Back to the Cal Poly Home PageThe following questions are those that we have anticipated the user community may ask in each of the categories listed. If you have a question that isn't addressed here, please email it to aliasmgr@polymail.calpoly.edu.
To see the answer, simply click on the question.
Answers to the questions:
A class email alias is an electronic mailing list that contains the email addresses of all faculty and students associated with a particular class. The purpose of the class alias is to simplify the process of communicating with students via email. It allows the sender to send email to members of the class by entering the name of the class alias on the "To:" line of any email client. The recipients only see the alias name in the message headers. The individual member names and email addresses are not displayed.
The alias can be addressed in several forms depending on the email client that you are using. The following are common clients and how the aliases are addressed from them.
When sending mail from Central UNIX, the alias may be addressed by the alias name. No host information is required.
In the Oracle Web client, simply address the message to:
aliasname@calpoly.edu
When using Microsoft Outlook, simply address the message to:
aliasname@calpoly.edu
When using Netscape Messenger, simply address the message to:
aliasname@calpoly.edu
When not using Central UNIX, or Oracle email, you can send email to the alias by addressing it to:
aliasname@calpoly.edu
Anyone on the internet can send email to a class email alias. At this time, the technology available does not allow us to restrict who can send email to a class email alias.
If a user does a "Reply All", the reply will go to everyone on the list as well as any other messages specified on the "To:", "From:", "Cc:", or "Sender:" lines. If the user does a simple "Reply" the message should go back to the sender only. The way this is implemented usually is very client dependent. We suggest that faculty instruct their students on the proper use of "Reply" and "Reply All" as it pertains to the way they want their class to use the alias.
If you are one of the instructors of record for the class (the class scheduling office and PeopleSoft handle this), your ID is associated with the class, and we use that to identify you as an instructor in the class. If you are an instructor in a class, you will receive an e mail message identifying the classes that were added for you on a given day and where the files are that you can use to add extra addresses.
You should only get one message per day from the "aliasmgr" account. Each message will list all of the aliases added for you or that you were added to as an instructor on that day. You will NOT get another message about that alias again during that term.
If you are not the instructor of record, but another instructor is, they will get the message. Please ask them to forward that message to you.
Refer to the Advanced Class Email Alias User Guide for instructions on adding names to the alias.
Additional email addresses can be added to a file stored in the Department Library account. Refer to the Advanced Class Email Alias User Guide for detailed instructions.
Refer to the Advanced Class Email Alias User Guide.
Faculty can edit any file in any department library account. Department Librarians that are not faculty can only edit files in the department library account that they are the librarian for.
Refer to the Advanced Class Email Alias User Guide.
Use the following table for the meaning of each of these course number prefixes:
| Prefix | Prefix Meaning |
| 0 | Normal course prefix. Alias contains all regularly registered students. |
| x | Experimental course. Alias contains all regularly registered students. |
| e | Extended Education course (replaced by the "p" prefix). Alias contains Extended Education registered students only. These courses associated with a course with either a "0" or "x" prefix with the same course number and section. |
| p | Open University course (replaced the "e" prefix). Alias contains Extended Education registered students only. These courses associated with a course with either a "0" or "x" prefix with the same course number and section. |
| s | Extended Education special summer course |
If you have Extended Education or Open University students in your class, they will not show up in the normal generated list. This is due to the fact they are assigned to a similar class when added, but not that exact class. For example for the class abbr-110-01-2068, they may actually be assigned to abbr-p110-01-2068 or abbr-e110-01-2068. You can either add their address to your class "include" file in the associated department account, or you can see if an aliases with the "p" or "e" suffix is also located in that same departmental account and try sending to that to see if they get the message.
Email has a large number of possible errors because of the different machines that people use for email services (Central UNIX, Oracle Email, AOL, etc.). If you do not find your error on this list, forward the error message to aliasmgr@polymail.calpoly.edu and it will be reviewed and added to the list when a resolution to the problem is found.
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This can have several possible causes:
The user will need update their Email Delivery Address using the Personal Information Channel at http://my.calpoly.edu/ (available starting Spring Quarter 2002). They also need to forward any email going to their Cal Poly email account (Oracle Email). Instructions for doing this may be found at http://email.calpoly.edu/webfrwrd.html .
If the forwarding is set up incorrectly, the email may be going to the wrong address. The forwarding address information should be checked and corrected if necessary. Refer to the item above this one for Web sites.
Some of your students may be Extended Education or Open University students.
If they are an Extended Education or Open University student, they will not show up in the normal generated list. This is due to the fact they are assigned to a similar class when added, but not that exact class. For example for the class abbr-110-01-2068, they may actually be assigned to abbr-p110-01-2068 or abbr-e110-01-2068. You can either add their address to your class "include" file in the associated department account, or you can see if an alias with the "p" or "e" suffix is also located in that same departmental account and try sending to that to see if they get the message.
Message bounces because the email account has not been activated. Message text:
This is an auto-reply message sent to you in reply to the message you sent to StudentName (a Cal Poly address). This email account has not been activated by the recipient and the account is not being used at this time. StudentName has not seen the email message you sent. If this is an important message please contact the recipient by other means.
