[online-accounts] No edit UI

Just a small correction: updating the password is supported by Online Accounts and does not require editing the account: we have a mechanism in place where the client can request for a password update, and that happens as part of the authorization process.
Currently it's buggy, but it will work :-)
See the "password-query" test case in https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Process/Merges/TestPlan/ubuntu-system-settings-online-accounts, if you want to give it a try.

Nevertheless, this bug report makes sense for the other cases, when connection parameters change. At some point an e-mail provider might force SSL, or change the address of the imap server.

Oh cool.. i'll take a look at that, thanks!

One thought I have though is a client would possibly first have to fail an authentication attempt in order to prompt the user for an updated password. Which would definitely do the job and a client should handle this, but maybe an unnecessary step having to rely on authentication failing to allow a user to update a password.

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

Dan reiterated that this is a big headache for Dekko, let's try and push this further :)

Online Accounts is for remembering, updating, and reusing account credentials. It is not for remembering, or providing UI to edit, app-specific settings like mail server address and port number. That is up to individual apps. There are three reasons for this:

(1) Putting app-specific settings in Online Accounts would complicate the Online Accounts UI with settings for apps that you may never use. For example, if you use a Yahoo account for Yahoo Mail, not Yahoo Calendar, calendar-specific settings in Online Accounts would be distracting. (And time-wasting, if you got the impression that you had to configure some of them anyway.)

(2) Apps for services that have non-UOA providers have to provide UI for those app-specific settings anyway. For example, Dekko has its own UI for editing server address, port number etc for non-UOA IMAP accounts, and it would need that UI even if UOA had its own UI for those same settings for UOA providers. So if it did, you’d end up with UI for the same settings in different places, with different layout and terminology, depending on the type of account.

(3) If a provider starts, stops, or changes a particular service, an app can be updated more quickly than the OS can. For example, if tomorrow Facebook started providing an e-mail service, or Yahoo stopped providing their e-mail service — or if “an e-mail provider might force SSL, or change the address of its imap server” — then Dekko could update within days, without having to wait for an update to Ubuntu that might take weeks. Similarly, if Google released a new video calling app, that app could use UOA without having to wait for Ubuntu to update UOA to “know” that Google accounts can be used for video calling. All UOA ever needs to know is how to sign in to an account, and which apps have permission to use it, not what they are using it for.