Re: authinfo/netrc file encryption status -- GnuPG

["Steven E. Harris" <seh@panix.com>]

"Ted Zlatanov" <tzz@lifelogs.com> writes:

> I tested them, let me know if you get good results too.

More feedback after using the updates for most of the day: I now need
to type my .authinfo decryption password more often than I used to
have to type the individual server passwords.

I have gnus-encrypt-password-cache-expiry set to 600, or ten
minutes. Now, whenever I contact a server that I haven't exchanged
data with for ten minutes, Gnus prompts me for my decryption
password. Without an encrypted .authinfo -- one missing the password
specifications to begin with -- Gnus will only prompt me for a
password if the server has disconnected, and even then Gnus still
seems to cache the passwords until I close a server manually.

The distinction here is that with an encrypted .authinfo, expiration
of the password cache seems to cause Gnus to think that it needs to
re-authenticate, even if it's not necessary with an .authinfo missing
passwords altogether.

Of course my descriptions involve a lot of hand-waving because I don't
know how Gnus actually handles server disconnects and authentication
requests. I'm just comparing against the "normal" behavior I've grown
accustomed to over the last few years.

Summarizing: With no passwords in a non-encrypted .authinfo file, I
type a password for each server each time I start Gnus, and I usually
don't have to repeat that password until I exit and restart Gnus. With
passwords in an encrypted .authinfo file, I have to type the
decryption password every gnus-encrypt-password-cache-expiry period.

Is that the expected behavior?

-- 
Steven E. Harris