(Note: Only the recipient may activate this account.)
If this message is received then the class instructor should advise the student to go to http://my.calpoly.edu/ and select the "activate your account" link in order to use email.
Once the Cal Poly email account is activated, if the student prefers to use an email account other than the one provided by Cal Poly then he/she should change their Email Delivery Address by logging into http://my.calpoly.edu and using the Personal Information Channel. They should also set a redirect in their Cal Poly account (Oracle Email). For instructions go to: http://email.calpoly.edu/documentation/email_forwarding.html
This usually indicates that the portion of the address to the left of the at-sign (@) doesn't exist at the destination machine address. The left portion may also be misspelled or may have been entered incorrectly. We suggest asking the class member who provided that address to verify their address if it was entered in the include file. A user in the class may also have an invalid address set for forwarding their email from the address that specified in the "include" files.
This is a variation of the "Returned mail: User unknown" message.
This is usually caused by indicating an address of "username@calpoly.edu" which is invalid or matches too many people. The explanation of this error can be found in the first few paragraphs of the error report.
This message indicates that one of the files or directories leading to it has improper permissions set for the system mail program to be able to access the file. If this occurs with your alias, please contact the departmental librarian for the departmental account associated with your class "include" file. NOTE: This is more likely to occur during the processing of a departmental alias than a auto generated class alias.
This message indicates that the alias "include" file that you can edit for the auto generated class alias, or one of the directories leading to it has improper permissions set for the system mail program to be able to access the file. If this occurs with your alias, please contact the departmental librarian for the departmental account associated with your class "include" file. You can find the name of the department librarian by logging into Central UNIX and issuing the following command:
% ulib dir | grep deptlogin
where "deptlogin" is the departmental library login as indicated in the error message between "/ulib/" and "/.aliases".
Faculty members who are indicated in PeopleSoft as instructor for the particular course, or department librarians for the responsible department, can submit an electronic request for the list of the addresses at http://www.calpoly.edu/~unixsys/autoalias/AliasInfoRequest.html.
If someone isn't on the autogenerated list they are either not registered for the class in PeopleSoft yet, they may be an Extended Education or Open University student, or they do not have an email address yet in the Directory Server.
If they are not in PeopleSoft yet, you can add them to your class "include" file. They can be removed from the class "include" files when they show up in PeopleSoft for your class.
If they are an Extended Education or Open University student, they will not show up in the normal generated list. This is due to the fact they are assigned to a similar class when added, but not that exact class. For example for the class abbr-0110-01-011, they may actually be assigned to abbr-p110-01-011 or abbr-e110-01-011. You can either add their address to your class "include" file in the associated department account, or you can see if an aliases with the "p" or "e" suffix is also located in that same departmental account and try sending to that to see if they get the message.
If they do not have an email account (all students get one created for them when they appear in our PeopleSoft feed) they should request one from the ITS Service Desk in Building 14 Room 114.
The files are updated automatically. They can not be edited since they would be overwritten the next time the aliases are built.
ITS receives class information from PeopleSoft for each student and instructor per class section. We then use this information to extract all of the classes being taught and generate queries for each of the classes to build the address list. The resulting data files are stored in a system area on the UNIX mail server.
A second file called an "include" file is created in a sub-directory of the departmental library account. Its contents are added to the built alias file so faculty/departmental staff can add themselves, graders, grader accounts, etc. to the actual alias when it's processed. Data added to the "include" file is dynamically added to the alias at the time the alias is used.
The primary file containing enrolled student email addresses is updated daily. The "include" file that contains additional addresses can be changed as often as you like.
Approximately 24 hours. The generated alias files will be updated every weekday.
Aliases for the upcoming quarter are created as soon as the last changes for the current quarter are complete and students have started to register for the upcoming quarter. This usually occurs during the 7th or 8th week of the current quarter.
The current term's alias files will be regenerated every weekday from the point that quarter becomes current until the next quarter becomes current (7th or 8th week of a given quarter).
We keep each file around for one full year. After that it is deleted. This means that there are four quarters worth of aliases available at any point in time.
If the "include" files are manually deleted during the quarter that they reflect, they will be recreated during the nightly process. At the end of one year, the class email alias and associated "include" file will be deleted automatically. No manual intervention is required.
At the end of one year, the class email alias and associated "include" file will be deleted automatically.
For assistance in editing the alias "include" file, contact your Department Librarian. You can determine who your department librarian is by using the command: "ulib dir" and look for your department in the generated list. If your department does not appear, your department does not have a department library account and you may not edit the alias "include" files.
If you do not have a Central UNIX department library account for your department, your department chair may apply for one using forms from the ITS Service Desk or http://servicedesk.calpoly.edu
Detailed instructions on the use and editing of class email aliases are contained in the Advanced Class Email Alias User guide.
You may also contact the ITS Service Desk at 756-7000 and request assistance.
Click this link for more details: Training. You may also contact the ITS Service Desk at 756-7000 and request assistance.
Last updated: April 23, 2007