Early Access Feedback

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snozdop
snozdop
Community Member
in Desktop betas (Mac, Windows, and Linux)

Been a 1Password user for 12 years, and had a subscription since August 2016 and I'm almost always using the latest beta for Mac, so was eager to give 1Password 8 Early Access a try.

Oh dear...

  • Jerky animation when unlocking
  • Couldn't login with U2F key (now its just a web app wrapper, why not?)
  • Instantly jarring non-Mac style UI
  • Mac-app no longer auto-installs the Safari extension. Multiple unfriendly extra steps to do that and it doesn't even work on Catalina.
  • Preferences window is locked in place, can't be moved. Clicking outside it makes it disappear.
  • Preferences window close icon is an X (labelled "Done"?!) in top-right instead of standard Mac red circle in top-left.
  • Preferences window layout and design is nothing like a Mac-app should be
  • When scrolling the main list of password items you can see them drawing on-screen. Scroll slightly faster and you're scrolling an empty pane because the window can't draw fast enough. Have to stop scrolling to give it chance to catch up and draw in. Terrible.
  • Clicking the Watchtower section always flashes up a message for a second saying its generating the report - every single time. Why does it need to regenerate it every time, especially if nothing has changed in the vault?
  • Can't access Dropbox vaults
  • Bright blue line appears when mousing over the vertical dividing lines between panes. Why? Not part of any Mac UI I've ever seen.
  • Can't hold down the Option key to temporarily reveal the password.
  • 1Password mini is gone, replaced by virtually useless 4 item menu.
  • Can't simply browse items in the Quick Access like you could in 1PW mini
  • Changed the cmd-\ shortcut for no apparent reason, and no option to change it back
  • Memory usage is dramatically higher: 134.6 MB vs 313.6 (even without the Safari extension installed)

Over on Twitter Dave Teare has been telling everyone to give it a try and he thinks they'll "be pleasantly surprised". I'm surprised, but not pleasantly. More shocked actually that this is the way 1PW is going (non-native Electron crap) and as a lover of efficient, streamlined, native Mac apps, I see this as the biggest step-back in 1Password's history. This is especially shocking coming from originally Mac devs who made top-notch Mac apps - even feels like a betrayal of your roots and the Mac community.

Unbelievably, Dave thinks this Electron-based web-app with non-Mac UI is "the best Mac app we've ever had"!!

So it's pretty obvious there's no turning back and the many complaints about a non-native Mac app will be ignored.

Unfortunately, even though I've been happy with it for 12 years, I won't be supporting a developer who doesn't care about creating the best native Mac password manager anymore. That makes me really sad.

1Password Version: Not Provided
Extension Version: Not Provided
OS Version: Not Provided

Comments

  • unknowndomain
    unknowndomain
    Community Member
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    Feel free to stand on a sinking ship Dave, but if you launch 1Password 8 without MAJOR improvement you will do to yourselves what Apple did when it killed Shake and released Final Cut Pro X, they've made some ground back eventually after years of work, but no one seriously uses Apple for editing any more, and they had the money to mess it up.

    I am really disappointed, reading all the negative stuff about 1P8, I thought nah people are just being dramatic. M1 is high power Electron won't touch it. But the issue isn't Electron and it isn't the performance...

    The issue is that it's half the product it used to be and it's lost much of it's Mac feel in lieu of what looks like a Bootstrap / Material UI appearance thats out of place.

    To reiterate from the list above, in just 5 minutes I experienced most if not all these issues, other issues:

    • The touch ID interface doesn't come up automatically.
    • Theres no link between the app and the extensions, they don't sync login status.
    • the menu bar item no longer does naything other than take up space, it used to open the mini browser.

    The most MAJOR issues for me beyond having to install 2 apps to get the Safari extension which I presume might be fixed when 1P8 is released on the app store eventually, the MAJOR issue is you've killed the Mini Browser entirely.

  • NathanL
    NathanL
    Community Member
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    The issue is that it's half the product it used to be and it's lost much of it's Mac feel in lieu of what looks like a Bootstrap / Material UI appearance thats out of place.

    Agreed. This is the type of app absolutely not suited to Electron. If anything, good Electron apps don't try to look like Mac apps because when they do they always fail. It's a horrible middle ground, that has led to a really sub-par experience.

  • rob
    rob
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    @snozdop thanks for the detailed list of feedback, and I'm sorry for the delay. It looks like your thread got lost in the shuffle. There's quite a bit there, including some intentional design choices and some things we've heard from other users, but there are a few points I can respond to specifically:

    Bright blue line appears when mousing over the vertical dividing lines between panes. Why? Not part of any Mac UI I've ever seen.

    I actually like this a lot. It's much more accessible for folks and easier to see what you're doing if you click on it. Not related to the hover state, but you can also tab to this control and adjust it with your keyboard, which I enjoy as a keyboard navigation enthusiast.

    Can't hold down the Option key to temporarily reveal the password.

    Maybe this could come back as a preference. Having it on by default, though, can be jarring for people who aren't expecting this behavior and didn't intend to reveal their password.

    1Password mini is gone, replaced by virtually useless 4 item menu.
    Can't simply browse items in the Quick Access like you could in 1PW mini

    Quick Access is one of the youngest features and we still have a lot of work to do there.

    Changed the cmd-\ shortcut for no apparent reason, and no option to change it back

    We've actually brought this back within the last week, but there are still some things to tidy up with it.

    @unknowndomain hey there, thanks for those points as well.

    it's half the product it used to be

    We've got plenty of work left, but this is an early access. It will probably not be shipping this year.

    The touch ID interface doesn't come up automatically

    This is working for me in my testing just now with the latest nightly. It's possible it was fixed sometime this week.

    Theres no link between the app and the extensions, they don't sync login status.

    You can enable browser integration where the lock status is synced. In preferences, under Browser, enable "Connect with 1Password in the browser". And in the browser, open 1Password's settings and make sure "Integrate with 1Password app" is turned on.

    the menu bar item no longer does naything other than take up space, it used to open the mini browser.

    This may have also changed in the last week. It's currently opening the new Quick Access feature for me, which as I said above, is still very new, so it's not at the level of 1Password mini at this point.

    It's a horrible middle ground, that has led to a really sub-par experience.

    @NathanL, I'm sorry to hear you're not a fan. We're going to keep polishing it, and we're happy with the progress we've made at this stage.

This discussion has been closed.