Attachments location
Are attachments stored within the vault or do they just link to the original file?
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Comments
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@kyuss - if you're using standalone 1Password, attachments are stored locally, encrypted. It wouldn't make much sense for us to have all this encryption, then just links to local unencrypted files on your hard drive. So when you drag in a .jpg or a .pdf or whatever, 1Password actually makes a copy of that which is attached to the item you dragged it onto.
If you're a 1password.com user, there are no direct attachments. Instead, 1password.com accounts use Documents, which are also encrypted but more flexible and robust than direct attachments of standalone 1Password.
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I have to say, I find the "linking" strategy taken by 1Password a bit cumbersome and confusing having come from the standalone version since the files are just strewn around on the vault making it messy. It may be more robust and flexible, but its not very usable.
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@wavesound - not sure what you mean by "...just strewn around on the vault." Files added as Documents are organized automatically into their own category ("Documents"), which can be viewed like every other category; by date modified, date created, alphabetically, and all the other ways you can sort actual category items. By contrast, in standalone 1Password, you have to do an advanced search to find all items with attachments, since they're actually directly attached to the item to which you added them. Your mileage may vary, I suppose, in terms of what you prefer, but I'm hard-pressed to see how Documents are less useful than attachments.
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Hi Lars,
I'm happy to oblige with an example.
In 1Password, we name all of our password items to a naming standard to ensure that everything is sorted by named category when we list our items alphabetically (these are customized categories that we incorporate in to the beginning of the item title to help us sort, like CLIENT, VENDOR, etc.) in vaults for easy viewing when you are using 1Password for the Mac client in my case. We used to use things like Notes to record information about certificates that were deployed for customers along with the certificates and keys themselves.
Since we moved to 1Password for Business, those files are now listed in-line with their original file names. When you go to an item, you see the file linked/attached. However, when you look at the document/file itself, you don't see how the document/file is connected in any way to the the original 1Password item that links to/attaches it.
Additionally, the file throws of our naming schema for items in 1Password, so the result is, as I described, files strewn around that were formerly tucked away and attached to items in the vault.
At a minimum, it would be useful to see from the view of the document/file itself, what item (in my case, these are usually notes) it links to so that I can reference my original notes to understand/remember why I stored that file in 1Password. I can see how new method is more robust, but I hope that you can see the situation we find ourselves in with this strategy. Perhaps in a new release 1Password could more clearly show how items and documents/files are linked/attached to one another?
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@wavesound - links are unidirectional instead of bidirectional because not everyone wants links both ways. But you can create a link from the Document item back to any other items in 1Password it's associated with, as well. An example would be a receipt for a software bundle containing eight or ten apps. You only get one receipt via email in PDF form, but it has all eight or ten software licenses listed on it. So you want to associate that with all ten Software License items you create for your new licenses. In standalone 1Password, you would have had to add that same receipt ten different times if you wanted it visible within (attached to) each Software License. With Documents, you upload it a single time (reducing clutter and confusion) and then you can (from within the Document item itself) link it to all ten Software License items very easily.
Also, if you're setting up links from within the other items (not the Document itself), perhaps by choosing "Add New," once you create the link from the item to the Document, as soon as you click Save, you can use that link to take you to the Document, and create the reverse link right on the spot.
I'll definitely pass along your thoughts to the developers, however, as we're always looking to improve 1Password's functionality for as many users as we can. Thanks for the clear explanation! :)
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@Lars, thank you for getting back to me. I understand your explanation and your choice to abstract items this way, but I guess we'll have to disagree on the implementation since this is something clearly structured for someone more technical than the average consumer. It's powerful and flexible yet bewildering to a non-technical person. I am technical, but most of my customers to whom I recommend your product are not and they find this unintuitive and confusing.
Let's take an example using your logic. I create a note and attach 5 separate files, say certificates. Before, I would attach 5 files and I would know that they are enclosed within the item. If I no longer need that note, I would delete the note and the documents/files would vanish with it.
Now, using 1Password's cloud service, if I delete the same note, now I have 5 "orphaned" files in my vault that have no context or relation to anything outside of my note. If I want to keep track of how these files were associated, I have to go into each file that I attached and then delete them. If I want the "bi-directional" relationship, I now have to go into each file, click edit, clink link and then find the original item. Even if I do that, I only get benefit of seeing those file showing up in my results when I search for the note.
