User cannot change email address

[cortho]

Steps to reproduce

1. Set an email address with occ as described at https://doc.owncloud.org/server/10.0/admin_manual/configuration/server/occ_command.html#setting-a-setting
2. Log in as this user and change the email address to some other address
3. Log out and log in again
4. Visit user's email settings -> The address configured with occ is shown, not the one as changed right before

Expected behaviour

The email addresss is changed

Actual behaviour

The email address is overwritten with the one from oc_preferences / The address in oc_preferences was not updated

Server configuration

ownCloud version: (see ownCloud admin page)
10.0.10.4

ownCloud log (data/owncloud.log)

Nothing relevant

Reason

When you set an email address with occ like described at https://doc.owncloud.org/server/10.0/admin_manual/configuration/server/occ_command.html#setting-a-setting, this address is stored in oc_preferences as user preferences whereas changing the password in the UI only changes the values in oc_accounts (source).

At every login the password is synced from the preferences to the accounts table (called here and performed there) and thus changes from the UI are lost.

Regarding #30529 I find it confusing, having multiple places where email addresses are stored.

• if the user preferences variant is deprecated, the occ command for changing email addresses must be removed
• the documentation must be updated
• changing the address in one place/method must make sure it is changed everywhere

Edit: typo, added other issue

[ownclouders]

GitMate.io thinks the contributors most likely able to help are @PVince81, and @ownclouders.

Possibly related issues are #5593 (Possibility to add email address in user management), #16057 (Not possible to remove email address from personal info), #927 (Invalid default (& lost password) email sender address), #27111 (Allow the use of email address for password recovery), and #28436 (Admin Settings: Email From address takes any value).

[PVince81]

occ command for changing email addresses must be removed

We can't remove the generic command. We could maybe block setting this particular value.

the documentation must be updated

From what I see we did update the docs https://doc.owncloud.org/server/10.0/admin_manual/configuration/server/occ_command.html#modify-user-details and it's unfortunate that "email" was used in the example in https://doc.owncloud.org/server/10.0/admin_manual/configuration/server/occ_command.html#setting-a-setting. We should fix that.

I've raised owncloud/docs#437 to adjust the docs.

Would that be enough ? If yes we can close this ticket in favor of the docs one.

[mmattel]

The docs PR has been filed and merged - closing ?

[cortho]

Either I am overlooking something or this issue is not completely fixed.

I did not find any hints for this change in neither the release notes https://doc.owncloud.org/server/10.0/admin_manual/release_notes.html nor in the changelog https://owncloud.org/changelog/server/.
When browsing the server code, I did not find some kind of migration.

How can a server admin find out, this had changed?
The basic issue was not addressed as well. When there are values in the preferences table, they overwrite the account values on every login.
Maybe, when changing the address as a user and there exists a value in the preferences that value should either be removed or changed as well.

What do you think?

Edit: typo

[PVince81]

preference table values should be removed on update.

there was a similar topic here #33186

cc @tomneedham