So after some experimentation I discovered that the password protection works correctly in RSS feeds. Or maybe it had to do with the fact that I changed some obscure setting in the configuration of the RecentChanges pages. Anyway when you are logged in and you click on an RSS feed link you will see only the items that you have permission to read. This is also true if you are not logged in. So the advantage of that is that you when you are on the site, you are not distracted by changes made to pages that you don't have permission to see anyway. The disadvantage is that if you are using an RSS feed client other than a browser that has a logged in cookie, you won't see changes to pages that you do have permission to see by virtue of your login.
When I log into the site with Firefox, the RSS feeds work fine and the feed contains links to changed pages that I can only see by virtue of my login. On the other hand, if I am using Thunderbird to read an RSS feed for the site, then I only see links in the feed to pages that do not require a password.
bill February 11, 2007, at 11:20 PM CST
