Subject: Re: Pine config of news server/login/groups

From: Scott Leibrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 13 Dec 1999 11:13:49 -0800 (PST)

During your session, it's stored in memory.  If you want to save your
password between sessions, you need to tell it where to save it by
defining the PASSFILE variable.  Here's what it says at
<http://ism.ucdavis.edu/info/pine/installation.html>:

PASSFILE 

WARNING! Turning this on is very dangerous and should probably not be
done, except on single user systems! For PC-Pine, this is turned on by
default and set to the filename PINE.PWD. You may enable it for Unix
systems by defining PASSFILE to be a filename which will be located in the
same directory as the pinerc file, usually the home directory. See
./pine/osdep/os-wnt.h for an example showing how to define it.

The file is used to save passwords from one session to the next. Even if
you define PASSFILE when you compile Pine, password saving will not be
enabled by default, but requires the existence of the file (the name of
which is the value of PASSFILE). Even with the existence of this file, the
user must still acknowledge a prompt before the password is saved to the
file. If Pine is configured to access several different IMAP servers, each
password entered will be kept (associated with the corresponding host
name) in memory during the current session, and optionally, in the
PASSFILE file for use in subsequent sessions.

WARNING! Use this feature with caution! It effectively makes the user's
mail no more secure than the physical security of the machine running
Pine. What's more, while the password is cloaked by a mild (some might
say, feeble) encryption scheme, it is nonetheless sitting in a file on the
disk and subject to cracking by anyone with access to it. BEWARE!

-- 
Scott Leibrand
[email-masked]
http://students.washington.edu/leibrand
* RCW 19.190 notice: This email address is located in Washington State. *
* Unsolicited commercial email may be billed $500 per message.          *

On Mon, 13 Dec 1999 [email-masked] wrote:

> 
> So where is my password stored?  doesn't it have to be stored somewhere?
> 
>

---

From: Andreas Kraft <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 11:33:13 +0100 ((MEZ) Mitteleuropäische Zeit)

Hi,

On Mon, 13 Dec 1999, Scott Leibrand wrote:

> [...]
> [...]

I am using PC-Pine (4.21) to access my regular emails on an IMAP server.
Here, everything works fine. But I am also have another INBOX on
a POP3 account. Here, PC-Pine asks me for the password for this account
and also aks me whether I want to store it in the PASSFILE. The
problem is that it is either not stored or not correctly retrieved
because PC-Pine is asking me for the password every time I am
accessing this INBOX. Is this a known problem?

Best regards,

Andreas

-- 
  o  _     Andreas Kraft
 (\_|_)      GMD FOKUS, [email-masked], +49 30 3463-7232
 T> ] [        The sky is the limit

---

From: "LINEart" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 14:52:01 -0500

I wonder if this has anything to do with POP3 not being supported for "new"
messages while in-session.

as you know, you cannot view "new" messages that arrive in a POP3 box
without exiting PINE and re-entering.  I wonder if it's asking you for a
password because when you leave the POP Inbox you're in effect "closing" the
PINE session and upon re-entry, you're "starting" the PINE application
again. . .

---

From: Scott Leibrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 15:01:21 -0800 (PST)

I don't know if it's a "known" problem, but I'm certainly seeing a lot of
posts about it.  The general trend seems to be that if you're accessing a
mailbox with a different uid than you're running Pine under, Pine no
longer remembers that you've already logged in.

I'm going to do some comprehensive testing soon to see if I can get a more
precise description of the conditions under which the problem occurs.

---

From: Andreas Kraft <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 11:48:49 +0100 ((MEZ) Mitteleuropäische Zeit)

Scott,

thank you for your answer.

> longer remembers that you've already logged in.

Maybe I should describe my scenario:
Normally I am "logged" on to the IMAP server of my company with my uid. 
I have also another account at another ISP which I want to check
regulary. This ISP offers only POP3 mail access. The username there is the
same. I therefore added another incoming-folder:

	user-id=myuid
	incoming-folders="other inbox" {otherisp.de/user=myuid/pop3}INBOX

So, I am using the same uids for both accounts.

I hope that helps,

Andreas

---

From: Andreas Kraft <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 11:52:50 +0100 ((MEZ) Mitteleuropäische Zeit)

Hi,

> PINE session and upon re-entry, you're "starting" the PINE application

Is it really necessary to leave Pine or is it OK to just close the
incoming folder (eg. open the inbox of another email account) and open
it again? 
I don't think that Pine "forgets" my uid because I can still access
my email on the IMAP server I am usually connected to.

Best regards,

Andreas

---

From: Nancy this-address-is-valid McGough <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 10:23:50 -0500 (EST)

On 99-12-15 Andreas Kraft <[email-masked]> wrote:
> I am using PC-Pine (4.21) to access my regular emails on an
> IMAP server. Here, everything works fine. But I am also have
> another INBOX on a POP3 account. Here, PC-Pine asks me for the
> password for this account and also aks me whether I want to
> store it in the PASSFILE. The problem is that it is either not
> stored or not correctly retrieved because PC-Pine is asking me
> for the password every time I am accessing this INBOX. Is this
> a known problem?

Make sure you put "/user=userid" in *all* your server
specifications in your pinerc, e.g.:

 your.pop.server/user=userid
 your.imap.server/user=userid2

This includes specifications of remote folder collections and
IMAP-accessible address book. I have examples of this in my
PC-Pine page, which is a link in the URL in my sig below.

Good luck,
Nancy

-- 
Pine info & links @ http://www.ii.com/internet/messaging/pine/
 
©Nancy McGough         http://www.ii.com/         Infinite Ink
-----== Sent via Pine 4.21 running on Debian GNU/Linux ==-----

---

From: Andreas Kraft <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 17:49:41 +0100 ((MEZ) Mitteleuropäische Zeit)

Nancy,

thank you for your answer. However, what you recommend doesn't work.

>  your.imap.server/user=userid2

I changed the inbox-path to the following:

	inbox-path               = {mymailhost/user=uid}INBOX

and did the same for my address books on the IMAP server. Pine still
asks me for a password every time I try to access my POP3 mailbox.

> PC-Pine page, which is a link in the URL in my sig below.

I actually got the ideas for the POP3 configuration from your
excellent descriptions (btw: thanks for all the efforts you put into these
pages!).

> Good luck,

Thanks. I keep trying :-)

Andreas

---

From: Scott Leibrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 16 Dec 1999 09:35:09 -0800 (PST)

In your case, where the POP3 inbox is not your primary inbox, it should be
ok just to close the folder and reopen it.  The real annoyance is for
people whose main inbox is their POP3 inbox, because you can't close that.

If you can, try Pine 4.10 and see if you have the same problem.  It seems
that all the new problems with multiple uid/passwd prompts have come up
using 4.2x, but I'd like to confirm that.