bug#33146: .authinfo.gpg not automatically loaded when using (dired) on macOS

[Michael Albinus]

Christian Johansson <christian@cvj.se> writes:

> Hi again

Hi Christian,

> I stumbled on this alternative solution from the user-guide to John
> Wiegley async.el:
> https://github.com/jwiegley/emacs-async
>
> They instead suggest using:
> (setq auth-sources '("~/.authinfo.gpg" "~/.netrc"))
>
> instead of:
> (setq ange-ftp-netrc-filename "~/.authinfo.gpg")
>
> to avoid the problem of unnecessary user-interaction, especially in
> the case of async.el since it's spawned process doesn't support
> user-interaction.

That's the goal of making ange-ftp aware of auth-source.el.

> Maybe both solutions are equivalent in solving the problem that
> authinfo doesn't automatically work with .netrc files and ange-ftp
> doesn't work with .authinfo files?

Yes. In general, I believe the auth-source.el solution is superior,
because you could manage all your passwords wherever you want, even in
the Gnome Password Manager (in case you use the secrets.el backend of
auth-sources).

> I think most people just use the tokens: machine, default, port,
> login, password and they seem to work already after setting either
> ange-ftp-netrc-filename or auth-sources variable.

Right.

> Can you make one of those solution a default configuration and then
> perhaps add a override for people that want to use tokens that have
> special meaning the context of ange-ftp or authinfo it they are not
> fully compatible? Maybe there could be warnings occuring when authinfo
> stumbles upon a token it doesn't support and vice versa for ange-ftp?

In general, I don't want to support two different ways to handle
passwords in ange-ftp. That sounds good for trouble, because it
increases configuration complexity.

I prefer to switch to the auth-source.el solution in ange-ftp. With the
help of Ted, this shall be possible.

> Regards
> Christian

Best regards, Michael.