273478 - Anonymous FTP confuses Firefox calendar logging into remote server

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Calendar :: Provider: ICS/WebDAV, defect)

Description

[RickM]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.7.5) Gecko/20041128 Firefox/1.0 (Debian package 1.0-4)
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.7.5) Gecko/20041124 Firefox/0.09

MVL helped me sort this one out.
http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?t=177309

The easiest way to describe this is to first describe the normal behaviour when
contacting FTP servers that calendar has no problem with.

Using a URL such as ftp://user:[e-mail]/path/to/calendar/mycal.ics, FF-cal
logs right in and gets the calendar file.

If you omit the user:pwd and specify
ftp://ftp.server/path/to/calendar/mycal.ics, FF-cal prompts for userid and
password as expected.

Howver, the FTP server that I access has anonymous FTP enabled such that FF-cal
only works if the user:pwd is given. If omited, it ends up in the anonymous FTP
directory area without ever prompting for the userid/pwd. It then reports that
the file is not found: 

550 /path/to/calendars/mycal.ics: No such file or directory.

It can't find the file because "ftp" is not in your home directory; it's in the
anonymous FTP area. It doesn't know who you are.

You can demonstrate this by using this URL in a browser (I used firefox):

ftp://spots.ab.ca

and you'll get right into the anonymous FTP area. If you use any other machine,
such as your own Linux desktop (ftp://localhost/), you'll probably get a prompt
for the userid and password. It is this difference that is confusing FF-cal.

Presumably the same same problem exists with Sunbird and Thunderbird-cal. I
can't test this because neither has builds that include FTP support yet. (see
Bug 273476).

Reproducible: Always
Steps to Reproduce:
1. See details above.
2.
3.

Actual Results:  
See details above.

Expected Results:  
FF-cal needs to detect this anonymous FTP server scenario and prompt for a
userid and password. This will put the FTP server into the user's directory
where the path to the calendar file will be found.

Thanks to Michiel for being patient and getting to the bottom of this problem.

Comment 1

[Matthew (lilmatt) Willis]

Reassigning all automatically assigned bugs from Mostafa to nobody@m.o

Bugspam filter: TorontoMostafaMove

Comment 2

[cmtalbert]

Marking QAWanted to attract the attention of the FTP gurus. Not only can this be confirmed, but I have a suspicion that it has now been fixed on Sunbird.  

--> WFM?

Comment 3

[Bas van den Bosch]

can be confirmed but doesn't work for me...

I think it would be better to always have a username-field in the dialog when adding a remote server, like thunderbird has. This could be pre-filled with a text stating "anonymous: no username needed" which includes spaces and may never be used as a username anyway. Also the attempt for the anonymous login will only be made if it's appropiate. The url could internally be stored as user@url and would never have to be translated back (should be tested for a valid username though). The only place where this url is visible (afaik) is while editing the remote calendar and I think no-one minds when the url is visble including the username here. Not sure wether this works for caldav-url's too, but for http and ftp protocols it does.

However, if it's clear one should use http://user@domain or ftp://user@domain this is a easy workaround.

Comment 4

[Matthew (lilmatt) Willis]

We won't hold 0.5 up for this.

Comment 5

[Martin Schröder [:mschroeder]]

Resolving WONTFIX as FTP capability has been discontinued (bug 1574475).