iOS -> Mac Sync (prior to factory reset)

SockThief

Hi! I am unsure how to solve this and hope someone can help.

I need to factory reset my iPhone, and as such need to backup my 1Password vault.

In an ideal world, I would like to create a new vault on my Mac, let's call it, "iPhone Backup", and then copy all the items from my iPhone into that vault. However, it doesn't seem that this is possible, as the sync options will sync the primary vaults (which I definitely don't want to do).

Once copied, I would like to, selectively merge this data back to my Primary vault. (I say selectively, as some is old data; some will conflict, etc).

I would rather not manually copy the data across (I.e.: manually replicate each entry on the Mac).

I have considered using iTunes backup. However, as far as I can see, I will need to restore to the iPhone and then I am in the same position as before, having to manually recreate each item.

The last option I can see, is to create a new vault on the Mac, move all my login items to the new vault, then sync the devices. However, when I attempted to do this, the copy didn't contain the folders that the primary had.

Any suggestions? It would be great to have one way copy, and not have to sync the primary all the time.

littlebobbytables

Hi @SockThief,

I think what you want should be doable but I would like to make sure I'm understanding your situation correctly before we proceed. I'd look pretty daft if I'd made a fundamental mistake when I read your post and gave a massive set of instructions that don't apply :tongue:

1. At the moment you have a vault on your iPhone and a vault on your Mac and these two aren't in sync.
2. You want to copy the entire of the iOS vault to your Mac without risk of contaminating your current primary vault on your Mac.
3. You'll maybe do some tidying up, moving between the two vaults but after the factory reset you want to only copy this secondary vault to the iOS device and not your primary Mac vault.
4. You have folders in one or both vaults that you need to keep.

Can I ask, what sync options are you happy using? For example can we employ Dropbox to get the vault from your iPhone to your Mac or are cloud based approaches unacceptable? If you're already using Dropbox with 1Password for other machines or devices that would important to know too. Even if you don't want to keep the two in sync after this we can use sync to act as the conduit for moving the vault.

Sorry for all the questions but I think with a firmer grasp on your situation we can definitely come up with a solution.

SockThief

Hi LittleBobbyTables - i'm sure you hear this all the time, but as professional DBA, I love your handle :)

1. Yes, I have a vault on my Mac (the primary) and a vault on my iPhone (also a primary).
2. Yes, I would like to copy the items from the iPhone's primary vault into a new (temporary) vault (not the primary) on my Mac
3. Once I have copied the iPhone's 1Password items to the mac, I will remove 1Password on the iPhone. I will then clean out duplicates (on the mac itself) and other non-required items, and then copy them into the primary vault on the Mac and remove the temporary vault.
4. I have folders only in my Mac's Primary vault. The issue here was, I thought I could create a new vault on my Mac, and move all the items from the Primary Vault to it, the primary vault on the Mac would then be empty. This would mean that, when doing a sync, the primary vaults would sync, and in effect, this would copy all the login items from the iPhone to the Mac. However, when I tried this, I copied all the items from the Primary to the new vault, but the folders from the primary were not recreated in the new vault (i hope this makes sense!)

I am not using any sync at the moment. In effect my iPhone and Mac (from a 1Password perspective) run independently. I have only ever had cause to do this copy process once before, and (unfortunately) I forgot to do it, before I deleted the 1Password app (which removed the need to sync.. just with undesired side effects).

I would much prefer to copy the data from iPhone to Mac using iTunes or a USB connection. Failing that, the local WiFi is my preferred option. Dropbox and other cloud sync are out (and we can save that discussion for another day!)

I would like to do some sync after I restore - however I plan on changing my work habits. As you can not avoid syncing the primary vaults (I wonder why this is?) I will not use the primary vault at all. Instead I will have three vaults on my mac.

1. Primary (not used)
2. Local
3. Sync

As I said, the primary will not be used (because I can't stop it syncing). The Local will be for items I don't want synced between the Mac and iPhone (more sensitive data, for instance, or items that I just don't need on the iPhone). The Sync will be for items I want synced between the Mac and iPhone.

But for now, the first step is to find a way to move the login items from the iPhones primary vault to a secondary vault on the Mac :)

littlebobbytables

Hi @SockThief,

Your requirements do make this one interesting :smile: That's not to suggest it isn't possible but to keep things as clean as possible there will be a few steps in here. I get the feeling you won't mind though (but do correct me if I'm wrong).

Is there a way to directly transfer your primary iOS vault to a secondary Mac vault? without Dropbox the answer is no.

Can we achieve your end goal via a slightly different route? I believe so.

What we're going to do is export your Primary Mac vault. This will maintain folders (smart or normal), tags, attachments - absolutely everything. Then we're going to replace your entire Mac vault with the backup from the iOS device. We'll export that as well and then start over on your Mac from a clean point. We'll create the required vaults, import your data and then you can get started with the manual task of merging/moving whatever is required. How does that sound? It will all be done locally with no potential contamination between the vaults so I think we've covered the bases :smile:

Export your Primary Mac vault

1. Launch 1Password for Mac.
2. Select the File > Export > All Items... drop down menu option.
3. Enter your Mac Master Password when requested and click Continue.
4. Leave the export format on the default, 1Password Interchange Format .1pif, select an appropriate location (we often recommend the Desktop for ease) and I'd title it Mac Primary to easily distinguish it later and click Save.

