Pre-Sales Issues

Hammerhead

Howdy, folks.

I've been looking a long time for a multi-platform password manager that does not require a subscription or 'cloud' services to replace Roboform, and I hoped 1Password was going to do the trick. Unfortunately it seems either I'm either not understanding its use, or there are some serious flaws in the program both on Android and PC.

First, a bit about my systems:
HTC M9 running ARHD5 (Lollipop 5.0.2)
PC: Windows 8.1

Can someone help get me pointed in the right direction on these two key issues?

1) Is there not either a plugin for those of us who use Swiftkey or an extension for the native browser or Firefox for Android? Forcing customers to use the 1password keyboard which is barely adequate, or having to do the "keyboard shuffle" to switch back and forth between SwiftKey and the 1P keyboard to fill out a password seems to be more problem than it's worth, especially when browsers will remember IDs and passwords these days. This process is kludgy at best.

2) On my PC, how can I get folders to display either at the top or bottom of my Login lists? In other words, I have all my passcards organized in subfolders, but they are sorted alphabetically, placing subfolders between passcards. This wasn't a problem with Roboform, they all sorted alphabetially with folders first. It just makes a mess of the display and it's harder to find what I'm looking for.

3) Is it possible to use WebDav to synchronize my Android and PC 1Password folders? I have my own WebDav server, and the instructions speak about DropBox and WiFi, but are silent regarding other methods. It would seem that one method is as good as another, no?

Thanks in advance!

RichardPayne

1) The native browser doesn't support plugins. In fact, Firefox is the only Android browser that does, but no, there is no plugin. I agree with your comments on using the 1Password keyboard but the reality is that the alternatives are just inadequate. Google's support for this stuff is poor at best.

2) Not sure what you mean by this:

On my PC, how can I get folders to display either at the top or bottom of my Login lists? In other words, I have all my passcards organized in subfolders, but they are sorted alphabetically, placing subfolders between passcards.

The folders are listed at the bottom of the categories and are not placed between "passcards"; whatever that means.

3) No. Last time they tried to implement WebDAV they found significant performance and reliability issues and so dropped support.

peri

Hey @Hammerhead. Thanks for getting in touch and welcome to the forums. :)

I'll be happy to help address some of your concerns, though it looks like Richard beat me to the punch.

1) Is there not either a plugin for those of us who use Swiftkey or an extension for the native browser or Firefox for Android?

It's not possible for us to create a browser extension for mobile like it is on desktops and laptops. This is due to the limitations of browsers on mobile devices, and is a big part of why it was so difficult for us to implement in-app filling on mobile for so long (as it only just recently came to iOS and Android). After weighing our options and trying out another in-app filling method, we decided to go with the custom keyboard and accessibility service. This decision was made for several reasons, which included the fact that it allowed us to fill in user information almost anywhere, while also allowing us to continue avoiding the clipboard.

Since the custom keyboard is a new implementation for us, we've definitely got some improving to do with it, and we're hoping to be able to get some improvements out soon. We do realize that there are apps whose business it is to make great keyboards, and we know that our customers already have keyboards that they're fond of. This is why we recently added the long press on the space bar shortcut, to allow for fast switching between keyboards. There is also a softkey in most Android devices, which allows for pretty quick (a swipe and a click) switching between keyboards.

2) On my PC, how can I get folders to display either at the top or bottom of my Login lists?

As Richard pointed out, the folders should be listed below the categories. Let us know if you have other questions about that.

3) Is it possible to use WebDav to synchronize my Android and PC 1Password folders?

Once again, Richard is correct here. We have previously tried WebDav, but it is too difficult to implement, since the Agile Keychain format includes so many files.

I hope this helps! Let us know if you need any further clarification. :)

Hammerhead

Thanks for responding, guys. Sorry I didn't get back sooner - seems Richard's post didn't trigger a notification to my email for some reason, or it just got lost in the sauce.

Anyway, let me expand on my questions.

