Workaround for using Dropbox sync with it on another drive (volume)

Terry Norton

I recently upgraded from Dropbox free account to 100GB. My MacBook SSD didn't have room for this, so I moved Dropbox to another internal drive (replaced my OptiDisk with a 750 GB drive).

Due to the fact that some of my apps had data files in Dropbox, I did create a Dropbox symlink and placed it back in my home folder, where Dropbox used to be.

However, 1Password didn't like it and refused to acknowledge the symlink pointing to my new Dropbox location. After fighting with this issue for 2 days on my computer, on my daughter's iMac which Dropbox syncs with, and our iPhones, I believe I finally figured out a workaround.

This works with both our computers and 1Password on both of our iPhones.

1. Pause Dropbox syncing
2. 1Password on the Mac - DO NOT use Dropbox sync. Use the default location in the ~/library/... folder
3. In Finder locate ~/Library/Containers/com.agilebits.onepassword-osx-helper/Data/Documents/1Password.agilekeychain
4. Create a symlink of the 1Password.agilekeychain file
5. Move the 1Password.agilekeychain link file to your .../Dropbox/1Password folder
6. Rename it to 1Password.agilekeychain
7. Turn Dropbox syncing back ON

So what you have is all Macs NOT using Dropbox, and all iOS devices using Dropbox. Because of the 1Password.agilekeychain symlink in Dropbox, all the iOS devices are actually looking at the real 1Password.agilekeychain file in the Mac's ~/Library/... folder.

This workaround was so simple, I felt rather stupid for not figuring this out earlier.

Terry

khad

Thanks for taking the time to write this up, Terry! It is possible that it will continue to work without any trouble, but we do not recommend it. There is a much simpler solution. :)

First, I'll share a little bit of background for folks who may not understand the point of your post. 1Password 3.9 adheres to Apple's sandboxing guidelines which require explicit permission to access files and folders on your disk. 1Password 3.9 has permission to access this exact location:

~/Dropbox

If your Dropbox folder is not located there, 1Password simply cannot access it. At the moment, 1Password 3.9 is only allowed to access the default location of Dropbox. We're working on an update to allow you to grant explicit permission to 1Password to access your Dropbox folder elsewhere, but I don't have a timeframe on this.

If you need a temporary workaround, you can simply use 1Password 3.8 which does not adhere to Apple's sandboxing guidelines and can thus access your data file from anywhere on your disk regardless of where your Dropbox folder is located.

Since you already purchased 1Password on the Mac App Store, you can just email us your Mac App Store receipt. We'll send you a license key for 1Password 3.8.

support@ agilebits .com

You can download 1Password 3.8 from our website:

http://agilebits.com/downloads

Aside from sandboxing, there are not really any substantial differences. Most users never run into this problem as they use the default Dropbox folder location, but in your case "sidegrading" to 3.8 is an option. It is not a downgrade. 1Password 3.8 and 3.9 have been developed in tandem and only have different version numbers for technical reasons.

If you are comfortable using an unsupported workaround, you are free to do so. I'm just not sure why you would when there is a supported solution with no downside that I can think of.

I hope that helps. Please let me know.

Cheers!

Terry Norton

At the time I needed this to work, my preliminary search for a solution did not turn up that 3.8 was the same as 3.9, so I found a solution for 3.9.

As for being simpler, I guess that's up for debate. After all, I'm using 1Password exactly as intended in it's default mode. Can't get any easier than that. All I've done is allow 1Password for iPhone to see the keychain file on my Mac, which was the reason for wanting to use Dropbox in the first place.

Aliases are supported on OSX, so it's not like I've hacked anything, just solved a temporary issue by simply creating one symlink. That's much easier than switching to and installing 3.8, then getting and applying a 3.8 license. Sounds like it will be a moot point anyway once 4.0 is released.

However, I understand you do have a company sponsored solution, so perhaps it would be best to delete my solution from the forum so as not to confuse the issue for anyone else searching for a solution. However, please post your solution as a sticky so it's easily found.

khad

I'm more than happy to keep your post here for advanced users. We just need to make sure there is an appropriate disclaimer. :)

Offhand, I can't imagine any trouble arising from your solution, but we just simply aren't testing with it in mind (and neither is Apple I'm sure). Anything could happen.

What I've written above has been posted elsewhere and comes up in a forum search for "sandbox", but I'll see about adding it to the Knowledge Base to make it even easier to find.

Thank you for mentioning that.

Cheers!