[SabreWolf3]

Hi all,

I need the experts here, I am stuck.

I have developed an Excel macro that will catalogue image inventory for my company. Our images are stored on a UNIX server that is behind a firewall. Basically, I take information from a database, and concatenate a bunch of text together to form the source URL for the image. Then I use the AddPicture method in VBA to insert each image as a shape.

My problem is this.... the first image that my macro tries to grab, I get a popup dialog box asking for a username and password to access the UNIX directory. Once this information is entered, for the rest of the session I am not asked for it again.

I am trying to figure out a way to not receive that first dialog box. Is there some way, by either configuring the UNIX server or doing something on my end, that I can pass the username/password info along in the URL?

My Excel macro is distributed among many people in our company, so the solution can't be IP-based or Host-based. The reason it's a problem is that my automated report can take upwards of an hour to generate. Sometimes the user will start the report and head off to lunch, or go home and let it run overnight. If the user isn't there to fill in the username/password prompt when it first appears, it times out and the macro will continue. All of the images inserted in this scenario will be broken red X's, and the entire report must be ran again.

Any help or suggestions would be most appreciated. I can't seem to get the UNIX server admin to sit down and talk with me, he's always on vacation or something.

Thanks,
Richard

[deuce868]

how are you connecting to the unix directory? Is it just through the web? I guess I don't understand where the username/password box is coming from. It is a .htaccess password promt?

[SabreWolf3]

Hi deuce,

I am accessing the image just by going to its URL. I can receive this prompt in one of two ways:

a) by opening Internet Explorer, entering the URL for an image, and I get the prompt
b) by using the AddPicture method of VBA and using the URL as my file name (which I assume accomplishes the same thing as part a)

In both instances, the dialog box is the same:

It is entitled "Enter Network Password"
It has two fields that are pre-filled and non-changeable:
Site: www.msn.com (example)
Realm: Reporting Website

and then it asks for a User Name and Password, and it offers a checkbox to save this password in my password list.

The prompt box is completed with Ok and Cancel buttons.

I do not know if this is an .htaccess prompt. Is there a way to tell?

I will tell you all I know about the server. It is a server that runs a java reporting application. The reporting application displays these images in .html pages, but the interface is very restrictive. The image directory and the reporting application reside on the same server, so when running the reporting application this dialog box is not present.

I was told by someone familiar with the process of this server, that the server requires authentication from any application that does not reside on the box itself. So I am guessing the username/password prompt is being generated by the server itself?

Thank you,
Richard

[deuce868]

ah, this password is your network password. It is probably set up in a proxy server at your company and has nothing to do with the web server. The problem is that you have to log in before you are allowed to access the internet. I don't think there is a way you can auto log into the proxy. You might check with your network admins to see if they can add an exception to the machine the images are on so that users don't need to authenticate to the proxy in order to get to it.

[SabreWolf3]

Hi deuce,

I don't believe this prompt is coming from a proxy server. There are a number of reasons I feel this way.

• I do not have to provide authentication info to access any other internet websites

• My network password, which allows me to log on to the domain at work and access shares and printers, is not the same username/password that this application requires

• The username/password that I must enter to access the images was assigned to me by the server administrator of this particular web server. It's the same username/password that I have to enter to access the Java reporting application that resides on the server. So this username/password is DEFINITELY directly related to this particular web server.

I did forget to mention that I have to access these images with a secure URL: (https://) Not sure if that makes any difference or not.

Thanks for the help though, it was a good guess. Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller? 8-)
Regards,
Richard