Re: Handle HTTP error 511 Network Authentication Required (standard secure proxy authentification/captive portal detection)

On Mon, Feb 20, 2012 at 08:06:46PM +0100, Daniel Stenberg wrote:

quoted

3. Open a browser and say "Ah, I see. A captive portal".

We should already be doing that. Adding more support could make
step 3 a little nicer, but like I said, I'd be more interested in
seeing a real case first. It may even be a feature that would be
more appropriate to curl (which git builds on for http access).

We're already discussing the 511 in the curl camp as well, but with
even more sighs and hands in the air. 511 is clearly intended for
HTML-understanding user agents and curl is not one of those. IMHO,
curl will remain to simply help users to figure out that it is 511
and leave it at that.

Thanks for the input. It sounds like our best bet is to just report the
URL from a 511 better, then. Do you have any idea yet how that
information will be available to curl library users?

As a git user, I would probably be very surprised if using 'git'
suddenly caused by browser to pop up a captive portal login. I would
prefer git to instead properly explain to me that is being the victim
of a 511 and what I should do to fix it.

I agree. Even if the "step 3" in my list is "then the user starts a
browser given the URL from git's error message", that is a huge
improvement over the current state. And it retains the principle of
least surprise.

-Peff