Re: [Evolution] More authentication headaches

[Milan Crha <mcrha redhat com>]

On Thu, 2016-09-15 at 12:45 +0100, Patrick O'Callaghan wrote:
> < Daily Limit for Unauthenticated Use Exceeded. Continued use
> requires signup.

        Hi,
could it be the updated evolution-data-server finally broke things,
instead of fixed them?

The calendar request has missing OAuth2 token, which resulted in the
403 Forbidden response, which makes sense, because that entry point
requires OAuth2. The error of "Daily Limit for Unauthenticated Use
Exceeded" I quoted above is just an indication that it had been tried
too many times without the token. I do not know why this would break so
much.

> Finally, why am I posting this via webmail? Because when I try to
> post using my normal account (*not* the one which has been giving me
> the problems mentioned above), the sending process simply hangs. 

A backtrace of the hung evolution would be nice to have. Debuginfo only
for the evolution-data-server and evolution itself welcome. You can get
the backtrace with command like this:
   $ gdb --batch --ex "t a a bt" -pid=`pidof evolution` &>bt.txt
Please check the bt.txt for any private information, like passwords,
email address, server addresses,... I usually search for "pass" at
least (quotes for clarity only).

Nonetheless, it feels like this should be dealt with in a GNOME
bugzilla, as it looks like a bug to me.

> I was asked to authenticate the Gmail one, but not this one. Possibly
> because the address (poc usb ve) doesn't indicate Google directly so
> the setup wizard treats it differently, but that's speculation. 

That's correct, as the address isn't @gmail.com/@googlemail.com, then
the wizard doesn't know it's hosted by Google. You can try to start
with a Google address, then return back in the wizard and change it to
@usb.ve address. Or in the account properties after finishing the fake
Gmail account. But I'm uncertain whether it'll work from the UI.

> However this had been working correctly before I tried to reset the
> whole shebang. I speculate that enough had been left over from before
> I switched from GOA to direct OAuth2 to keep it working, but now it
> has lost the tokens and doesn't know how to get them back.

The main difference is that in GOA you start by specifying what account
type you are creating, in this case "Google", while in the Evolution
that cannot be done, everything is guessed and setup from the email
address, if possible. The 3.20.x also doesn't setup OAuth2 for the mail
account if you uncheck both Contacts and Calendar parts. This is
changed in the development version, where the OAuth2 is enabled for a
Google account even if the both checkboxes in the summary page are
unchecked.

As it's currently basically impossible to change these settings in the
UI, I suggest to edit the .source files in
   ~/.config/evolution/sources/
and change the Method in the [Authentication] section from (I guess)
'plain/password' to 'Google', aka from
   [Authentication]
   ....
   Method=plain/password
   ....

to
   [Authentication]
   ....
   Method=Google
   ....

Similar .source files can be in 
   ~/.cache/evolution/sources/

In any case, it'll be better to move to the GNOME bugzilla with both problems.
        Bye,
        Milan