Multiple vaults and dropbox

camner

I use 1P on several macs and 1 PC. The Dropbox account for the Macs is a different account than on the PC. When I went to create a new vault on the PC and told it I wanted to sync via Dropbox, not surprisingly, a new 1Password folder was created in the PC Dropbox account. I then shared that folder with the Mac Dropbox account, which resulted in a folder in the Mac Dropbox called "1Password(1)" (so as not to conflict with the original Mac "1Password" folder). So, the two agile.keychains are in different folders in the Mac Dropbox.

I now want to share the Mac vault with the PC. If I share the 1Password folder from the Mac with the PC Dropbox account, this will now create a folder in the PC Dropbox called "1Password(1)" (so as not to conflict with the folder on the PC called "1Password").

This is a confusing state of affairs. Vault 1 (originally from the Mac) will appear on the Macs in the folder called "1Password" and on the PC in the folder called "1Password(1)." Vault 2 (originally from the PC) will do exactly the reverse, showing up on the PC in the folder called "1Password" and on the Macs in a folder called "1Password(1)."

I'm thinking there ought to be a better way....

Sorry if I'm presenting this in a confusing way.

Megan

Hi @camner,

Thanks for writing such a detailed post here! I can certainly see why you'd be a little bit confused with all of the '1Password' floating around in your Dropbox accounts. Before we get into some steps to hopefully simplify your 1Password life, I'd love to get just a bit more clarification about your end goals here:

• Do you want one big vault with all of your info available to your on all your Macs and your PC?
• If not, how many vaults do you have and which ones need to be available where?

Once we know what you're looking to end up with we can get this straightened out, no problem. :)

camner

No, I want two vaults. My wife uses the PC and has many logins that I don't need to see (but my vault is more complete, so it's probably helpful for her to have access to my vault). On my Mac, I only really need one vault. We have a shared laptop on which we want both vaults. (Of course, it is not a problem for my wife's machine to have access to my vault and my machine to have access to her vault...that's convenient for several reasons, including that where we both need access to the same login we can share the login with the other vault).

Is this clear enough?

chrisdj

The easiest way I see this working is to rename your wife's vault so it does not conflict in Dropbox.

1. Unshare her agilekeychain from your Dropbox (and make sure the file is removed from your Dropbox). We still want it to exist in her Dropbox.
2. On her PC, quit 1Password, in her Dropbox folder, rename her 1Password.agilekeychain to HerName.agilekeychain. (Obviously, replace HerName with her actual name).
3. Launch 1Password on her PC, and it should ask to use the renamed keychain.
4. Now share HerName.agilekeychain to your Dropbox. Once it is fully synced, go ahead and double click it to add it as a secondary vault.
5. Share your 1Password.agilekeychain (no need to rename, but if you do, you will need to resync) to her account, and she can switch between hers and yours using the vault switch icon in the main app's toolbar.

I hope this helps!

camner

@chrisdj:
I almost did all of this already....I changed the name of my wife's agile keychain when I first set up this sharing system. Following the instructions at https://learn2.agilebits.com/1Password4/Mac/en/Tutorials/share-vault.html, I shared the 1Password FOLDER not the agile keychain INSIDE the folder. It was that sharing of the containing folder that caused the issue.

You are suggesting sharing the individual agile keychain file (I think that it isn't really a "file" but a Mac OS X "package," but that may be a distinction without a difference). If this is really a better way to go, then perhaps the instructions on the AgileBits site should be changed to reflect this alternative approach?

chrisdj

Hi @Camner,

Ah, I understand a bit better now. You definitely want to share the enclosing folder. So perhaps change her 1Password folder to 1Password_HerName. That should get things going.

camner

It seems to me that it would be most convenient if the multiple vaults could be in the same enclosing folder. Is there a reason why it is the enclosing folder that needs to be shared instead of the file itself? Or alternatively, is there a reason I can't share one folder (say the Mac Dropbox account's 1Password folder) and have the other vault (the one that is primary on the PC) be in that shared folder?

chrisdj

Hi @camner‌,

Because the agilekeychain is indeed a bundle file, we don't recommend sharing just that. You can absolutely consolidate under a single shared 1Password folder, as long as the beginning of the separate agilekeychains are different (e.g. 1Password.agilekeychain and HerName.agilekeychain).