Plugin: I surely hope that the dev team will reach out to other vendors and partner with them to find a solution. I know there are LOTS of keyboards out there, but picking the most popular ones first (like SwiftKey and Google Keyboard) would make your solution FAR more marketable, since ease-of-use is a key factor in the decision making process for some users. To that end, I already signed up for the beta, but was disappointed to see that there wasn't a more elegant solution in the making. I guess that makes it a "zero sum game" since it's an architecture issue which affects Android globally, but I'd still encourage you to place yourself in a leadership position by putting some effort into that. As I'm sure you're aware if you read the trades, the mobile space is rapidly outpacing traditional desktop/laptop for most of us and you could be the "first-est with the most-est" if you can figure it out.

Folder Sort: See my screen grab of the ID card flyout. Note how folders are sorted among the cards? (remind me to delete these images once you reply!)!
removed by AgileBits

Now, take a look at how it appears with Roboform:
removed by AgileBits

WebDav: Sorry - I wasn't suggesting a native (in-app) utility. Is there any reason why I can't use a 3rd party utility to synchronize the 1Password folder via WebDav (or any other cloud service, for that matter) so that all my devices are using the same files at all times? If you can copy from one machine to another by USB or WiFi, bits are bits, no matter how they're transferred, no?

Looking forward to your reply. Thanks!

peri

Hey again, @hammerhead and thanks for the clarification. :) I went ahead and deleted those images from your post to protect your information.

I think keyboard integration is a great suggestion and it would be awesome to implement something like that. I will definitely pass this along to the developers. It's totally worth considering in our development plans, and like you said, we do love being the first-est with the most-est. :lol:

I see what you're saying about the folder sorting now--thanks for the images. We do receive requests for the ability to customize the sort order in the mini, as well as to have the mini reflect how you've grouped items in the main app. I'll go ahead and add your vote to these issues.

Finally--you're absolutely correct. 1Password 4 for Android allows you to sync with local storage. This keeps your .agilekeychain folder in whatever location you choose on your device. You can definitely then sync via WebDav if you like. The only caveat there is that, while we do support local storage syncing, we don't officially support WebDav, so we can't guarantee that sync will work without errors. Of course if you do have any errors, though, we're always here to troubleshoot and try to get things back on track.

I hope this answers your questions more thoroughly. Let me know if you need any further clarification on any of this! Thanks again!

RichardPayne

@Hammerhead could you search back through your emails, and check your spam folder, to check whether the notification for my post is actually there. If it's not that @peri will need to raise an issue with Vanilla for a forum bug. A thread starter should always receive notifications about their thread, even if the replies do not include their \@username.

Hammerhead

@RichardPayne , I know for sure that I've received every email where the @ tag is used. I won't rule out that your first got deleted accidentally on my end, but you guys might want to look into it anyway.

RichardPayne

The point is that I didn't use the @ tag.

Hammerhead

Interesting. This time I got a notification. Might have been an inadvertently deleted email. It happens.

peri

Thanks for clearing that up. I'm glad to hear that you are receiving notifications on this thread after all. :) If you do have further trouble with the forums, or anything to do with 1Password, let us know!

Hammerhead

Odd. OK, so I got a notification about Richard's post at 2:13am, but none since. You guys might want to send in a ticket to the board devs. If it's any help, vBulletin is fully mature and rock solid. Night be an option if this one isn't working for you.

peri

Hey @Hammerhead, just so we're clear here, are you referring to notifications in your email inbox, or to notifications in the forums?

It seems that by default, you'll get both email and forum notifications when you're @mentioned, but you'll only get forum notifications when people comment in your discussions. Can you verify whether that's indeed the case?

Click on your profile in the top bar here, and then click Edit Profile > Notification Preferences. Is the Email box checked for "Notify me when people comment on my discussions?"

Hammerhead

Peri, that seems to be the bugaboo.

The forum notifies by default for:
Bookmarked discussion
Tagged mentions
PMs

But NOT:
Comment on MY discussions
Commentary on discussions I've participated in

So I should have changed my default preferences. Other forums subscribe by default for any thread a user starts. I didn't think to look in the settings, and I seem to have missed the little star at thetop right to manually subscribe.