Although I can search the item by name, If I have linked the document to other items, I have to review each file one-at-a-time, to see if that file is linked elsewhere to another item lest I accidentally delete a file associated with another Note/item/software license, etc.
Technically, this is an excellent implementation of database flexibility. But, in my opinion, you are exposing too much abstract logic of the average consumer of your product and you are confusing and therefore alienating them.
Simplicity and the intuitive interface is the hallmark of 1Password. It is the only product that we heartily recommended to our friends and colleagues of all skill levels to secure their personal credentials and other information such as digital copies of Passports, Drivers licenses, etc. There are plenty of other confusing password managers out there, 1Password doesn't need to join that club.
I would like to point out that I do mean literally all skill levels, we have several older clients that just bought their first phones and/or computers and they were all able to make 1Password a permanent part of their procedure for using online services. We have not had that level of success with any other password management product.
I think you have your cake and eat it to with attachments and items and, but I believe it requires a more thoughtful approach.
Case in point, I think the scenario that you suggested with Software Licenses and a Receipt is a perfect use case for having linked items automatically show up in "Related Items." I would want to know each Software License linked to a PDF receipt, and therefore a link to each Software License under "Related Items' in the receipt PDF item would be ideal.
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@wavesound - thanks for the feedback.
Simplicity and the intuitive interface is the hallmark of 1Password.
We've always thought so -- perhaps second only to security. We go to some pretty substantial lengths to get the "simple and intuitive" part of things correct, and when we don't succeed exactly at first, we listen to user feedback and we iterate until we've gotten things into the best condition we can.
I would like to point out that I do mean literally all skill levels, we have several older clients that just bought their first phones and/or computers and they were all able to make 1Password a permanent part of their procedure for using online services. We have not had that level of success with any other password management product.
That warms my heart because you're absolutely correct: we have users at ALL skill/familiarity levels. Some of our early adopters know so much they could easily have worked here -- and a few did and still do! Many of our "power user" community continue to push us forward in terms of 1Password's capabilities and functionality -- and we're grateful for every bit of feedback we receive. But I used to joke that if we'd said yes every time someone requested a feature and urged us to "just add it as a checkbox/toggle/preference," 1Password would quickly come to resemble this:
...and I don't think any of us want that. That kind of UI, while full of "functionality" would have sent your older clients running for the hills with a screaming case of the heebie-jeebies. And they wouldn't have been wrong -- a crowded UI like that means developers have chosen NOT to make (m)any decisions about how their own app should behave, and have instead punted everything (or nearly so) to the user. It's an abdication, not just of good design principles, but of responsibility.The flip-side of that dystopian nightmare ( :lol: ) is making an app that's too deliberately limited and therefore not powerful enough for anyone but those less-savvy, beginner users, and what we try to do is thread that needle of being secure, powerful and cutting-edge enough for the expert user while remaining accessible to newer or less-sophisticated users. In short, we believe strong security should be not just available to but meaningfully usable by, everyone. So we try very hard to make the right choices, which is occasionally why it seems like things may be taking longer than a casual estimate suggests they might need to take -- because we believe it IS often possible to satisfy everyone. And, where it's not, we still pursue the goal of making the right choice, the one that makes the most sense for the most users. And we rely to a significant extent upon our awesome user base to tell us what they think as well -- because we haven't always thought of everything. So thank you for participating in that ongoing dialogue by taking the time to share your thoughts and ideas about how 1Password could and should work with us. I'll definitely pass them along to the development team. :)
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But I used to joke that if we'd said yes every time someone requested a feature and urged us to "just add it as a checkbox/toggle/preference," 1Password would quickly come to resemble this…
That's an amusing joke, but you're attacking a strawman. Obviously, nobody ever used all those Microsoft Word toolbars at the same time, and — more to the point — those controls are not preferences. Preferences don't clutter the interface of an app while in use, and there are many apps with very simple, intuitive interfaces, but with lots of options that the users can set if they want to. Restricting those options is a reasonable way to achieve a simple interface, but it's not the only way.
…a crowded UI like that means developers have chosen NOT to make (m)any decisions about how their own app should behave, and have instead punted everything (or nearly so) to the user.
