Re: AUTHINFO

[Lloyd Zusman <ljz@asfast.com>]

Hrvoje Niksic <hniksic@srce.hr> writes:

> Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org> writes:
> 
> > > For example, people with FTP access to their newsserver who use this
> > > Gnus option will inadvertently be losing the FTP session password
> > > protection they once had.
> > 
> > You mean, since the password is stored in clear text?  But that's
> > the case in any case.  Or do you mean that miscreants will be able
> > to sneak up to a logged-in terminal and ftp to the nntp server?  I
> > hadn't thought of that...
> > 
> > I dunno.  Let's have a vote:  ~/.netrc or, uhm, ~/.authinforc as the
> > default file?
> 
> I'd like it cleared up: Can one expect to login to FTP and NNTP
> servers with different passwords?  If yes, I vote for `.authinforc'.
> If not, I vote for `.netrc'.

One can indeed expect to log in to FTP and NNTP servers with different
passwords.  On Unix boxes, the FTP password is usually the login
password for the account one is FTP-ing to.  NNTP passwords are
managed in the news server, and in my experience, they generally have
nothing to do with any login passwords in /etc/passwd.  If these
two passwords are the same, it often is a coincidence.

-- 
 Lloyd Zusman
 ljz@asfast.com