Re: can emacs use the mac os x keychain?

[Uday S Reddy <uDOTsDOTreddy@cs.bham.ac.uk>]

Ted Zlatanov wrote:

> USR> Another question that I always wondered about.  Does auth-source allow
> USR> for multiple logins on the same server/protocol combination?
> 
> Not currently.  The first one found is picked IIRC.  I think it would
> make the UI significantly more complex to allow multiples and perhaps
> confuse users.  The advanced users that need that can typically use
> aliases for the server name.  Do you see a need for it?

Yes, I think it is needed.  Some people maintain multiple email accounts on 
ISP's like gmail, hotmail etc.  In organizations, it is common for people to 
have a personal email account and, separately, one or more role-based or team 
email accounts (techsupport, sales, admissions, ...).  I know that many novice 
users might find it hard to deal with it.  But, gmail and hotmail are educating 
them fast.  So, yes, restricting to single email accounts per server would be a 
serious limitation.

I am not sure what you mean by UI getting complex.  The only user interaction 
seems to be to ask for a passphrase.  (There is a problem at the moment because 
it doesn't say passphrase for which auth-source.  So, if somebody happens to 
use multiple auth-sources with different passphrases, they would be in trouble!)

If you instead mean the API getting complex, one could call 
auth-source-user-or-password with '("login" "password") as the MODE and get 
back a list of results.  A simple `assoc' would give the desired password.

Cheers,
Uday