[imp] exchange and special passwords

[Joseph Brennan]

>> The character % is not allowed in imap passwords.  RFC 2060.
>
> % works fine in passwords here, using Pine as an IMAP client against a UW
> IMAP server...  The RFC says that passwords may be made of "atom" or
> "string", and strings can contain % as far as I can tell from the spec.

The imap RFCs are not noted for clarity.  In re-reading I see
I followed the "atom" definition and failed to follow the
"string" definition.  So scratch that comment.

password        ::= astring

astring         ::= atom / string

atom            ::= 1*ATOM_CHAR

ATOM_CHAR       ::= <any CHAR except atom_specials>

atom_specials   ::= "(" / ")" / "{" / SPACE / CTL / list_wildcards /
                    quoted_specials

list_wildcards  ::= "%" / "*"

string          = quoted / literal

quoted          = DQUOTE *QUOTED-CHAR DQUOTE

literal         = "{" number "}" CRLF *CHAR8
                    ; Number represents the number of CHAR8s


But the reason this came to my attention a few years ago was that
some users had set passwords, wisely one might think, that had
non alphanumerics in them, and found that while they worked with
shell login and pop, they could not do imap.  Apparently whatever
client that was did not properly quote or delimit the passwords
as strings, and being sent as atoms they failed.  This would be
a bug then, and has quite possibly been fixed in current versions
of whatever it was.

Sorry for the mis-statement.

Joseph Brennan         Columbia University in the City of New York
Academic Technologies Group                   brennan at columbia.edu