[BCLUG] Mailing Lists, backups, VanLUG shit show

[BCLUG]

Rick Moen wrote on 2022-07-27 23:15:

>> Considering the source, not surprised...
> Ouch.

Oh Rick, I really should make a VanLUG Hall of Shame. There's so much 
material...



> Looks like VanLUG's mailing list server ("Robomod") encountered some
> sort of fatal mishap a few months ago, and all they have had for
> discussion lately (to my knowledge) is their Meetup walled garden
> things.

The DNS entry for lists.vanlug.ca disappeared, so no mailing list nor 
website front end.



> web.archive.org appears to have grabbed nothing later than 2016 from
> Robomod, and that little available in public said that they had Mailman
> configured for member-only archives, with the result that, if they
> didn't do effective manual backups, then they lost everything.

They lost everything prior to 2016.

It was hosted on Some Else's Computer, and the disk failed.

They considered spending thousands on data retrieval but

a) nothing of value was lost (other than membership list)
b) they didn't have access to the disk



> This is why automated backups of the mailing list's cumulative mbox file
> and of its subscriber roster to offsite -- to at least one place, and
> why not several? -- are a necessary minimum.

Yeah, but... VanLUG.

Too busy playing Mr President, Mr Treasurer, etc.  Actual technology is 
way down the list of important things.



> (Example scripts, etc., cheerfully shared upon request.  In fact, I
> probably ought to just tar such stuff up and offer them as a standard
> download somewhere inside http://linuxmafia.com/pub/ .  (If you're
> suspecting from that URL that there's also anonymous ftp, you would be
> correct.  Also public rsync .)

I may look at that. I host all our stuff, either at home or on a VPS 
which I back up every day or two to my home PC.

Which needs backing up, badly.

RAID is a backup, right?  le sigh.


I know, I know... At least I feel guilty.