Mystery solved.

peri

Well, I guess we can close the file on that one! :lol:

Let us know if you think of anything else. Thanks!

Hammerhead

Guys, I just wanted to check back to say that although I really, really, _**really **_wanted to like 1Password, I'm afraid it's not going to work out for me.

I need a password manager that is truly multi-platform, which means among other things, one which will work with Android. Not only is the present 1P keyboard (and also the Beta) kludgy and does not integrate with Swiftkey (or have a browser plugin), but the auto fill does not work properly, because all websites are identified as the HTC site (I'm running an HTC 1 M9 with LP), which pops up my passcard for the HTC login. Thus, I have to:
1. Switch to the 1P keyboard
2. Open search
3. Find card for the site in question
4. Click to enter login
5. Switch keyboard back to Swiftkey

Not to put too fine a point on it, but five key presses is four key presses too many. Then, there's the cost of $50 to jump ship from Roboform to 1Password, plus the $10 it would cost for the 1P Android app, bringing the total to a heady $60 for a solution that brings zero additional functionality.

I'm telling you this not to beat you guys up, but because I'm a sales and marketing professional, sharing my views in the spirit of constructive customer feedback to emphasize my earlier point that ease-of-use is king. If I were in a decision making capacity for AgileBits, I would be engaging in an outbound partnering program to team up with the most popular keyboard vendors to accommodate the 1P autofill capability into their products, instead of trying to craft my own solution that's cumbersome at best. Then, once done, I would offer a competitive upgrade price to induce users who are already invested in other products (like Roboform, LastPass or Dashlane) to jump ship for my solution.

Anyway, I thank you both for your help and encourage you to please feel free to contact me if you have any other questions.

Good luck!

peri

Hey @Hammerhead. I'm really sorry to hear that 1Password doesn't suit your needs at the moment. Thanks for giving us a shot, and thanks for the thorough and thoughtful feedback.

While I can't make promises or provide specifics at the moment, I can say that we are working on making 1Password more uniform across platform. Which I'm really looking forward to.

I have forwarded your ideas regarding integrating 1Password filling into third party keyboards to our developers, and they're considering the possibility of implementing this in the future. That said, I wonder if the issue you're having regarding filling has anything to do with your browser, as we've found that certain browsers (such as Firefox) obfuscate the URLs so 1Password is unable to detect logins for those pages..

Once again, I'm sorry to see you go. However, I encourage you to keep your eye out for updates, and hope that you give us another shot when 1Password is more suited to your needs. We'll be happy to help in any way we can. :)

Thanks again!

Hammerhead

There's been a new development you guys might not be aware of.

While puttering around with the 1Password app again over this past weekend, I just noticed the globe icon when pulling up the menu for a passcard. This causes a browser-like interface to open up and the ID/PW for sites are automatically entered without the need of your keyboard. I'm going to guess that this is driven by the system services loaded by 'Android System Web View' which may not be available in versions before LP, but thought you guys ought to know about it, because it makes 1P marginally more usable for my needs.

I would still encourage your development team to adopt a partnering model and create plugins for the leading browsers and/or keyboards. You already have a plugin for Firefox on PC, it surely can't be that much trouble to adapt it for FF on Android - if LastPass can do it, I'm sure you can, too. I'm tempted to buy 1P in the hope that it might one day have those plugins, but I've tried that before with other software products and have been disappointed. But I'm thinking about it... ;-)

peri

Hey @Hammerhead. Long time no see. :)

It sounds like you may be describing 1Password's built-in 1Browser. The 1Browser is an internal browser based on the WebView class provided by Android. You can indeed use this browser for filling if you prefer it.

One thing I'd like to point out though is that if your OS version is earlier than 5.0.2, you may be vulnerable to FREAK by using the 1Browser. You can check if a browser is affected by the FREAK vulnerability by visiting the following page with it:

https://freakattack.com/clienttest.html

Let us know if you need anything else! Thanks!