Export your Primary iOS vault

1. Turning your attention to your iOS device, launch 1Password for iOS and follow the steps in the Creating manual backups section of our Creating and restoring 1Password backups in iTunes (iOS) guide.
2. Returning to 1Password for Mac, open 1Password's preferences and switch to the Backup tab.
3. Click on the Find Backup button and select the .1p4_zip file that is in the Backups folder you saved to your Mac in step 5. Click the Add Backup button.
4. Select the newly added backup from the list which is ordered by the timestamp. The one you're after will probably stand out thanks to the number of items. Click on the now enabled Restore button.
5. 1Password will shut down as part of the restore process so launch it once again.
6. At this point you should see just your Primary iOS vault as we've restored the iOS backup. We're good because we've exported your Mac vault already.
7. Follow steps 2-4 from the Export your Primary Mac vault section but title this export iOS Primary.

We now have exported copies of both your Mac and iOS vaults and we're now in a position to create a blank slate on your Mac to import both of these.

We're going to pause for a second because I'd like to make a suggestion about your vault configuration. At the moment you're proposing an empty Primary vault because of how Wi-Fi Sync works. What if you made your Sync vault the primary, thus enabling Wi-Fi Sync and your local vault your secondary? Wi-Fi Sync of secondary vaults is optional so the secondary vault can remain local. As long as your Master Password is strong you're safe. Also, the iOS Safari Extension will only save items to the Primary vault so this would save all of the faffing about of item moving on the Mac should you make use of this feature. I'll cover both scenarios below.

Start over and prepare the new vaults

1. Follow our How do I start over with an empty vault? guide.
2. Create a new Primary vault on your Mac.
3. Create your Local secondary vault by selecting the 1Password > New Vault... drop down menu option and fill in all of the required fields.
4. If you like my proposed vault configuration skip this step. If you don't then return to your Primary vault using the ⌘1 keyboard shortcut and repeat step 3. for a new Sync secondary vault. The New Vault... option is disabled if a secondary vault is active hence the ⌘1. Please note secondary vaults will be ordered alphabetically rather than by creation timestamp.
5. Switch to the Local vault and select the File > Import... drop down menu option.
6. Point the Import window to your Mac Primary export folder. The Open button won't respond to a mouse click (it's a bug) so just press enter to import.
7. The Local vault will now contain your original Mac vault.
8. Depending on your choice above, either select the Primary vault or your Sync secondary vault and repeat steps 4-5 with your iOS Primary export folder.

No matter what you decided, you are now in a position where your iOS vault is safely on your Mac and you can now perform a factory reset on it and tidy up your two vaults.

Once done, you can use Wi-Fi Sync to sync your Mac with your iOS device and it will either be syncing an empty Primary plus your Sync secondary vault or you'll be syncing just your Primary.

That's a pretty big post, with plenty to digest. Please take some time to read, mull it all over and if you have any questions please do ask. I think though we've got a suggestion that works but only you can say for sure :smile:

SockThief

Wow! That's a stunningly brilliant answer! I highly recommend the admins sticky that :) worked like a charm!

I made one modification to the process - as the exports were non encrypted, i disabled Time Machine first, so I wouldn't have a backup of non-encrypted passwords.

The use of iOS Backups made me happy - I would love to be able to sync that way as well, as it's easier for me to just dock the iPhone when I come home. Lastly, it would be great if syncing the primary vault we're optional, though I followed your advice and the primary is my synced vault (which is the one I most often use when surfing the web etc anyway).

thanks again!

Ben

Wow! That's a stunningly brilliant answer! I highly recommend the admins sticky that :) worked like a charm!

Excellent! Thanks for the update. Glad to hear it helped. It frankly isn't a common enough issue that it would warrant being made sticky, but I'll ask our docs team to look into adding it to the knowledgebase.

I made one modification to the process - as the exports were non encrypted, i disabled Time Machine first, so I wouldn't have a backup of non-encrypted passwords.

Not a bad idea. Of course it is possible to encrypt Time Machine backups. :)

The use of iOS Backups made me happy - I would love to be able to sync that way as well, as it's easier for me to just dock the iPhone when I come home.

Thanks for the feedback.

Lastly, it would be great if syncing the primary vault we're optional, though I followed your advice and the primary is my synced vault (which is the one I most often use when surfing the web etc anyway).

This would require a restructuring of how we handle multiple vaults, so it isn't likely to change in the near future. Probably something we should look into for the future though as we continue to look into ways to beef up our multiple vault support.

SockThief

@bwoodruff - yes, that is true; my use cases are not normally straight forward! however there were some very useful tips - for instance, if I just wanted to copy my primary vault from iPhone to Mac, I could have just taken the backup from the iPhone and imported into a new vault on the Mac; I wasn't aware that that was possible.

But now i have a system which is perfect for my needs

thanks again

littlebobbytables

Glad we could help @SockThief and thank you for the suggestions to improve the steps too. On a personal note I enjoyed it as it was a bit more of a lateral thinking type puzzle - when you've got the right frame of mind going on those are fun :smile: (I've been playing a bit of Free Flow on my iPhone lately I confess).

Happy syncing going forward and if you have any more puzzles or questions you know where we are :smile: