer any questions today doesn’t mean that you won’t be able to answer one tomorrow.

How do I submit a question?

The list address, whether for questions or replies, is list@project-wombat.org

How do I subscribe?

See the list page for the necessary links.

How do I unsubscribe?

If you remember which version of the list you subscribed to, you can go to the subscription management page for that version and use the “Unsubscribe” section of the page. (Note that you must click the “Unsubscribe” button on the second page as well.) You will receive a confirmation message with instructions which you must follow in order to unsubscribe. See the list page for links to the subscription management pages.

If you do not remember which version of the list you subscribed to, you can send an e-mail message to unsubscribe@project-wombat.org and the server will attempt to unsubscribe you from all three lists at once. (This method will usually result in two error messages in addition to a confirmation message, since the server will be attempting to remove you from the lists to which you don’t subscribe as well as the one to which you do.)

If neither method works for you, it probably means that your subscription is under an address other than the one you currently use (which means that messages are being forwarded to you). In that case, please send an e-mail message to subscriptionhelp@project-wombat.org and ask to be unsubscribed by hand. This last method may take longer than the others, so we recommend trying the other two first.

My messages to the list are being rejected because of a “filter rule match”. What’s going on?

Unfortunately, we can’t configure Mailman to give custom error messages when a message triggers our filters, so there are several possible causes:

• Your message was sent to the wrong address. All messages must be sent to list@project-wombat.org rather than to the direct Mailman-specific addresses. (This guarantees that all messages are at least submitted to all three lists, although they may be rejected from one or more of them.)
• Your message had an attachment. Attachments are not allowed on any of our lists. It is a way of automatically preventing viruses from spreading. (Please note that some mail clients include attachments as part of formatted text.)
• Your message used formatted text and provided no plain text alternative. If your message uses styled text but provides a plain text version (a common feature) then the plain text version is accepted by the server. If no plain text version is available, though, then the server will reject the message. For instructions on how to turn off formatting in many e-mail programs, see http://www.expita.com/nomime.html.
• Your message was base64 encoded. Base64 encoding causes messages to to be unreadable in digests and archives. Therefore we attempt to reject any messages which are encoded that way. Usually, there is no problem doing this. (There is no situation in which a message without formatting or attachments actually has to be encoded with base64; even when using character sets other than standard Roman, there are ways to avoid the encoding.) Google’s mail service often uses base64 unnecessarily; toggling the “encoding” setting between “UTF-8” and “Default” and resending the message is said to solve the problem.
• Your message was too long. The server will automatically reject any message which is larger than 15 KB of text. (This is primarily used to reduce the number of replies to digests which unthinkingly quote the entire digest instead of just the important parts. Even allowing for very long headers, 15 KB is enough for a very long message.)

My message got rejected (or did not come through) on the “Open” list! What’s going on?

My message got rejected (or did not come through) on the “Classic” list, yet I am a Classic subscriber and not on the watchlist! What’s going on?

These two questions have similar answers. First off: be sure to check the archives for the list about which you are complaining to make sure the message really didn’t go through. (If you did not receive an actual rejection notice, then your message might just be taking a while to get through to you.)

Ordinarily, messages from all subscribers automatically are accepted by the “Open” list, and messages from subscribers to the “Classic” list are automatically accepted by the Classic list. The only possible rejection under those circumstances is a “filter rule match” as described elsewhere in this FAQ. But in order for messages to be automatically accepted, they must come from a recognized address. If your e-mail client appears to be sending messages from a different address—even an address which is functionally identical to your subscribed address—the server will consider your messages to be from a non-subscriber, and pass them to the moderators. And although the moderators are excellent at passing messages, they are only human, and may mistakenly Reject or Discard a message.

If you are sure your message was sent correctly, please write to subscriptionhelp@project-wombat.org and report the problem. Otherwise, wait a few hours to make sure the message has a chance to come through, then try re-sending it.

I want Digest Mode, but I don’t see it listed on the List page. Where is it?

When you subscribe, you will be given the option of using Digest mode. It is a subscription option, not a list.

How do I unsubscribe/turn off mail delivery/switch to Digest mode/Turn off the monthly password reminders?

Go to the subcription management page for the list to which you subscribed, and use the section of that page labeled “Unsubscribe from/Set Options for <list name>”. You can go to the subscription management page using the link which was e-mailed to you when you subscribed, or you can go using the links on the list page.

What’s up with the name “Project Wombat”?

Project Wombat was created to take over from the now defunct Stumpers discussion list. In May of 1994, several messages about wombats got caught in an endless mail-delivery loop and were sent repeatedly to subscribers. The word wombat became a joke, then a mascot, and finally a term for subscribers to the list. So when it was time to change the name of the mailing list, and we were going to be hosted by Project Gutenberg, there was an obvious choice...

Why is the word “Wombat” misspelled so often?

As mentioned above, the word “Wombat” is often used as a name for subscribers to the list, as in “Will there be any Wombats at the ALA Conference?”. In order to make sure that people searching the archives can differentiate between questions about real wombats and list members, the word is usually... creatively spelled when referring to list members. With the switch to Project Wombat, we are making an official recommendation: please use the spelling W0mbat, using a zero instead of a letter “o”. “W0mbat” is fully indexable, being just letters and numbers, and will never be mistaken for an e-mail address or split up by indexing software as the most common alternative, “Womb@t,” may.

I have suddenly stopped receiving any messages. What’s going on?

Usually this is a symptom of one of two things. Most commonly, you subscribed under an address which had been forwarded automatically to your new address, and the forwarding expired. (For example, if your address changed from “example@mail.example.com” to “example@example.com”.) The other common cause of this problem is repeated bounced mail, because of a full mail account or mail server problems.

Before contacting the moderators for assistance, try logging in to the server and see if your e-mail address is still listed as being subscribed. If not, and you had another address which was being forwarded, try logging in with the other address as well.

Can’t I subscribe by sending e-mail?

Yes, you can. But supporting e-mail commands wastes a lot of time for list administrators, which slows everything down. If you’re familiar with Mailman e-mail control commands, then you can probably do everything without help. If not, just use the web interface instead. It’s fast, it’s easy, and you don’t have to worry which keywords the list processor will accept.

If I send you e-mail, will you subscribe me?

No. Unless, of course, you have already tried to subscribe to the list with the web interface and it failed. In that case, please write to subscriptionhelp@project-wombat.org and describe the error. We will subscribe you and, hopefully, fix the problem as well. Since the first thing we will try is using the normal web form, it probably isn’t a good idea to try this just to be lazy.