My situation is this: while i know i can *read and write* to [[special_remotes/S3]] fairly easily with the credentials, I cannot read from there from other remotes that do not have those credentials enabled.

This seems to be an assumption deeply rooted in git-annex, specifically in `Remote/S3.hs:390`.

It would be *very* useful to allow remotes to read from S3 transparently. I am aware of the tips mentionned in the comments of [[tips/publishing_your_files_to_the_public/]] that use the `addurl` hack, but this seems not only counter-intuitive, but also seem to add significant per-file overhead in the storage. It also requires running an extra command after every `git annex add` which is a problem if you are running the assistant that will add stuff behind your back.

Besides, you never know if and when the file really is available on s3, so running addurl isn't necessarily accurate.

How hard would it be to fix that in the s3 remote?

Thanks! --[[anarcat]]
