Safari extension and syncing

denisdp

Hi guys,

Something I wondered today. Would it be possible to sync 1password (with whatever cloud service we're using) after creating a new login in safari. As of now, I think we need to open the app to actually have it synced.

Rad

Hi @denisdp,

Thanks for taking the time to write in :+1:

The 1Password extension like any other iOS 8 extension is a light wight process (a separate app) which comes bundled inside the main app.

iOS 8 extensions are designed to perform very short and specific tasks. The resources (memory, CPU, etc) that they can use are very limited and their lifecycle is very very short, meaning that the extension process is terminated as soon as the extension is dismissed (as you save the item in the case of the 1Password extension).

iOS extensions can not perform background tasks and on top of it all, iOS (the OS itself) reserves the right to terminate the extension process at any time, especially if it uses a lot of resources.

That's why sync is not possible/convenient to implement in the 1Password extension.

For more information about iOS Extensions, please visit the App Extension Programming Guide documentation.

For now, if you wish to sync the newly saved Login from Safari, you can either open the main 1Password app which triggers sync or wait for 1Password to perform sync as a background task. Note that the latter may take quite a while.

I hope that this helps :smile:

Cheers!

denisdp

Ok noted, thanks for the response. And I guess an extension cannot trigger background activity of the parent app itself?

Rad

Hey @denisdp,

Thanks for getting back to me so quickly :+1:

No, there is no direct communication between an app extension and its containing app.

Best,