Running configure

You should not be root while performing the steps in this section. Do them under your own login, or whatever account you typically install software as. You do not need to do these steps as user mailman, but you could.

Make sure that you have write permissions to the target installation directory, and permission to create a setgid file in the file system where it resides (NFS and other mounts can be configured to inhibit setgid settings).

If you've installed other GNU software, you should be familiar with the configure script. Usually you can just cd to the directory you unpacked Mailman into, and run configure with no arguments:

% cd mailman-version
% ./configure
% make install

% ./configure --with-mail-gid=mail --with-cgi-gid=nobody

Configure options

--prefix=dir

Standard GNU configure option which changes the base directory that Mailman is installed into. By default $prefix is /home/mailman. This directory must already exist, and be set up as described in section 1 above.

--exec-prefix=dir

Standard GNU configure option which lets you specify a different installation directory for architecture dependent binaries.

--with-var-prefix=dir

Store mutable data under dir instead of under $prefix or $exec_prefix.

--with-python=/path/to/python

Specify an alternative Python interpreter to use for the wrapper programs. The default is to use the interpreter found first on your shell's $PATH. Note that when running the scripts from the command line, the first Python interpreter found on $PATH is always used.

--with-username=username-or-uid

Specify a different username than mailman to use as a default. Use this only if the username mailman is already in use by somebody (e.g. Mark Ailman's login name). Can take an integer user id. Be sure your $prefix directory is owned by this user.

--with-groupname=groupname-or-gid

Specify a different groupname than mailman to use as a default. Use this only if the groupname mailman is already in use. Can take an integer group id. Be sure your $prefix directory is group-owned by this group.

--with-mail-gid=group-or-groups

Specify an alternative group for running scripts via the mail wrapper. group-or-groups can be a list of one or more integer group ids or symbolic group names. The first value in the list that resolves to an existing group is used. By default, the value is the list other, daemon.

This is highly system dependent and you must get this right, because the group id is compiled into the mail wrapper program for added security. On systems using sendmail, the sendmail.cf configuration file designates the group id of sendmail processes using the DefaultUser option. (If commented out, it still may be indicating the default...)

--with-cgi-gid=group-or-groups

Specify an alternative group for running scripts via the CGI wrapper. group-or-groups can be a list of one or more integer group ids or symbolic group names. The first value in the list that resolves to an existing group is used. By default, the value is the the list www, www-data, nobody.

The proper value for this is dependent on your web server configuration. You must get this right, because the group id is compiled into the CGI wrapper program for added security, and no Mailman CGI scripts will run if this is incorrect.

If you're using Apache, check the values for the Group option in your httpd.conf file.

--with-cgi-ext=extension

Specify an extension for cgi-bin programs. The CGI wrappers placed in $PREFIX/cgi-bin will have this extension (some web servers require an extension). extension must include the dot.

--with-gcc=no

Don't use gcc, even if it is found. cc must be found on your $PATH