Trouble with konqueror on http authentication

[Erik Rull]

Erik Rull wrote:
> Erik Rull wrote:
>> Stefano Crocco wrote:
>>> On sabato 30 gennaio 2021 09:25:45 CET Erik Rull wrote:
>>>> Stefano Crocco wrote:
>>>>> On giovedì 28 gennaio 2021 23:39:00 CET Erik Rull wrote:
>>>>>> Stefano Crocco wrote:
>>>>>>> On martedì 26 gennaio 2021 22:04:15 CET Erik Rull wrote:
>>>>>>>> Hi all,
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I don't know how to get this working again. I just updated to 20.04
>>>>>>>> from
>>>>>>>> 16.04 (kubuntu LTS) and before the update this was working great:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I start my Linux box (just power on) and remote SSH into the system
>>>>>>>> (X-Forwarding enabled). Then I open my applications and also konqueror.
>>>>>>>> This works all fine and smoothly, websites are displayed fine. Until I
>>>>>>>> try to access a website with HTTP-Authentication - there I directly get
>>>>>>>> a 401 - no asking for a password, nothing, just the 401 page directly.
>>>>>>>> Firefox prompts me for the username/password and shows me the page
>>>>>>>> behind the
>>>>>>>> authentication. So the server is fine. I tried multiple servers and
>>>>>>>> konqueror behaves always the same.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Any idea what I broke during the update?
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Best regards,
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Erik
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Hello Erik,
>>>>>>> do you by any chance know whether your previous version of Konqueror
>>>>>>> still
>>>>>>> used the WebKit engine or had it already switched to QtWebEngine? In the
>>>>>>> first case, I think you can have found yet another feature which stopped
>>>>>>> working with the switch to the new engine.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> If your current Kubuntu version still provides KWebKitPart, you could
>>>>>>> also
>>>>>>> try installing it, select it as default web engine in the General tab of
>>>>>>> the Konqueror settings page and check whether the HTTP Authentication
>>>>>>> works with it. If it does, the problem lies with QtWebEngine, otherwise,
>>>>>>> we'll need to investigate somewhere else.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Stefano
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Hi Stefano,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I don't know exactly. How can I check this and / or switch the engine?
>>>>>> When opening konqueror and access e.g. google.com then a new process is
>>>>>> listed with QtWebEngineProcess - so I assume this is the QtWebEngine.
>>>>>> I tried to search for kwebkit in aptitude - nothing found...
>>>>>> Maybe it is hidden in a different named package?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Best regards,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Erik
>>>>>
>>>>> Hello Erik,
>>>>> the current version of Konqueror uses QtWebEngine by default. I fear that
>>>>> kwebkitpart may have been removed from it (for instance, I know it's been
>>>>> removed from Gentoo). In the weekend, I'll try to install an Ubuntu
>>>>> virtual
>>>>> machine with both Ubuntu 20.04 and 16.04 to check what the situation is.
>>>>>
>>>>> Stefano
>>>>
>>>> Hi Stefano,
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Thanks a lot!
>>>> Please try the SSH access before you logged in.
>>>>
>>>> I found out something new meanwhile:
>>>> When NOT logging in directly on the desktop - I get the 401 with konqueror
>>>> directly via SSH - that I described already.
>>>> BUT - When logging into the system directly (local screen and keyboard) and
>>>> THEN open the konqueror remotely via SSH, konqueror does NOT display the
>>>> 401 - it "waits". But what happens in parallel on the local screen: the
>>>> authentication dialog of the requested website pops up!
>>>>
>>>> So "something" is different when being logged in directly. But the behavior
>>>> is still odd, because you have no chance to access the login dialog via
>>>> SSH...
>>>>
>>>> Any ideas?
>>>>
>>>> Best regards,
>>>>
>>>> Erik
>>>
>>> Hello Erik,
>>> I can confirm that, unfortunately, KUbuntu 20.4 doesn't include KWebKitPart. If 
>>> you are comfortable building programs from source, you can download it from 
>>> https://invent.kde.org/libraries/kwebkitpart and install it (it requires 
>>> kdewebkit which is available in KUbuntu). After installing it, in the General 
>>> tab of Konqueror settings dialog, you'll be able to set KWebKit as default web 
>>> browser engine. I'm not sure whether this will fix your issue or not, however.
>>>
>>> As I've never used ssh with X-forwarding, could you please explain step by 
>>> step what you did to in the two situations you described? I tried setting up a 
>>> very minimalistic server with http authentication and accessing it with using 
>>> Konqueror from ssh and I had no problems neither with the old KWebKit nor with 
>>> the new QtWebEngine.
>>>
>>> Stefano
>>
>> Hi Stefano,
>>
>> sure - her a bit more verbose what I did (target system is kubuntu 20.04):
>> - install the SSH server on the target system
>> - do a fresh boot of the target system (just power it up)
>> - start an SSH client on an second system or use konsole on the second system with:
>> ssh -X user at target
>> (enter password)
>> then on the new opened remote console:
>> konqueror
>> Enter a URL that requires username/password via HTTP
>> Now there are two possibilities:
>> 1) you have NOT logged in on the target desktop via keyboard / monitor
>>  => you get a 401 directly
>> 2) you have logged on the target desktop when calling the URL
>>  => you get a "busy" icon on the upper right but no dialog via SSH
>>  => you get the dialog prompted on the desktop of the target desktop
>>  => nothing happens on your remote session, you can press ESC to proceed
>> browsing to somewhere else but the dialog stays open on the target desktop
>>
>> Best regards,
>>
>> Erik
> 
> Hi Stefano,
> 
> I tried a bit more - I tried to use another browser using the QTWebEngine and I
> found "falkon" in the repositories.
> And this browser worked just fine - I got the http login dialog from both SSH
> remote and locally.
> So the chance that the QTWebEngine is the root cause got less likely.
> I checked what happens in addition compared to the falkon browser and discovered
> the dbus session.
> I have a bad feeling that the dbus / dbus-session might be the troublemaker...
> 
> Best regards,
> 
> Erik

Found it!
it is necessary to issue a:
export $(dbus-launch)
after the login to get the login dialogs!

Otherwise this will not work.

Best regards,

Erik