general/6202: mod_roaming + Mac Communicator = CRASH

[Ric Miller <ri...@acns.colostate.edu>]

>Number:         6202
>Category:       general
>Synopsis:       mod_roaming + Mac Communicator = CRASH
>Confidential:   no
>Severity:       serious
>Priority:       medium
>Responsible:    apache
>State:          open
>Class:          sw-bug
>Submitter-Id:   apache
>Arrival-Date:   Fri Jun 16 12:10:00 PDT 2000
>Closed-Date:
>Last-Modified:
>Originator:     ric@acns.colostate.edu
>Release:        1.3.12
>Organization:
apache
>Environment:
Running OS - AIX 4.3.2 on IBM RS/6000 S70
Using standard IBM c compiler that comes with OS

uname -a produces "AIX loma 3 4 000954964C00"
>Description:
We are having the below problem too at Colorado State
University but we have never used roaming before.
Mac Netscape 4.7 aborts with a type 2 error and
only the initial PUT in the accesslog as described
below.  If we us 4.73 we get a type 1 error.  We
have tried this on various types of Macs.  This 
problem has not surfaced for any clients other than a Mac.
This appears to be an Apache problem since we can use
roaming to a Netscape server from one of these
Macs with no problem.  Besides the standard mods
to Apache, I have installed mod_ssl, mod_auth_dbm,
mod_proxy, and mod_status, mod_roaming.

The following is from the news group  comp.infosystems.www.servers.unix
and describes our problem at Colorado State U.  This person is experiencing
the same problem at his site it appears.

In article <39...@spacepirates.com>,
  Scott Douglass <sc...@spacepirates.com> wrote:
> Software:
> Solaris X86 2.6
> Apache 1.3.12
> mod_roaming 1.0.1
>
> Situtation.
>
> I recently rebuilteverything (Apache, mod_ssl,
openssl, openldap, and
> many other packages) on one of my servers in
order to get up to date
> with current versions. I was running Apache
1.3.9 before the upgrades.
>
> Everything is working fine, except one big
issue: mod_roaming no longer
> works for Mac Communicator clients (it works
fine for Linux, Solaris,
> and Windows clients...). Considering the number
of packages I rebuilt,
> reinstalled and reconfigure, I consider myself
lucky to have only one
> problem!
>
> When a Macintosh Communicator client attempt to
connect to the roaming
> server, this is what appears in the httpd's
access log for roaming user
> frank:
>
> 192.168.29.102 - - [06/Jun/2000:12:49:46 -0400]
"PUT
> /roaming/frank/WRITETEST HTTP/1.0" 401 518
>
> Then Communicator crashes with a Type 2 error
(gotta love the the
> Mac...).
>
> From a Windows client I see this:
>
> 192.168.29.102  - frank [06/Jun/2000:13:12:23
-0400] "PUT
> /roaming/frank/WRITETEST HTTP/1.0" 200 155
> 192.168.29.102  - frank [06/Jun/2000:13:12:24
-0400] "DELETE
> /roaming/frank/WRITETEST HTTP/1.0" 200 161
> [...rest of roaming download deleted ...]
>
> It looks like the Mac is not sending the same
info (leaving out %u) from
> its request. The strange thing is, this all
worked perfectly for months
> from Macintoshes. Unfortunately, I haven't been
capturing user agents in
> my httpd logs, so I can't say for certain if the
Macs always failed to
> send the http user info, or not.
>
> Anyone have any clues how I can fix this
problem?
>
> Scott
>How-To-Repeat:
>From a Mac running 4.7 or greater, configure for roaming access to an 
apache 1.3.12 server with mod_roaming installed.   When you try and login with
any login and password you have set up, netscape aborts with a type 2 error. 
If you try and by pass the login netscape drops out and will not start.  You
must remove the netscape prefences file to make netscape functional again.
>Fix:
Check to see if this is not a problem at 1.3.9 as Scott suggests.  If not, then
figure out what broke mod_roaming from 1.3.9 to 1.3.12
>Release-Note:
>Audit-Trail:
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