Trigger Custom Build via HTTP

So I'm trying to trigger a build in TeamCity 8.0.1 via a HTTP request, I believe there's still no REST API for this purpose?

I did however, find this http://confluence.jetbrains.com/display/TCD8/Accessing+Server+by+HTTP which currently seems to be the only way to trigger a build.

I want to trigger a build for which I have defined configuration parameters using TeamCity 8's password field, from what I've deduced from the limited documentation, I would do something like this:

https://teamcity:8544/httpAuth/action.html?add2Queue=DeployToDev&name=RUN_AS_USER&value=chris&name=RUN_AS_PASSWORD&value=P*SSW0RD

This seems to trigger a build off nicely, and the username gets passed in as a parameter correctly, however the password is blank.. it would seem that this method of triggering a build is unable to pass data into a TeamCity 8 password field.

Is this correct?

Is this a bug?

When is the REST API for triggering builds actually being implemented, from what I gather it's been in the pipeline for a couple of years now?

Thanks