Initial config: Honor respective port/security values from provider database in "Advanced" section

Feature Proposal
1

The initial configuration dialog gives the possibility to set individual IMAP and SMTP ports (for SSL/STARTTLS).

Expected behavior

After the email address has been entered and the domain of the respective mail provider has been identified from Delta Chat, it should correct the default values for IMAP and SMTP port and security automatically (by referring to the internal provider database).

Actual behavior

After the email address has been entered and the domain of the respective mail provider has been identified from Delta Chat, it does not correct the default values for IMAP and SMTP port and security automatically. (Posteo generally recommends STARTTLS security, which is also set in the interal provider database.)

To make the issue more understandable: People like me who are forced to use an alias address (e.g. ending with “.at” instead of “.de”) cannot log in unless the unique user ID is entered in the “Advanced” section. The default values in there are those for SSL security. Although Delta Chat can connect to Posteo with SSL just fine, it is neither recommended from Posteo nor does it match the respective parameters from the internal provider database. This could lead to a lot of wrong configuration setups every time a mail alias becomes part of the game…

2

so you basically want that the provider db details are filled in into the advanced fields?
I still don’t quite understand what you want. is there a bug or do you only want visual feedback for what the core is resolving the automatic values into?

3

From my personal view, I would call it a bug, although from a developers view, it currently might be a lack of support. That is why I have created a “feature proposal” in the forum rather than an issue on Github.

4

I think I should explain how users with a mail alias would deal with the situation:

  • Entering alias address, and password, result: bad login credentials.
  • Entering alias address, and password, expanding “Advanced”, and entering the real address (user ID), and password (for SMTP), result: ready, but SSL is used.

Instead, for users without alias address:

  • Entering address, and password, result: ready, and STARTTLS (recommended by Posteo) is used.

My concern is: Users with alias address would not think about changing port and security values as well, they just try and succeed, that’s it. They would not know about a wrong configuration unless anything does not work out right. This could be avoided by Delta Chat, by considering the parameters stored in the provider database.

5

the thing you describe here sounds more like a bug now:
Posteo isn’t using starttls as described in https://raw.githubusercontent.com/deltachat/provider-db/master/_providers/posteo.md
Maybe the updated db is not yet in the core you are using?

6

When I use my “.de” (real) address, not even touching the “Advanced” config, it looks good:

|2020-06-28T14:13:39.877Z|core/event            |INFO||"DC_EVENT_INFO"|0|"src\\configure\\mod.rs:71: Configure ..."|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|2020-06-28T14:13:39.878Z|core/event            |INFO||"DC_EVENT_INFO"|0|"src\\configure\\mod.rs:388: checking internal provider-info for offline autoconfig"|
|2020-06-28T14:13:39.879Z|core/event            |INFO||"DC_EVENT_INFO"|0|"src\\configure\\mod.rs:425: offline autoconfig found: anonymous@posteo.de imap:anonymous@posteo.de:0:posteo.de:143:cert_accept_invalid_certificates smtp:anonymous@posteo.de:0:posteo.de:587:cert_accept_invalid_certificates IMAP_STARTTLS 0x100SMTP_STARTTLS 0x10000"|
|2020-06-28T14:13:39.879Z|core/event            |INFO||"DC_EVENT_INFO"|0|"src\\configure\\mod.rs:174: Got autoconfig: anonymous@posteo.de imap:anonymous@posteo.de:0:posteo.de:143:cert_accept_invalid_certificates smtp:anonymous@posteo.de:0:posteo.de:587:cert_accept_invalid_certificates IMAP_STARTTLS 0x100SMTP_STARTTLS 0x10000"|
|2020-06-28T14:13:39.880Z|core/event            |INFO||"DC_EVENT_INFO"|0|"src\\configure\\mod.rs:525: Trying: imap: anonymous@posteo.de@posteo.de:143 flags=0x10104 certificate_checks=automatic"|
|2020-06-28T14:13:40.580Z|core/event            |INFO||"DC_EVENT_INFO"|0|"src\\configure\\mod.rs:528: success: imap: anonymous@posteo.de@posteo.de:143 flags=0x10104 certificate_checks=automatic"|
|2020-06-28T14:13:40.580Z|core/event            |INFO||"DC_EVENT_INFO"|0|"src\\configure\\mod.rs:584: Trying: smtp: anonymous@posteo.de@posteo.de:587 flags: 0x10104"|
|2020-06-28T14:13:40.969Z|core/event            |INFO||"DC_EVENT_INFO"|0|"src\\configure\\mod.rs:590: success: smtp: anonymous@posteo.de@posteo.de:587 flags: 0x10104"|

When I use my alias address (".at"), I must expand “Advanced” where SSL values are set as “(Default)”. I know of course that these are not default for Posteo, so I must change them accordingly. But who else is about to know that? Most people would check out the (wrong) default settings and see Delta Chat works fine, that’s it.

BTW, the latest core version (1.39) is used in Desktop release 1.4.2.

7

Sometimes one picture says it all:

grafik
grafik292×642 17.9 KB