Again, the crowded UI in question is a lot of tools because of the many functions that the program can perform, and allows the user to do more things with the app. I would argue that Microsoft Word could achieve the same level of functionality with some reduction in the number of controls, but that's beside the point. If we're really talking about preferences, it's not "punting everything to the user" if the defaults are chosen well, such that most users don't even have reason to know that those preferences can be changed. But offering options with good defaults allows those with particulars needs to also get what they want, without having to work around the arbitrary limitations imposed by the designer.
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@gedankenexperimenter - Not really a strawman. It's not a perfect analogy, but whether they're toolbars or menus or preferences, the point remains: too many of them clutters the UI and not only can cause confusion/problems for less-advanced users, but can be off-putting to potential users as well. Thanks for sharing your perspective, however. :)
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It is a strawman when you're addressing preferences, which are not present in the UI during normal use, but you're presenting other tools to show how bad it could get if those preferences were allowed. Firefox, for example, has an exhaustive array of configuration variables, but the vast majority of users aren't even aware of them at all, and are certainly not off-put by the complexity.
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Okay. I think you've made your point. :) We disagree on design philosophy.
Ben
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@gedankenexperimenter - thanks for the feedback. :)
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@gedankenexperimenter: This is like walking past strangers on the street who are having their own conversation and starting an argument with them because they said something to each other that you personally didn't like. Stop it.
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@brenty — My mistake. I was under the impression that this was a public forum discussion. Now I see that it was a private conversation in which others are not allowed to participate. Please feel free to remove my offensive comments and/or disable my account. Alternatively, I think it's possible for you to initiate a private conversation should you wish to do so. I do not appear to have the bits for that (or can't find the controls).
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@gedankenexperimenter: No, you're not getting it. You're allowed to participate. But this getting really off-topic and out of hand. I'll send you a private message to avoid derailing the discussion further. Thanks for suggesting that.
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The way attachments are handled is the single "feature" that has stopped me from completely migrating from standalone vaults to 1password.com vaults and I would like the 1password team to please consider at least adding the option to have 1password.com vaults behaving like standalone vaults.
I think the issue can be broken down as follows. As a (mostly macOS/iOS) user, I want in my attachments to:
1. be easily quicklook-able (on macOS)
2. not show up as independent items (because they are not)Issue 1
On the standalone vaults I can simply hover the mouse over the attachment and click "quick look". Afterwards, I press space bar and I am back to the original item. However, on 1password.com vaults I have to click the attachment, which jumps to a different item (the "document"). To actually invoke proper quick look I have to click three times more ("decrypt", "Quick look", then "quick look" on the menu that shows up).
So, up until here, the number of clicks to invoke quick look went from 1 to 4 which is pretty bad by itself. However, it gets worse. The problem is that after following the link to the attachment, there's no way to go back to the original item (unless I take the time to actually explicitly create a link to the original document (as suggested here) from the attachment, which is extremely cumbersome and counterintuitive to say the least). On the standalone vaults I can simply press "space bar" and I am back to my item. On 1password.com vaults I have to search for the item again. So if I have 3 attachments and want to quicklook them all, on standalone vaults what would have taken me 3 clicks and 3 spacebar key strokes, becomes 12 clicks, 3 spacebar key strokes and 2 searches (=1 click + a few key strokes) on the 1password.com vaults.
I don't know exactly what kind of workflow the dev team or the average user has, but for me it's a terrible UX downgrade in exchange for some "flexibility" (1-to-n linking of attachments) which adds no tangible benefits to me as a user.
To fix issue 1 (while keeping the current functionality), all that is needed is a "quick look" button next to the attachment. Hopefully that's not too hard to implement.
(PS: the web version has an "open" button next to the attachment and automatically does the decrypting which is a better UI than the macOS app)
Issue 2
Most of my attachments are just simply screenshots or pictures and I don't care about their file names. However, since they show up as independent items, my item list is cluttered with meaningless item names which come from the attachment file names. (e.g.:
Screen Shot YYYY-MM-DD at yy.mm.ss.png,IMG_XXXX.jpg). Again, I don't know what the dev team or the average user workflow is, but at least to me that's also a huge UX downgrade.To fix issue 2, you can just add the option to hide "documents" from the "All Items" (and maybe search) views.
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Thank you for sharing both ideas with us @gusutabopb! :+1: :)
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