APOP support in movemail

APOP support in movemail

[Eli Zaretskii]

Is anyone working on APOP support in movemail?

Many POP servers now require some sort of encryption, to avoid sending
POP3 passwords in the clear, and current versions of movemail,
including the one in CVS HEAD, doesn't have that.  This means
movemail, which AFAIK is the main means of getting mail into Emacs,
could be useless in the near future for POP users.

Did I miss something?

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen]

Eli Zaretskii <eliz@elta.co.il> writes:

> This means movemail, which AFAIK is the main means of getting mail
> into Emacs, could be useless in the near future for POP users.
>
> Did I miss something?

pop3.el supports APOP.

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

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org>
> Date: Tue, 04 Nov 2003 07:34:48 +0100
> 
> pop3.el supports APOP.

Yes, I know, but that's not an option for me on some platforms I work
(it's a long story).

Anyway, unless we are going to switch to pop3.el as the main means of
fetching mail via POP3, movemail needs to be updated to support APOP,
I think.

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Simon Josefsson]

Eli Zaretskii <eliz@elta.co.il> writes:

>> From: Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org>
>> Date: Tue, 04 Nov 2003 07:34:48 +0100
>> 
>> pop3.el supports APOP.
>
> Yes, I know, but that's not an option for me on some platforms I work
> (it's a long story).
>
> Anyway, unless we are going to switch to pop3.el as the main means of
> fetching mail via POP3, movemail needs to be updated to support APOP,
> I think.

Doesn't GNU MailUtils include a POP3 command line client?  Even if it
doesn't, I think it would be better to move the kind of functionality
movemail provides into GNU MailUtils, instead of supporting it in
Emacs.

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Simon Josefsson <jas@extundo.com>
> Date: Wed, 05 Nov 2003 21:50:47 +0100
> 
> Doesn't GNU MailUtils include a POP3 command line client?

I will look, thanks.  However, I need something that can work on
Windows as well as Unix, and prefer non-Cygwin ports.  Do you know
about Windows ports of Mailutils?

> Even if it doesn't, I think it would be better to move the kind of
> functionality movemail provides into GNU MailUtils, instead of
> supporting it in Emacs.

I'm not sure.  From what I've read, adding APOP should not be too
hard, and having movemail in the Emacs distro has a significant
advantage of being able to have a working mail setup with no extra
work beyond installing Emacs.

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Simon Josefsson]

"Eli Zaretskii" <eliz@elta.co.il> writes:

>> From: Simon Josefsson <jas@extundo.com>
>> Date: Wed, 05 Nov 2003 21:50:47 +0100
>> 
>> Doesn't GNU MailUtils include a POP3 command line client?
>
> I will look, thanks.  However, I need something that can work on
> Windows as well as Unix, and prefer non-Cygwin ports.  Do you know
> about Windows ports of Mailutils?

Sorry, I don't.  But aren't there build chains that allow you to
compile native Windows binaries on Unix?  But I'm not familiar with
them, though.

>> Even if it doesn't, I think it would be better to move the kind of
>> functionality movemail provides into GNU MailUtils, instead of
>> supporting it in Emacs.
>
> I'm not sure.  From what I've read, adding APOP should not be too
> hard, and having movemail in the Emacs distro has a significant
> advantage of being able to have a working mail setup with no extra
> work beyond installing Emacs.

I just fear that adding new features to Emacs movemail will be more
difficult than doing the same in MailUtils, where there already is a
infrastructure for mail-related stuff.  Consider SASL and STARTTLS as
two things which are roughly equal to APOP that someone might want
sooner or later.

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Richard Stallman]

    > I will look, thanks.  However, I need something that can work on
    > Windows as well as Unix, and prefer non-Cygwin ports.  Do you know
    > about Windows ports of Mailutils?

    Sorry, I don't.  But aren't there build chains that allow you to
    compile native Windows binaries on Unix?  But I'm not familiar with
    them, though.

I think it is useful at this point for me to restate the GNU project
policy that support for non-free operating systems such as Windows is
a secondary priority.  We will not make major design decisions based
on what does or does not suit Windows.


Our motto is: Whatever you are doing, it runs best on GNU. 

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org>
> Date: Fri, 07 Nov 2003 21:16:04 -0500
> 
> I think it is useful at this point for me to restate the GNU project
> policy that support for non-free operating systems such as Windows is
> a secondary priority.  We will not make major design decisions based
> on what does or does not suit Windows.

I'm with you on that, but this policy is not really relevant to this
discussion: APOP is not a Windows-only feature, and neither does it
favor Windows in any way.  GNU and Unix users will need APOP in
movemail as long as we continue using movemail as the primary means of
fetching mail from POP3 servers into Emacs.

