I think RPC access is important enough that it should be enabled by default. This would allow greater integration with other applications.

For instance, we could support Bitcoin URIs (issue #14) by having a bitcoin openuri command that would open the "Send Coins" dialog box with the address and amount pre-populated.

I therefore propose the a small changes:

• The -server flag is deprecated and the server config option is considered on (1) by default.
• A -noserver flag added to explicitly turn off the RPC server at the command line.
• If there is an rpcpassword field in the bitcoin.conf file, that password is used.
• Otherwise, a random password is generated on startup, and placed in a file called bitcoin.password (user readable only).

If people think this is a good idea, I can put together a patch for this.