# Setting defaults to enable mailing list mode-Temporary Solution

**URL:** <https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-defaults-to-enable-mailing-list-mode-temporary-solution/25645>\
**Category:** Product Support\
**Tags:** email\
**Created:** [25. Februar 2015 um 01:04 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-defaults-to-enable-mailing-list-mode-temporary-solution/25645 "2015-02-25T01:04:25Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 1

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**Author:** ![watchmanmonitor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/watchmanmonitor/32/430970_2.png) [@watchmanmonitor](https://meta.discourse.org/u/watchmanmonitor)\
**Post date:** [25. Februar 2015 um 01:04 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-defaults-to-enable-mailing-list-mode-temporary-solution/25645/1 "2015-02-25T01:04:25Z")

</div>

Continuing the discussion from [Edit a user setting for all Discourse users](https://meta.discourse.org/t/edit-a-user-setting-for-all-discourse-users/25162):

> [@Edit a user preference for everyone or a subset of users](https://meta.discourse.org/t/edit-a-user-preference-for-everyone-or-a-subset-of-users/25162/1):
>
> So you want to edit user setting for all Discourse users? Great!

So, I did this in my forum - I sent a nice email explaining what’s up, and just did it.

Then, I went ahead and set the defaults as I wanted to be checked by default - and have instructions telling people how they can change them if they want (all I did was set defaults, not lock them in place)

It’s been great. Discourse is now the mailing list I’ve wanted since day one, with the most functional web-ui out there.

Here’s how I did it, I sure hope I didn’t break anything horribly wrong, and am posting here to ensure that fact.

First, ssh in to your host as root.

```sql
cd /var/discourse/

./launcher ssh app

su postgres

psql

\c discourse
alter table only users alter column email_always set default true;
alter table only users alter column mailing_list_mode set default true;
\q

This error is expected: could not save history to file "/var/lib/postgresql/.psql_history": No such file or directory

exit (to get out of the docker image)
exit (to get out of the host)

```

Done.

At this point, I tell people that this is a mailing list, with the option to go web-only if they want.

Thank you discourse, for being awesome.

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_[View the full topic](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setting-defaults-to-enable-mailing-list-mode-temporary-solution/25645)._