Re: Mail::Transport::IMAP4 bug

On Wed, 2005-05-25 at 10:59 +0200, Mark Overmeer wrote:
> * Raul Dias ([email protected]) [050525 06:41]:

> > The solution is to place the first authentication() call after
> > the imapClient has being saved.
> 
> Well, that would require everyone to create the IMAPClient object
> explicitly, which I do not want.
> 

No, thats the one thing I am not doing.  Creating the IMAPClient object
explicitly.  Moving this the way I did is what allowed me to have
Mail::Box create the IMAPClient automatically.

> The solution is simply to delay the reduction in list of authentication
> methods to the moment the connection is established/being build.
> 

yep.

> I have changed the implementation of sub authenticate() to do a
> better job.  This will come to you in a separate mail.  Can you
> try it?
> 

sure.  I report to you as soon as I tried it.

> > BTW, I spoted a bug in Mail::IMAPClient when doing a CRAM-MD5
> > authentication against a Cyrus-Imapd server without authentication
> > mechanism (other than PLAIN).  In this case Mail::IMAPClient will hang
> > forever.
> 
> I have quite bad experiences in my attempts getting bugs in IMAPClient
> fixed.  Hope you get better results.  Or maybe someone can take over
> its maintenance...  I have quite a long list of improvements...
> The code hasn't been updated in 18 months.
> 

can you post this fixes?
Also I think that a patchs dir in the Mail-Box package with all patchs
is a good way to distribute the imprvements to Mail::Box users.

> > I have mailed the Mail::IMAPClient author, but I suggest that when
> > authenticate is 'AUTO' it should try plain 'PLAIN' before 'CRAM-MD5'.
> 
> No, that is not a good solution: connection attempts should go from
> most-secure to insecure.

Right. A note about the IMAPClient bugs (like CRAM-MD5 hanging would be
a good adition to the docs).


> > The last thing I noticed is when authenticating with wrong credentials,
> > Mail::Transport::IMAP4 will loop forever in login, because 'retries' by
> > default is -1 which means forever.
> 
> That is because Mail::Box is a library, not an end-user application.
> If you write a mail-client for users, you wish an interaction with the
> user on every attempt.  However, as an automated mail application, you
> do not want the application to fail when the server is temporary
> unavailable or misconfigured.
>   The (expected) performance (for some of the folder types) of MailBox
> (being mainly written in Perl) is probably not really sufficient for
> interactive applications. [Although I have heard other statements, I have
> no experience with that]  Therefore, the defaults are usually tuned towards
> optimal behaviour for automatic clients.  In this case: try until you die.

This would be another good adition to the docs :)


Raul Dias