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Simon Josefsson]

"Eli Zaretskii" <eliz@elta.co.il> writes:

>> From: Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org>
>> Date: Fri, 07 Nov 2003 21:16:04 -0500
>> 
>> I think it is useful at this point for me to restate the GNU project
>> policy that support for non-free operating systems such as Windows is
>> a secondary priority.  We will not make major design decisions based
>> on what does or does not suit Windows.
>
> I'm with you on that, but this policy is not really relevant to this
> discussion: APOP is not a Windows-only feature, and neither does it
> favor Windows in any way.  GNU and Unix users will need APOP in
> movemail as long as we continue using movemail as the primary means of
> fetching mail from POP3 servers into Emacs.

Continuing to support movemail in Emacs only because it works on
Windows, even though the best long-term solution may be to choice
something else (that might not work immediately for Windows), would be
relevant, I think.  The 'something else' solution might be to move
'movemail' into GNU MailUtils and have it use the MailUtils POP3
library (which already support APOP and STARTTLS, judging from a quick
browse in the MailUtils CVS).

Consider also the question of adding support for STARTTLS or SASL
(e.g., to support Kerberos 5 via GSSAPI) to movemail as well.  Adding
these features when movemail is part of Emacs would make Emacs depend
directly on the MailUtils library, GNUTLS and/or GNU SASL.  I have
received several requests for this feature for SMTP, I suspect POP3
users will start to request it as well.

The ideal solution would, IMHO, be to have only interface in Emacs to
access POP3 and make it supports all features users wants.  Right now,
I believe there are too many solutions, all with different kind of
feature sets and bugs.  It is difficult to write good manuals or
answer user questions for this kind of situation.

  - movemail.  Works on Windows.  No APOP/STARTTLS/SASL.
  - pop3.el.  Works on Windows (?).  Support APOP.  No STARTTLS/SASL.
  - epop3 (not part of Emacs).  Works on Windows (?).  Support APOP, and
    "leave-mail-on-server" feature frequently requested.
  - fetchmail (not part of Emacs).  Works on Windows (?).  Supports
    GSSAPI/Kerberos.

As for the solution, I think I would vote for extending pop3.el with
e.g. APOP functionality, and have it fall back to an external
application (e.g., 'gsasl') instead of `open-network-stream', for
those authentication systems that can't be implemented natively in
elisp (STARTTLS and certain SASL mechanisms).  Most of this code has
already been written, but it would have to be adapted for pop3.el.

The 'movemail' application could remain in Emacs, but it would only be
responsible for moving mail from /var/spool/mail.  (Although is it
still the case that the special file locking movemail does cannot be
implemented in elisp?)

An alternative is to move 'movemail' to MailUtils, and make it use the
MailUtils library (to get you the APOP support, and possibly other
features, such as UIDL which I believe is required for
"leave-mail-on-server").

A combination is possible, e.g. extend pop3.el as described, _and_
move 'movemail' to MailUtils and extend it to support APOP.  This
might be required for backwards compatibility.

Of course, simply adding APOP support to movemail in Emacs could be
done now, pending the above migration that will bring users support
for STARTTLS, SASL, UIDL etc.

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Simon Josefsson <jas@extundo.com>
> Date: Sun, 09 Nov 2003 02:03:04 +0100
> 
> > I'm with you on that, but this policy is not really relevant to this
> > discussion: APOP is not a Windows-only feature, and neither does it
> > favor Windows in any way.  GNU and Unix users will need APOP in
> > movemail as long as we continue using movemail as the primary means of
> > fetching mail from POP3 servers into Emacs.
> 
> Continuing to support movemail in Emacs only because it works on
> Windows, even though the best long-term solution may be to choice
> something else (that might not work immediately for Windows), would be
> relevant, I think.

That's a different discussion altogether.  Please note that I said
``as long as we continue using movemail'', and didn't in any way
suggest that the decision whether to dump movemail should be affected
by Windows.

The discussion whether to discontinue using movemail probably warrants
a separate thread.

>   - fetchmail (not part of Emacs).  Works on Windows (?).  Supports
>     GSSAPI/Kerberos.

The only port of fetchmail to Windows known to me is from Cygwin.
I'm not sure it could be a good-enough solution (due to file-naming
stuff), someone should check that.

However, please note that Richard said he didn't want to think about
Windows users when making design decisions such as this, so the
question whether something works on Windows is not really interesting.

As an aside, there's Stunnel (http://www.stunnel.org) that can be used
as a wrapper for any TCP connection, and thus is another alternative,
on top of those you mentioned.

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Robert J. Chassell]

    Continuing to support movemail in Emacs only because it works on
    Windows ...

