Email aliases and mailing lists in the FB3 network

Every person in the department network can be reached worldwide via email at one of the addresses

user@informatik.uni-bremen.de
user@math.uni-bremen.de

user stands for the login name (account name) of the person. In addition, there are the addresses

user@informatik.uni-bremen.de
user@cs.uni-bremen.de
user@math.uni-bremen.de
user@tzi.de
user@tzi.org
user@tzi.uni-bremen.de

that are equivalent to user@informatik.uni-bremen.de. The same applies to aliases set in the university account (see in the Onlinetools of the university under University Search -> Manage e-mail aliases). Currently active personal email addresses with FB3 domains can be viewed in the FB3 Usertools.

Occasionally, there is a desire for additional email addresses, for example, to be reachable through a different address (personal email alias) or to create a local email distribution list that forwards emails to multiple people.

This text provides an overview of the options available to individuals in the FB3 network for setting up new email addresses. Currently, these are:

Setting up a personal email alias as a second (local) email address;
Setting up local email distribution lists for self-managed organization of discussion groups or public mailing lists.

Individuals who wish to use one of these services should contact the technical staff, e.g. via email at serviceinformatik.uni-bremen.de.

Personal email aliases

Occasionally, it may be useful to be reachable via a second local address in addition to the regular email address, where the login name is replaced by something else (an alias). In cases where the method described above using aliases set in the university account is not possible, FB3 technicians can set up personal email aliases upon request that are valid only for FB3 domains.

Example: A (fictional) person with the login name eddyhas released a software package called Eddix on the internet, which is now used on numerous sites worldwide. To be reachable by the users of the software through a dedicated email address related to the product (e.g. for bug reports), they can set up an alias.

eddix@informatik.uni-bremen.de

All emails sent to this address will then be automatically forwarded to

eddy@informatik.uni-bremen.de

The creation of aliases should, however, be limited to justified special cases, as

Aliases and login names are in the same namespace, so that after an alias is assigned, a login name can still be granted, but it will not be reachable via email as described above, which can lead to misunderstandings.
Email addresses that contain the last name or full name of the user (Hans.Kowalski or Hans_Kowalski) are not always unique; once a second person with the same name becomes a user in the FB3 network, misunderstandings are likely.

Reasons for setting up personal aliases include:

A person with an unfavorably chosen login name needs a more professional or less ambiguous email address;
The person's login name is often misspelled (e.g., because multiple, easily confused spellings exist);
A person has relinquished their account in the FB3 network and wants emails sent to the old address to be forwarded to the new address;
A person is the author of a software package that is used on external sites and wants to be reachable by the users of the software via a separate email address.

The generation of new personal email addresses is not achieved by setting up new accounts.

Local email distribution lists

Groups of people often want to be reachable through a common email address, for example, to conveniently manage a group discussion via email.

Mail distribution lists for UNIX groups

If only local individuals are participating, one of the participants can set up a UNIX group (e.g., linuxfans) and include the other individuals as members (more on this in the manual page for the command grp or via the FB3 Usertools). The members of the group can then be reached via the following email address:

grp-linuxfans@informatik.uni-bremen.de

Self-managed email distribution lists

If the prefix grp- should be avoided (e.g. due to external perception), and if both local and external individuals should be reachable via the same address, the technical staff can set up a self-managed local email distribution list.

Such an email distribution list functions essentially like a personal alias. However, the incoming email is not forwarded to a single person but to any number of email addresses of local and external individuals. The list of addresses is taken from a text file in /home/alias, which belongs to the owner of the email distribution list and can be freely edited by them.

Example: A user eddy requests a mail distribution list linuxfans, into which any local and external individuals can be included. The technical staff sets up a new address upon request:

linuxfans@informatik.uni-bremen.de

as well as an (initially empty) file

/home/alias/eddy/linuxfans

with owner eddy, into which the person can enter the members of the email distribution list themselves. Each line of the file contains a comma-separated list of email addresses; blank lines and comment lines (starting with #) are ignored, as are invalid addresses (e.g., if they contain invalid special characters). For the addresses of local users, the domain can be omitted as usual:

# Email distribution list /home/alias/eddy/linuxfans
# Owner: eddy@informatik.uni-bremen.de
#
# Local members:

eddy, tim, anna

# External members:

michael@informatik.uni-irgendwo.de
bettina@somewhere.de
linuxfans-archiv@heimrechner.at-home.de

Any new addresses can also be added to the email distribution file at a later time, and existing addresses can be deleted; changes will take effect after approximately five minutes.

For email distribution lists that are to be used for creating public mailing lists, the following aliases will also be set up:

linuxfans-request:  eddy@informatik.uni-bremen.de
linuxfans-owner:    eddy@informatik.uni-bremen.de

Users can own multiple email distribution lists; all email distribution lists of the user eddy are consolidated in /home/alias/eddy. The directories in /home/alias belong to the respective users, allowing them to use version control systems like e.g. git or RCS there.

All email distribution lists of this type have a validity of one year (upon request, the initial duration can be extended to up to 36 months). Before expiration, the owner of the distribution list receives two automatic email warnings (one month and one week before expiration), each containing a link through which the distribution list can be extended for another year. This can be repeated as often as needed until the distribution list is no longer required.

Email forwarding for former FB3 members

Members of the FB3 can request an email forwarding service for their previous FB3 email addresses to an external email address upon leaving the faculty. In this case, a short email to mailforwardinformatik.uni-bremen.de is sufficient to communicate the forwarding destination. (The automatic notification email sent one month before the expiration of the FB3 account will mention this offer.)

The email forwarding is activated upon the deletion of the FB3 account and is valid for one year. If the forwarding is needed for a longer period, it must be actively extended for another year before expiration. This can be repeated as often as needed after each additional year.

One month before the expiration of a forwarding, a reminder email with a link is sent. By selecting the link in the web browser, the forwarding can be extended independently. For any changes (new forwarding destination), an email can be sent to mailforwardinformatik.uni-bremen.de.