Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!usc!sdd.hp.com!ucsd!ogicse!milton!kraig From: kraig@milton.u.washington.edu (Kraig Eno) Newsgroups: comp.protocols.appletalk Subject: Re: Limitations imposed by AppleShare's User Authentication Method (UAM).. Message-ID: <6365@milton.u.washington.edu> Date: 15 Aug 90 20:44:45 GMT References: <13386@sun.udel.edu> Organization: University of Washington, Seattle Lines: 23 >>Most timesharing/server operating systems provide for passwords up towards >>16 or 32 characters. Now, realistically, nobody uses much more than, say, 10. > >I have had AppleShare type passwords which are longer than 6 characters. >Perhaps you could elaborate on the circumstances of your 6 character >password limit. For example, what version of AppleShare are you using? > >Barry Fausnaugh I agree that longer passwords should be acceptable. Using Chooser 3.5 and AppleShare 2.0.2, if I try to enter a password longer than 8 characters, it yells at me. The reason this is important is that my "AppleShare" servers are actually Unix machines (accessed via NFS through a GatorBox), and my passwords can easily be over 8 characters long. The authentication is done against the /etc/passwd file on a Unix host, so I MUST use the password that I've set with the passwd command there. It's OK for me because I know what's going on, but in a production environment the normal user would not know to limit his host password length until later when (s)he was denied access via the chooser. This is inconvenient at best, and should be a very easy change in the next version. Kraig Eno kraig@biostr.washington.edu