Author Topic: Badly detected username/password form fields  (Read 28267 times)

Offline tanstaafl

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Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #15 on: January 29, 2006, 09:18:08 PM »
Reported by Alex here.

"https://turbotaxweb.intuit.com/open/registr...ommain&rotate=1

neither username, nor password gets auto poulated
password field is populated manually with the toolbar button, but not username"

Offline Eric H. Jung

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Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #16 on: January 29, 2006, 10:20:16 PM »
Hi major4579,

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BTW, I can't say it enough.. thanks Eric for a great program!
Thank you very much.

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Since the next version is going to have auto-populated fields, and it looks like the decision is to require the MPW first - this could be used to get around these problems. Just enter the Username field as an auto-poulated field.
This is what I was planning as a solution in the short-term.

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Alternatively, in individual accounts, the username and password field names could be manually entered, if needed. (I.e., use the PWM built-in field names unless something was entered in the username and password field name fields).
And this is what I was planning longer-term :)  Perhaps these two should be placed in the feature request list for tracking...?

Offline tanstaafl

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Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #17 on: January 30, 2006, 08:09:13 PM »
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Since the next version is going to have auto-populated fields, and it looks like the decision is to require the MPW first - this could be used to get around these problems. Just enter the Username field as an auto-poulated field.
This is what I was planning as a solution in the short-term.
Ok, this one I don't understand...

The Username is *already* an auto-populated field...

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Alternatively, in individual accounts, the username and password field names could be manually entered, if needed. (I.e., use the PWM built-in field names unless something was entered in the username and password field name fields).
And this is what I was planning longer-term. Perhaps these two should be placed in the feature request list for tracking...?
I *think I understand this one, but before I add it...

Are you saying that you want to add two new fields that apply specifically to the username/password fields, that act as - what, alternate 'labels' from the list of officially supported 'field-names' for username and password fields that PWM bases its recognition of these fields on currently?

would it make more sense to simply have a 'Add this field name to PWM's list of username fieldnames'? That might get ugly though...

Awaiting clarification of what precisely these two 'Requests' consist of...

Offline Eric H. Jung

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Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #18 on: January 31, 2006, 01:47:38 AM »
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Ok, this one I don't understand...
The problem major4579 is trying to address is the one where some sites don't get username and/or password auto-populated. The reason for this problem is because PasswordMaker can only make an educated guess at the username and password fields on a page. It doesn't have a database of websites with their corresponding field names (although breyed hinted at doing something similar to this here). For example, the username field is deduced with the following logic:

If a textbox (html "input" tag) exists on the page and has any of the following in its name (case-insensitive):
  • ID
  • un
  • name
  • user
  • usr
  • log
  • mail
  • acct
it is assumed to be a username field.

However, plenty of sites (especially non-English ones) have username fields which don't meet this criteria. When this occurs, PasswordMaker is not able to auto-populate them.

The solution proposed here is for the PasswordMaker user to enter data about the field he wants populated. With the new "Automatically populate arbitrary fields" feature, you can choose any field on any webpage to be auto-populated...including these nasty username/password fields which don't fit PasswordMaker's "educated guessing" system.

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Are you saying that you want to add two new fields that apply specifically to the username/password fields, that act as - what, alternate 'labels' from the list of officially supported 'field-names' for username and password fields that PWM bases its recognition of these fields on currently?
Precisely, although the implementation probably won't be two new fields--it can somehow be rolled into the autopopulation tree. TBD.

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would it make more sense to simply have a 'Add this field name to PWM's list of username fieldnames'? That might get ugly though...
This isn't a good idea because the longer the list of possible username/password fields, the longer it takes PasswordMaker to perform the population. It is better to target specifc exceptions to the educated guessing system.

Does that help?

Offline Eric H. Jung

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Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #19 on: April 11, 2006, 07:27:10 PM »
With the release of 1.5 (auto-populate arbitrary fields), is this thread now irrelevent? If so, let's unpin it.
« Last Edit: April 11, 2006, 07:27:34 PM by Eric H. Jung »

Offline tanstaafl

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Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #20 on: April 11, 2006, 07:34:26 PM »
Quote from: Eric H. Jung
With the release of 1.5 (auto-populate arbitrary fields), is this thread now irrelevent? If so, let's unpin it.
Or maybe change the Title to 'Badly Detected Form Fields for Auto-Populate' or some such? There is already the one URL that Lutz reported as a problem here...
« Last Edit: April 11, 2006, 07:34:49 PM by tanstaafl »

Offline Eric H. Jung

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Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #21 on: April 11, 2006, 08:34:29 PM »
My point is that all of these pages should work now, except the one Lutz reported. Since that's the case, this thread might be misleading. We can deal with the site Lutz pointed out in that thread specifically...

