314495 - SeaMonkey doesn't remember newsserver username and password

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 437930

(MailNews Core :: Networking: NNTP, defect)

Description

[Manuel Reimer]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.7.12) Gecko/20050923
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.7.12) Gecko/20050923

At first: This bug report has nothing to do with the password manager. I don't want to store my passwords anywhere!

Mozilla asks every time for the newsserver username and password if the session has expired or for any other reason. The problem is (IMO) that mozilla doesn't remember the password in memory to answer the news servers request with the already specified values

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Log in to a newsserver
2. Wait some time
3. Try hitting "Get Msgs"

Actual Results:  
You will get the password prompt again.

Expected Results:  
Mozilla should remember the values specified by the user to answer the news servers request for username and password automatically. Noone wants to type in username and password dozens of times within one mozilla session.

Comment 1

[zug_treno]

Maybe related to Thunderbird bug 296534?

Comment 2

[Andreas Schwarz]

I had the same problem some time ago when I was using the freenet (IIRC) newsserver. I believe the reason is: If you open more than n connections at the same time, the server rejects the login, so Mozilla thinks you have entered the wrong password.

Comment 3

[Frank Wein [:mcsmurf]]

Maybe creating a NNTP log as described at http://www.mozilla.org/quality/mailnews/mail-troubleshoot.html would help.

Comment 4

[Mr David B Weintraub]

My old newsserver entries are in the password manager (1.7.x) but now it will not save my new newsserver in 1.8.alpha5. The server is newsgroups.comcast.net. I can save the entries for the email .

Comment 5

[Nelson Bolyard (seldom reads bugmail)]

I believe this is yet another manifestation of bug 286628.
Comment 2 seems particularly to confirm this.

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 286628 ***

Comment 6

[Manuel Reimer]

Reopening this one now, as the fix of bug 286628 didn't fix this issue for me.

At first again: This one *has* *nothing* *to* *do* *with* *the* *password* *manager*. I don't store my newsgroup password there and I also don't want to store it in future!

I want to specify a new lists of steps to reproduce now, as I have to reproduce the bug exactly like this several times a day!!

- At first you'll need a newsserver which reasks for the password after some time (timeout).
- Now get sure you don't have the password for this server in your password manager. Maybe you'll also have to disable the password manager.
- Set up the server and open some of the groups (at this place you'll have to login for the first time).
- Open one group and chech for new messages. Read some messages. Now wait for about ten minutes or longer (we need the server timeout).
- Now you should be still in the groups where you've opened some of the messeages. Hit "Chech for new messages" again now. You'll be asked for your username now. If so *hit* *Cancel*!
- Go back to the top node of the server tree (the one which says "news.yourprovider.com") and hit "check for new messages" there. Now you won't get the username/password requests again. SeaMonkey will query the server and update the unread-count of each group.
- Get back into the group where you've read some messages, some steps before, and hit "get new messages" there now. You'll see, that you won't get the username/password requests any more.

So this shows:

SeaMonkey stores username/password in memory, but it only sends the data back to the server if I use "get messages" from where I initially entered the data. It doesn't know, that the data, I've once entered for the "news.yourprovider.com"-entry, also is valid for each of the groups in the tree.

So what I'm doing now, if I'm reading newsgroups and getting this silly "please enter username"-message now, is the following:

- I'm hitting "cancel" as I'm too lazy to enter the fu**ing username over and over again.
- Then I'm switching to the top node of the tree and query for new messages.
- Then I'm getting back into the group where I've been before.
- Now I'm able to continue reading without entering username/password again.

This workaround definetly sucks. I'm using it several times a day and I'm finally at a point where I'm thinking of changing the NNTP client!

Comment 7

[Manuel Reimer]

Just for information:

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=36816

The fix for the above bug also didn't fix this issue, but the idea is the same. The mistake they did was, just again, that they assumed everyone to use the password manager.

Comment 8

[Karsten Düsterloh]

After some discussion and testing over IRC, Manuel and I think that the actual bug is a subissue of bug 36816. The problem is that we remember different login credentials for the server and its groups and *without* using the password manager, the fallback from group to server credentials does not work.
Steps to reproduce:
- choose a newsserver with global login and timeout, subscribe to some groups
- "opening" the newsserver in the folderpane or requesting new messages will
  allow reading until the next timeout
- wait until timeout
- clicking group x will request login: cancel (Esc etc.)
- clicking group y will request login: login
- group x is now usable without login, too
- wait until timeout
- clicking group x will request login: cancel (Esc etc.)
- clicking group y will *not* request login, and is usable
- group x is now usable without login, too

Comment 9

[Karsten Düsterloh]

Confirmed for Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.8.1.1) Gecko/20061211 SeaMonkey/1.1, btw.

Comment 10

[Manuel Reimer]

Moved to Core -> Networking: News
Added Keyword "helpwanted"

Confirmed for Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; de-AT; rv:1.8.1.5) Gecko/20070723 SeaMonkey/1.1.3