Majordomo is one of University's email list applications. The difference between Majordomo and other lists like Microsoft 365 is that external addresses can be added to the list through Majordomo. This guide describes the tasks of the administrator.
At the University, email lists are primarily maintained using the MajorCool software which allows you to edit the list's recipients, approve messages sent to a restricted list for delivery and change the list's configuration.
- A request to set up a MajorCool mailing list is made via a subscription form.
- The address of MajorCool, the list maintenance tool, is majordomo.helsinki.fi. To use it, you need a University username (use the short form, e.g. "rkeskiva"), the name of the list and its admin password.
- From the MajorCold interface, you can change the maintenance password or administrator.
- To delete an unnecessary mailing list, please contact the IT Helpdesk.
The MajorDomo software can be used:
- via the browser-based MajorCool interface.
- by sending commands to Majordomo via email.
Please take this into account when designing mailing lists:
- Majordomo lists can be subscribed to by an IAM group
- A Majordomo list cannot be added to an IAM list.
- If a list is going to include outsiders without a University of Helsinki email address, the Majordomo lists should always be used.
Quick help
Table of contents
MajorCool interface
In addition to the Majordomo software, the university offers the browser interface MajorCool to facilitate the use of lists. This interface sends the administration commands to the software on behalf of the user. This facilitates the administration of the list as errors are easy to make when using e-mail commands.
The address of MajorCool is https://majordomo.helsinki.fi/. Using the interface requires a university username plus the name and administration password of the list.
A reply message is sent to the administrator's address for all actions carried out in the MajorCool interface. Please note that not all administration operations, such as changing the e-mail list password, can be performed in the MajorCool interface. If you need to change the administration password or administrator, please contact the IT Helpdesk.
MajorCold
Note: If you see any unused or reduntant email lists in your MajorCold view, please request their deletion from IT Helpdesk.
MajorCold is used to change the administrators and password of Majordomo mailing lists. You can log in to MajorCold by using short form of your username (e.g. rkeskiva) at https://majorcold.it.helsinki.fi/.
- When you log in, you will be taken to a page where you will see all the Majordomo mailing lists you are the administrator of, based on your email address. You can return to this view by clicking on the top bar (1) Lists. By clicking on the name of a list (i.e. "test6 list"), you will see the email addresses of the administrators of that list.
- When you click on a specific list or on the top bar:
- (2) Change list admin you will be able to modify the list admins.
- (3) Change list password you can change the list password.
Change list admins
- Select (1) the address of the list the administrators of which you want to change from the drop-down menu. You can also type the name of the list in the text field (list name without the @helsinki.fi ending, i.e. "testi6-lista"). You can change the dministrators of a list if you know the list password even if you are not an admin..
- In field (2) "Email address(es) of new admins", enter all the email addresses for which you want list admin rights. If there are more than one administrators, separate the addresses with a comma.
- Enter (3) the current password for the email list and press (4) Save. The change will send an email to both new and old list admins, but you can choose to prevent this by selecting Do not send email to list admins.
Change the list password
-
Select (1) the address of the list the password of which you wish to change from the drop down menu (list name without the @helsinki.fi ending). You can also type the name of the list in the text field (list name without the @helsinki.fi ending, i.e. "testi6-lista").
-
Enter (2) the new password for the mailing list in the List new password field.
-
Press (3) Save. An email will be sent to the administrators about the change, which you can prevent by selecting Do not send email to list admins.
Administration by e-mail
Majordomo cannot read messages in HTML. Check from the e-mail program settings that the message is sent as plain text.
The Majordomo software can also be controlled by sending commands as e-mails. The e-mail address of Majordomo is majordomo@helsinki.fi.
The command is entered in the text section of the e-mail. The list server cannot process the subject field of an e-mail. Majordomo tries to interpret all text in the e-mails, such as your signature, as commands, so please check the e-mail before sending it.
You can send several commands in the same message, one command per row. If the command is longer than one row, you can break it with a backslash (\), e.g.
subscribe reallylong-listname \ even-longer.emailaddress@helsinki.fi
NOTE: The following should be observed in the use of footers: Footers may not display correctly nowadays because of different character encodings and message structures and using them is therefore not recommended. You should avoid using Scandinavian characters and other special characters as a minimum.
Detailed help
Video instruction
Give feedback
The instructions site of the University of Helsinki's IT Helpdesk helps you with IT-related issues related to your work. Let us know how we can improve our instructions. We greatly appreciate your feedback!
How would you improve these instructions?