Offline adamspiers

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Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #22 on: November 08, 2006, 04:43:31 PM »
Excuse me for butting in as a newcomer to PWM, but can't we take a leaf out of Firefox's own book here?  I've read this thread and understand about the difficulty of second-guessing fields in badly coded forms, but Firefox's Saved Passwords mechanism works beautifully for me - wouldn't it be possible to figure out how do they do it and copy the technique?

As a newcomer, my first impression of using PWM (other than that this is a really high quality extension with fantastic support) is that there are way too many broken forms out there, and as a result there is a serious usability issue involved with requiring a user to create a new PWM account every time they discover one.  We need something that will learn which (possibly broken) field represents a username the first time the user fills it in, and then automatically remembers it.  There are good reasons for a user wanting multiple usernames across different sites, and Firefox's Saved Passwords automatically learns username field names and values where as PWM doesn't.  As a result of this I am in serious doubt over whether PWM is currently practical for me to use, even though I love the concept, and the implementation seems to be 99% there.

Or is the correct approach/workaround to simply not use PWM's username features at all and rely on Firefox's ability to save form data correctly to remember the correct username for any given site?  This would seem a shame - if PWM has username support it would be great for it to work as well as or better than Firefox's native functionality.

Apologies in advance if I've misunderstood something!
Adam

Offline Miquel 'Fire' Burns

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Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #23 on: November 08, 2006, 05:11:08 PM »
The username part is partly solved by the advanced auto-populate feature that was added some time ago (1.5 is so long ago)

The issue is that if you want the username to have an effect with the generation of the password, you'll end up having to enter it twice.
"I'm not drunk, just sleep deprived."

Offline tanstaafl

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Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #24 on: November 08, 2006, 08:25:30 PM »
Quote from: Adam Spiers
Excuse me for butting in as a newcomer to PWM, but can't we take a leaf out of Firefox's own book here?  I've read this thread and understand about the difficulty of second-guessing fields in badly coded forms, but Firefox's Saved Passwords mechanism works beautifully for me - wouldn't it be possible to figure out how do they do it and copy the technique?
I'd be surprised if Eric hasn't already been looking there to create what he already has, but I feel your pain.

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As a newcomer, my first impression of using PWM (other than that this is a really high quality extension with fantastic support) is that there are way too many broken forms out there, and as a result there is a serious usability issue involved with requiring a user to create a new PWM account every time they discover one.
I don't think its quite what I'd call a *serious* usability issue, but I agree that there may be a better way. Sadly, I'm not a programmer, so I'm not in a position to make meaningful suggestions for *how* to improve on it.

To be honest, I'm quite happy with this aspect the way it is.

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We need something that will learn which (possibly broken) field represents a username the first time the user fills it in, and then automatically remembers it.
I'm sure Eric would appreciate any patches, or pointers on how to do this...

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There are good reasons for a user wanting multiple usernames across different sites, and Firefox's Saved Passwords automatically learns username field names and values where as PWM doesn't.
Yes, but what Firefox does and what PWM does are two completely different things. That said, maybe there is something there that Eric could use, but like I said before, I'd be surprised if he hadn't already looked closely at it - Eric?

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As a result of this I am in serious doubt over whether PWM is currently practical for me to use, even though I love the concept, and the implementation seems to be 99% there.
I really can't see how the disadvantage of *occasionally* having to create a new account for a site that has a broken form disqualifies PWM as a whole. The convenience factor, with the added security that can be had from using custom accounts (for financial sites, etc), makes it - for me - by far the most valuable program on my computer - but to each his own...

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Or is the correct approach/workaround to simply not use PWM's username features at all and rely on Firefox's ability to save form data correctly to remember the correct username for any given site?  This would seem a shame - if PWM has username support it would be great for it to work as well as or better than Firefox's native functionality.

Apologies in advance if I've misunderstood something!
Adam
I don't think you've misunderstood anything, I just think you're missing the point... PWM has dramatically simplified my online life so much so that I truly cannot imagine going without it. It would be worse than going back to dial-up (no, I'm not kidding)...

Charles

Offline Miquel 'Fire' Burns

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Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #25 on: November 09, 2006, 02:23:12 AM »
Hey! I'm stuck on dial-up!
"I'm not drunk, just sleep deprived."

Offline Eric H. Jung

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Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #26 on: November 09, 2006, 07:08:25 AM »
Auto-populate was added to PasswordMaker late in the game. For better or worse, it wasn't part of the original "core" features--those were centered strictly around password generation with a myriad of options.

So perhaps that explains why auto-populate in PasswordMaker isn't as good as, say, Firefox's native auto-populate.

Offline Eric H. Jung

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Re: Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #27 on: August 26, 2007, 09:32:02 PM »
Anyone stumbling across this thread: a lot of the sites previously mentioned in this thread now work with PasswordMaker auto-populate (e.g., USAirways and Delta, etc.)

PasswordMaker Forums

Re: Badly detected username/password form fields
« Reply #27 on: August 26, 2007, 09:32:02 PM »