"Forgotten password"

OK, I'm back. I had lost the authentication cookie that let me be "logged in".

I hunted around for my password, but I can't find it in the usual places - I probably didn't record it. With hindsight I see that this is not so clever, but most sites like this have an "email me my password" button, so it didn't seem necessary.

I recovered a copy of the cookie from a backup and appended it to my cookie file (the one that says "Do not edit!"), so I can post stuff until that expires. I can't do the XMLRPC thing though, I don't think. No big deal.

Next, I Used the Source. AFAICS the cookie I recovered was generated randomly when I created the account. The copy in the browser is supposed to expire in May 2003 (so if I go quiet about that time, you'll know what happened). The code doesn't seem to put an expiry time on the cookie in the Advogato database, so maybe I can just change the browser's expiry date?

If I ever hit the Logout link, it'll be Game Over.

Whining about the lack of "email me a password"

No, sir!

I can't be @rsed to code it myself. I don't see why anyone else should do it for me.

It would be much easier to make another account, or just leave the site. I'm sure it will cope without me. 8-)

I have other things to do. Always other things.

So you see, this is "Open Source in-action". Boom boom.

I'm not alone

While Reading The Fine Web, I found three other Advo users have also lost this passwords in some way, and found some route back in to the system. (One each, IIRC, of: finding the password, finding the auth cookie and pestering the admin for a change)

So, there's obviously a need for an "Advogato forgotten password FAQ" of some sort. This diary entry would serve, I suppose, as the other three entries served me. The problem is that AFAICS they expire to a dark place where Google refuses to look.

The two solutions that spring to mind are for me to post back-issues of my diary on my own website, or to post this drivel to the front page.

For now, I'll do neither. Maybe I'll get around to "backing up" my diary to my website once something important falls off the bottom.

(Update: Argh. I only wanted to edit a couple of typos, but it wants to put <p> in front of everything. The formatting was fine to start with.)