Re: AUTH=PLAIN support

[Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org>]

Tibor Simko <tibor.simko@cern.ch> writes:

>                   ("IMAP4" "IMAP4REV1" "AUTH=PLAIN" "CHILDREN" "IDLE" "NAMESPA

[...]

>                   "* OK The Microsoft Exchange IMAP4 service is ready.^M"]

Ok...  then we have one server type that says "AUTH=PLAIN", but doesn't
accept "AUTHENTICATE PLAIN" anyway (Exchange 2010), and we have another
user with a server that says "AUTH=PLAIN" (Zimbra) that doesn't accept
anything but "AUTHENTICATE PLAIN" ("LOGIN" doesn't work).

Does anybody know what the deal is here?  I don't really understand what
the purpose of "AUTHENTICATE PLAIN" is anyway -- it's just a
base64-encoded version of what "LOGIN" sends, so it seems totally
nonsensical.  But it'd be nice if nnimap could do the right thing here
automatically.

So does anybody know what combinations of capabilities should trigger
"AUTHENTICATE PLAIN" that works across the board?

> BTW, if you are looking at IMAP capabilities, I noticed a difference in
> that Exchange 2010 returns solely AUTH=PLAIN even when one authenticates
> via SSL, while Exchange 2007 returned also AUTH=NTLM AUTH=GSSAPI for
> authenticated users (and AUTH=PLAIN for anonymous connections).

You don't authenticate via SSL, do you?  That's just a transport, not an
authentication mechanism?  (If I have my terminologies right.)

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
  larsi@gnus.org * Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen