Re: [Postfixadmin-devel] SF.net SVN: postfixadmin:[482] trunk

[David G. <da...@co...>]

> > patch from int on irc - if $CONF[show_passwords] then do so
> > Modified: trunk/templates/edit-mailbox.php
> > Modified: trunk/edit-mailbox.php
> 
> I'd like to revert this change.
> 
> Reasons:
> 
> IMHO, showing the password is (only) useful at _mailbox creation_ to 
> check the password (or to note it down if you used an autogenerated 
> one).
> 
> But it isn't useful when editing mailboxes for several reasons:
> - the password field will just display stars, the "real" password will 
>   only be visible in the HTML source. That's useless.
> - the HTML source (including the password) might be stored in the 
>   browser cache - which implies some security risk
> - if the password is stored encrypted in the database, it will be 
>   displayed encrypted - which is more than useless ;-)
> - edit-mailbox might think the user wants to change the password 
>   (because the password field isn't empty). This might result in 
>   semi-random passwords if passwords are stored encrypted in the 
>   database - the password hash will become the new password. (untested,
>   but that's how I remember the code.)
> 
> Summary: There's no advantage for the user, but some possible problems.
> 
> GingerDog, do you agree on reverting this change?

Hi,

Well, int said there was a firefox extension which doesn't show stars
in a password field. The upshot being, that if you are a network
admin, and need to tell someone what their password is (or login as
them) then it's quite useful.

Perhaps the config setting should be renamed, or have a comment
attached to make it obvious that it's only of any use if you store
plain text passwords.


David.