Whitespace ignored in master password [only leading and trailing spaces]

19km

Hi. I tried to use whitespace only password for a vault, but the beta ignores them for the password and says "Must enter password." This situation is happened both creating new vault and opening an existing vault.

---

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

DBrown

Hi, @19km!

I just created a vault in 1Password for Mac, using a master password that included a space character; then I synced that vault to my Dropbox account.

In the 1Password for Windows 10 (version 2015.12.100) beta app, I opened a Dropbox connection, selected the new vault, and unlocked it using that same master password (including the space, of course). It worked as expected.

So, I'm not able to reproduce the problem you describe. If there's anything I might have left out that you think will help me better recreate the circumstances on your system, please let me know.

Thanks!

DBrown

Follow-up:

I deleted the test vault from Dropbox on my Mac, and it's gone from my private dropbox.com web site, but it still shows up in my Dropbox account on the Windows 10 device when I ask the beta app to open it again. (I don't know why.) At that point, it refuses the master password and displays a blank password hint.

Is it possible that the vault you're trying to open has been deleted?

19km

Hi @DBrown . Thank you for the reply. Now I am not able to use my Windows 10 device, so I should write a post later . But, to clarify the problem, I am writing this post. You used a master password including a space character; it is like "pass word" (a space is in between pass and word) isn't it? A password I tried was like "                    " (consists of 20x space characters).

DBrown

I see. Well, a password comprising only spaces might, indeed, be getting ignored. I'll see what Dev has to say about it.

Thanks again, @19km!

DBrown

Yep, that's the case: all leading spaces and all trailing spaces are ignored, so a master password comprising ONLY space characters is what programmers call a "null string", which is why the app prompts you to enter a master password even though you've typed a bunch of spaces.

The solution is to open the vault in 1Password on the platform where you created it (presumably a Mac or PC), change its master password to something stronger, and use that new master password to unlock the vault in the beta app on your Windows 10 device.

19km

Hmm. That is a kind of weird. You said, a password comprising only space character is called "null string". However, actually, a space is an ASCII character and it has unique ASCII code (0x20) as each of all other characters has its unique ASCII code. I think 1Password should handle space characters not as a null string but as a character.

DBrown

I apologize for any confusion, @19km, but what I said is that all leading and trailing spaces are ignored.

If you trim all the leading and trailing spaces off of a string comprising only spaces, what's left is nothing: what programmers call a null string.

1Password can handle medial space characters—those that appear anywhere except the beginning or end of your master password—just fine, though.

I hope that's a little clearer than my first answer. Thanks for the feedback!