When you refer to `Windows' do you mean the most common windowing
system in my experience, which by linquistic shortening is what my
friends and I refer to as `Windows', namely X Windows?  Or do you
refer to some other windowing system that we have the freedom to work
on if we choose, such as Fresno?  Or do you refer to a windowing
system controlled by an organization that forbids any of us to work on
it if we wanted to?

If the latter, please always tell this, so we don't have to waste our
time thinking about a system we are forbidden to work on.

Thank you.

-- 
    Robert J. Chassell                         Rattlesnake Enterprises
    http://www.rattlesnake.com                  GnuPG Key ID: 004B4AC8
    http://www.teak.cc                             bob@rattlesnake.com

Re: APOP support in movemail

[David Kastrup]

"Robert J. Chassell" <bob@rattlesnake.com> writes:

>     Continuing to support movemail in Emacs only because it works on
>     Windows ...
> 
> When you refer to `Windows' do you mean the most common windowing
> system in my experience, which by linquistic shortening is what my
> friends and I refer to as `Windows', namely X Windows?  Or do you
> refer to some other windowing system that we have the freedom to
> work on if we choose, such as Fresno?  Or do you refer to a
> windowing system controlled by an organization that forbids any of
> us to work on it if we wanted to?
> 
> If the latter, please always tell this, so we don't have to waste
> our time thinking about a system we are forbidden to work on.

Could we stop playing semantic games?  For some people Microsoft
Windows is the relevant infrastructure they have to work with, and
there is no purpose in willfully denying them access to freedoms that
could be available to them.  Just like the street towards your house
is relevant infrastructure to you which you are not allowed to
modify.  We need not feel compelled to work on other's streets, but
there is no point in sabotaging them actively and making maintenance
for those people harder than it already is on purpose.

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Robert J. Chassell]

   Could we stop playing semantic games?  For some people Microsoft
   Windows is the relevant infrastructure they have to work with, ...

Well, if that is what they choose, then please tell us.  For those of
use who choose freedom, `Windows' means the one that is our most
common structure.  

   ... Just like the street towards your house
   is relevant infrastructure to you which you are not allowed to
   modify.  

Right!  And I do not tell you it is the `Road', I tell you that it is
`Golden Hill Road'.  That is its name.

However, when I talk to people in this neighborhood, it is
the `Road'.  

Similarly, I work in a software neighborhood of freedom.  You may not.
But I do.  And many people I know do.  I agree, when talking to people
outside my software neighborhood I should talk about `X Windows' or
`Fresno'.  But similarly, when talking outside of your neighborhood,
you should specify `Microsoft Windows' or `X Windows' or `Fresno'.
Otherwise, you are being both impolite and confusing.

-- 
    Robert J. Chassell             bob@rattlesnake.com
    98A Golden Hill Rd.            http://www.rattlesnake.com
    P. O. Box 221                  http://www.teak.cc
    Lenox Dale, MA 01242-0221 USA  +1 (413) 637-4277  GPG key ID: 004B4AC8

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Karl Eichwalder]

"Robert J. Chassell" <bob@rattlesnake.com> writes:

> I agree, when talking to people outside my software neighborhood I
> should talk about `X Windows' or `Fresno'.

No, it's simply the "X", "X11", or the  "X Window System"; from the man
page:

The X Consortium requests that the following names be used when
referring to this software:

                                X
                         X Window System
                           X Version 11
                   X Window System, Version 11
                               X11

Please respect their decision.

-- 
                                                         |      ,__o
                                                         |    _-\_<,
http://www.gnu.franken.de/ke/                            |   (*)/'(*)

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Miles Bader]

Karl Eichwalder <ke@gnu.franken.de> writes:
> No, it's simply the "X", "X11", or the  "X Window System"; from the man
> page:

With all due respect, I believe that particular ship left port about 3
centuries ago...

Personally, I try not to use `X Windows' when I can avoid doing so,
because I think it sounds stupid.  However, the particular names
endorsed by the X consortium are often clumsy because they're either too
terse, and so can be confusing (X, X11), or simply unwieldy (`The X
Window System'); `X Windows' has neither of these problems (mostly
because it sounds like that well-known redmond-spawned system, of
course).

-Miles
-- 
Run away!  Run away!

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Robert J. Chassell]

   The X Consortium requests that the following names be used when
   referring to this software:

                                   X
                            X Window System
                              X Version 11
                      X Window System, Version 11
                                  X11

   Please respect their decision.

