Dairy-L has been active for a long time, and many topics have been discussed in the past. To avoid duplication, it’s recommended that people search the archives before posting a new question. There are two ways to search the archives: email and the World Wide Web.
The online archives were started in October 1994, and the email archives go back until January 1997. Thus, an online archive search is more complete. Also, it can take as long as overnight to get the results of an email search. The results of online archive searches are immediate, which can be very important in some circumstances. Instructions for both methods are below.
Online Archive Search Information
The URL for searching the online Dairy-L archives is below. Please note that you have to establish a password to search the database. Please read the instructions on the search page.
http://www.listserv.umd.edu/archives/dairy-l.html
Searching by Email
Searching the Dairy-L archives by email is a two-step process. In the first step, you send a message to the listserv software to find out which messages contain your word(s) of interest. When you send this message, you get a response that not only provides you with the total number of messages that contain your word(s) of interest but also gives you a unique identification number (Item #) and a few sentences from each message.
Using the few sentences, you can often decide whether you want to read the full message. The item numbers are then used in the second step to get the full text of the specific messages you want. Both steps are described below.
First Step
In the first step, you send an email message to listserv@listserv.umd.edu and put a line like the following in the body of the message:
Search mastitis in DAIRY-L
You modify this line according to the needs of your search. This example search picks up any message with the word “mastitis” in it. This will result in a large number of messages that match, or hits. You can restrict the search further by adding words to this line or replacing the word “mastitis” with other word(s). For more information about the details of modifying this line for use of “Boolean” terms like “and”, “or”, or “but”, send a message to the listserv address above, and put the following line in the body of the message:
info database
First step to search archives for more than one word:
Send a message to the appropriate listserv address with the following line in the body of the message:
Search heifer and synchronization in DAIRY-L
The “and” is the default between words. If you want to use “or”, you must specify the “or”.
Response from the First Step
After sending the one-line message to the listserv address, you get back an email message that tells you the number of messages that contain the word(s) you indicated and the specific item number for each message. With the example just above, you might get the following response:
> search heifer synchronization in Dairy-L
-> 4 matches.
Item # Date Time Recs Subject
—— —- —- —- ——-
008921 96/09/05 10:25 52 Ovsynch Program on Heifers
009129 96/09/18 09:05 33 Re: Precocious Lactation
009289 96/10/02 09:12 63 Out of sequence heats in OVSYNC protocol?
012514 97/04/03 11:17 53 GnRH and estrus
Then for each item number, you get a small section of the message with the word(s) emphasized. In the example above, you get the following from Item #12514.
>>> Item #12514 (3 Apr 1997 11:17) – GnRH and estrus
likely to have a follicle that does not have capacity to ovulate after GnRH. For this and other reasons related to follicle growth, there is not good synchronization of heifers with this protocol (70% synchronization of
In the response from the first step, the listserv software provides you with the command to get all of the messages that contain the word(s) of interest. In the example above, you get the following:
To order a copy of these postings, send the following command:
GETPOST DAIRY-L 8921 9129 9289 12514
You use this command to obtain full copies of the messages as described in the second step below. You can “copy” this line from one message and “paste” it into the message in the second step below. You don’t have to get all item numbers, but you can if you want to.
Second Step
The listserv software responds to the first step with an email message listing all item numbers that contain the word(s) of interest. Once you’ve decided which item numbers you want, you send a message to listserv@listserv.umd.edu and put a line like the following into the message:
GETPOST DAIRY-L 8921 9129 9289 12514
You modify this line according to the needs of your search. In the example above, these were the item numbers that were of interest. The listserv software’s response to the first step contains an example “GETPOST” line that will allow you to obtain all item numbers.
It’s common to want only some of the item numbers. You can just delete the item number(s) you don’t want from the provided example.
It’s common for the response from the first step to contain a “GETPOST” example that has item numbers that are on more than one line in the response. In the second step, each line MUST start with a “GETPOST DAIRY-L” before the item numbers. You can have more than one line starting with GETPOST DAIRY-L in a message to the listserv software.
The listserv software will respond to this second step with two email messages if you have made no errors. One message will indicate that:
File “DAIRY-L POSTINGS” has been mailed to you under separate cover.
The other message will contain the various item numbers.
Options for the First Step
To search archives before, after, or between dates:
Send a message to the listserv address above with a line like the following in the body of the message:
Search warts in DAIRY-L since Feb. 94
The syntax for searching archives for messages before, after, or between dates is as follows:
since date
from date to date
until date
The syntax for dates varies, and some examples are below:
- TODAY
- TODAY-7
- yy
- dd mm
- <dd><->monthname<-><yy>
- mm/yy
- mm-yy
- yy/mm/dd
- yy-mm-dd
By using the from Today-7 option, you can search for messages during the last 7 days. You can change the number after the dash to whatever is appropriate for your situation.
Month names can be abbreviated to any length. If there is an ambiguity, the first month in chronological order is retained. For example, “J” would mean “January”, “JU” would be “June”, and “JUL” would unambiguously select “July”.
To search archives for messages from an address:
Send a message to the listserv address with a line like the following example in the body of the message:
Search warts in Dairy-L where sender contains varner@umd5.umd.edu.
Put the email address of the person of interest at the end of the line. If you want all messages by someone, and you don’t want to search for specific words, you would replace the word “wart” in the example above with a “*”, which is a global match command.
To search archives for messages that contain specific words in the subject:
Send a message to the listserv address with a line like the following example in the body of the message:
Search pgf in Dairy-L where subject contains gnrh.
This search finds any message that contains the word “pgf” in the body of the message and “gnrh” in the subject line. If you want to find all messages that contain “gnrh” in the subject line, you would just replace the “pgf” with a “*”, which is a global match command.
To search archives for phrases:
Send a message to the listserv address above with a line like the following example line in the body of the message:
Search ‘growth hormone’ in Dairy-L.
The single quotes are used to denote a phrase. The phrase is not case sensitive.
To search archives for case-sensitive phrases:
Search “E. coli” in Dairy-L.
The double quotes are used to denote a phrase that is case sensitive.