Send paintext passwords

Hi,

I would like to authenticate the entered password and the corresponding user name against an LDAP - unfortunately this is not so easy, as the password is sent directly MD5 encoded. Is there a way (e.g. when using SSL or similar) to send the password to the server in plain text? (using this method: https://www.virtualhere.com/authorization)
Otherwise I would have to set up separate passwords, which in turn is quite tedious.

best regards,

pk