As I remember, the X Consortium introduced that language for legal
purposes when the US government decided that Microsoft had the legal
right, through its trade mark claim, to refer to its windowing system
as the "Windows" system.  The Microsoft claim was, in effect, that it
was the only organization at the time, more than a decade ago, that
worked with windowing systems.  The decision implied that the
competitors to Microsoft did not have windows, they had some more
wordy, less generic alternative.  The decision implied that the Apple
Macintosh did not have Windows, nor did any of the Unix windowing
systems.

You may respect the decision of the US trade mark office but I do not.
I used the word `Windows' before and still do to refer to X10 and X11
when talking with people for whom these are the salient window
systems.  It is misleading for me to do otherwise.

But when I talk about some other version of windows, like Macintosh
Windows -- more generally, when I talk with people for whom X is not
salient -- I try to specify the version,

Please bear in mind that trademark law has an overt and a covert
purpose:  it overt purpose, which is useful, is to reduce users'
confusion.  No two organizations are supposed to refer to their
different products with the same name.  Thus, a user is supposed to be
able to use words to distinguish between the windows from Apple and
the windows from the X Consortium.

The covert purpose is to hide alternatives from people who do not know
much.  This is done both by making the speaking of the alternative
less likely and by making it appear as if the trademarked word is the
prime or general entity.  Thus, because the trademarked term `Windows'
is falsely general, many people do not bother to think about the
history and alternatives to Microsoft Windows.

The trademark office could have granted Microsoft a trademark on
`Microsoft Windows'; that would have been reasonable.  The use of the
term would have prevented confusion.

-- 
    Robert J. Chassell                         Rattlesnake Enterprises
    http://www.rattlesnake.com                  GnuPG Key ID: 004B4AC8
    http://www.teak.cc                             bob@rattlesnake.com

Re: APOP support in movemail

[David Kastrup]

"Robert J. Chassell" <bob@rattlesnake.com> writes:

>    The X Consortium requests that the following names be used when
>    referring to this software:
> 
>                                    X
>                             X Window System
>                               X Version 11
>                       X Window System, Version 11
>                                   X11
> 
>    Please respect their decision.

[...]

> You may respect the decision of the US trade mark office but I do
> not.

You may not respect the X Consortium's wishes, but others do.

> I used the word `Windows' before and still do to refer to X10 and X11
> when talking with people for whom these are the salient window
> systems.  It is misleading for me to do otherwise.

There is no sense in butchering up communications with everybody else
just to placate your own idiosyncratic choice of words.

I consider the creators and maintainers of the system to be a better
reference with regard to what it is called than you.

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Eli Zaretskii]

> Date: Mon, 10 Nov 2003 12:56:36 +0000 (UTC)
> From: "Robert J. Chassell" <bob@rattlesnake.com>
> 
> You may respect the decision of the US trade mark office but I do not.
> I used the word `Windows' before and still do to refer to X10 and X11
> when talking with people for whom these are the salient window
> systems.  It is misleading for me to do otherwise.

You are free to go against the current conventions and de-facto
standard terminology, but doing so will only increase your own
confusion and degrade your ability to communicate.

Surely, people on this list do not deserve to be preached about the
virtues of Free Software, especially when it's combined with
tongue-in-cheek attitudes.

Now, could we please drop this useless thread that keeps generating
gobs of spam-like mail?  I, for one, can hardly keep up with mail I
do want to read.

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Eli Zaretskii]

> Date: Sun, 9 Nov 2003 12:43:22 +0000 (UTC)
> From: "Robert J. Chassell" <bob@rattlesnake.com>
> 
> When you refer to `Windows' do you mean the most common windowing
> system in my experience, which by linquistic shortening is what my
> friends and I refer to as `Windows', namely X Windows?

AFAIK, ``Windows'' is not the usual shorthand for ``X window
system''; the latter is shortened as ``X''.  ``Windows'' is the usual
short name of ``MS-Windows''.

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Jason Rumney]

Eli Zaretskii wrote:
>>From: Simon Josefsson <jas@extundo.com>
>>Date: Wed, 05 Nov 2003 21:50:47 +0100
>>
>>Doesn't GNU MailUtils include a POP3 command line client?
> 
> 
> I will look, thanks.  However, I need something that can work on
> Windows as well as Unix, and prefer non-Cygwin ports.  Do you know
> about Windows ports of Mailutils?

I don't know about mailutils specifically, but gnuwin32.sourceforge.org 
has non-Cygwin versions of most GNU packages.

Re: APOP support in movemail

[Richard Stallman]

    Anyway, unless we are going to switch to pop3.el as the main means of
    fetching mail via POP3, movemail needs to be updated to support APOP,
    I think.

In principle, I suppose we could switch to using pop3.el.  Are there
any disadvantages of such a change?

However, unless we decide to make that change, we do want movemail to
be updated.