[Samba] samba auth against imap?

[dnk]

I had a VP in our company ask today if it was possible to use the same  
id's and passwords as our mail server. Now if it was LDA based, no  
problem.....

But I was just curious if there was some sort of authentication method  
to authenticate samba shares against an IMAP server? I have seen a few  
other pieces of software use imap authentication. I have security  
concerns over this method, but just wanted to see if it was even  
possible. I have been google searching, but no real answers yet.

Thanks in advance,.

dnk