243347 - MozMail rejects valid username/password and repeats authentication dialog

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(MailNews Core :: Networking: SMTP, defect)

Description

[Eric Krock]

Using 1.7b on WinXP Pro SP1: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US;
rv:1.7b) Gecko/20040421.

1) To recover from bug 243275 "Password manager turns saved username into empty
string," (which bienvenu has kindly commented on) I (a) deleted the MozMail
password manager entries for the passwords where the username had turned into
"<>", then (b) had IT re-enable my Active Directory login for Windows/Exchange
and reset password.
2) Started MozMail. Prompted to enter password to check for mail; clicked cancel.
3) Composed test message. Clicked Send. 
4) Prompted for password. Entered the new password but did NOT click the
"remember password" checkbox.

EXPECTED: Email message is sent.
ACTUAL: Authentication fails. Prompted again with identical password challenge.
Enter valid password again; same result. Cancel on third appearance of the dialog.

The net net is that I can't currently send email using MozMail. Don't know what
the effect of clicking the save password checkbox would be & reluctant to
experiment as I want to avoid triggering bug 243275.

This report may be a DUP of bug 204371 "SMTP fail with repeat password dialog
(CRAM-MD5 authentication refused)" but I'm not sure.

This problem might also contribute to bug 243275 "Password manager turns saved
username into empty string," which I reported previously.

Comment 1

[Eric Krock]

Attachment: edited log file from session during which I reproduced error on final email send attempt

I successfully reproduced this problem during a session I had mail logging
enabled. I started MozMail, successfully received email, successfully sent a
test email. Then later on, I tried to send an email, and this time no matter
how many times I typed in the password, it kept showing me the password dialog
again.	reproducederror-stripped.txt is the log file (with my mail folder
titles stripped out for confidentiality, and lots of UIDs stripped out for
length). Contents of file don't look helpful to me, but maybe experts will see
something. When I finally clicked Cancel after entering the password about
seven times, got the error alert I'll attach next.

Comment 2

[Eric Krock]

Attachment: Error alert I saw when I finally hit cancel after entering password seven times.

Comment 3

[Christian Eyrich]

Reads like bug 230333 to me.

Comment 4

[Eric Krock]

Attachment: SMTP log for session where I had to enter password twice, then it succeeded

For this session, I started Moz with SMTP logging on (SMTP, not LDAP this
time), cancelled the initial password prompt when Moz wanted to check for new
mail, composed an email, clicked Send, got prompted for and entered password,
got prompted for and entered password AGAIN, then it succeeded. Fact that I was
prompted twice on a single Send for the password certainly seems like a bug to
me. It may or may not be exactly the same as the original issue in this report.

Comment 5

[David :Bienvenu]

was one of the passwords for the smtp server, and one for the copy to sent
folder on your imap server? We're definitely doing an auth login, and my guess
is that we're doing NTLM...Is it possible there's a bug in the NTLM code such
that occasionally we send the wrong password?

Comment 6

[Eric Krock]

Christian's bug 230333 explanation is a possibility, particularly for the the
first go-rounnd I had with this. Suppose that I had mistyped the password when
initially prompted. (Entirely possible given recent changes, resetting, etc.)
Then that would fail, and no matter how many times I typed it correctly
afterwards, due to bug 230333 it would be rejected.

David's suggestion that perhaps being prompted twice is sort-of correct
functionality (authenticating two times, one each for two purposes) is also
possible. I do use IMAP and save copies in Sent. But since I use Exchange, I'm
baffled why I would need to authenticate twice to what should be the same server
handling both SMTP and IMAP. (Or could it be that Exchange treats IMAP gateway
access as a "separate thing"?) This makes me think that the "authenticate twice,
then succeed" may be unrelated to the "even if I authenticate N times, still
fails" experience. I'll keep running Moz w/ SMTP logging, type carefully
[especially on the first entry!] and try to repro the "N times and still fails"
problem with a log.

Comment 7

[Christian Eyrich]

Eric, the client isn't really requested to login, neither for SMTP nor for IMAP.
We authenticate if it's a new connection and the server advertises to support
authentication.

It's necessary to prompt the user for IMAP login (as long as the password isn't
remembered) since a login is limited to a connection. So an authenticated SMTP
connection doesn't make a new IMAP connection automatically authenticated.

Comment 8

[Eric Krock]

I have good news. I verified by temporarily ceasing my use of MozMail that I'm 
in fact experiencing a mysterious ** Outlook ** problem (since my HD reinstall) 
that is causing my Active Directory user account to be disabled. This probably 
explains what appeared to be MozMail 1.7b "forgetting" my saved password and 
repeatedly prompting for a password even when I entered the "valid" (but 
disabled) password. Marking invalid. Really sorry for the trouble and the false 
indictment of an innocent Moz 1.7b. Thanks for everyone's help!!! Resolution: 
OUTLOOKSUCKS