Why does 1Password save full URLs?

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carrer
carrer
Community Member
in 1Password in the Browser

So far, I'm really liking 1Password – it works pretty well for my usage patterns. What I dislike the most is that it insists on saving the full URL for newly saved logins. I would much prefer it if it simply saved the domain, or at least provided an option for doing so.

I've imported hundreds of logins into 1Password. I don't recall ever in my life wishing that a particular login would only apply to a specific page within a domain. More importantly, whatever comes after the domain on a typical registration page tends to be irrelevant noise and has nothing to do with the actual login page that will be used from there on.

Browsers' password managers don't save full URLs, either. It's also unclear if 1Password even uses the path information in URL matching. From what I can gather, it only looks at the domain.

Is there a short answer to why 1Password behaves this way? :)

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Comments

  • matthew_ag
    matthew_ag
    1Password Alumni
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    Hi @carrer,

    Thanks for writing in. The website field is used in two ways:

    1. Domain matching.

      When you're on a log in web page, 1Password will take the sub-domain and base domain and use them to match against a Login using the domain part of the website fields. For this purpose, 1Password ignores the "path" part of the website field during the matching process.

    2. Go & Fill.

      You can have multiple website fields in a Login item. The first is used for Go & Fill which is where you open the 1Password mini by clicking on the 1Password browser button, search for a Login item and then select it. After you do this, 1Password will direct the browser to open the web address stored in the first website field. It's recommended to set this to the log in page for the website because once the page is loaded, 1Password will attempt to fill that Login. It turns your Login items into bookmarks that automatically log you in! :chuffed:

    I hope that helps. Please let us know if we can be of further assistance.

    Best regards,
    Matthew

  • carrer
    carrer
    Community Member
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    @matthew_ag,

    Right, I understand how it works.

    My point is, the URL of a typical sign-up page often has nothing to do with the actual login page, making the autosaved URL useless. When this happens, "Go & Fill" doesn't work anyway until I save the correct URL manually.

    (Also, I just like to keep my credential database clean, with most entries associated with the domain's root URL and nothing else.)

    So basically, every time after saving a login, I now have to go to 1Password and replace the URL it just saved for me. This is something of an annoyance.

    I would love it if there was some way to control the behavior. A couple of ideas:

    • The "Save Login" button could be split in two – one for saving the full URL, the other for saving the domain only.

    • The dialog could have an extra field displaying the full URL, which the user could edit right then and there.

  • littlebobbytables
    littlebobbytables
    1Password Alumni
    Options

    Greetings @carrer,

    We do try to consider every proposal but I'm doubtful we'll alter this. It's just my thoughts but here is my reasoning.

    Full URL versus FQDN (Fully Qualified Domain Name) only. This wouldn't affect any matching done by 1Password as all matching automatically strips any path from the URL. Saving just the FQDN would also not help with open and fill in most cases. If a Login item is saved on the login page for the site though there is a very reasonable chance that open and fill will work.

    Any changes, especially those that affect the UI (User Interface) have to be considered carefully. We know from experience that if done wrong a change can easily have a negative impact. We need to consider whether any given change is an improvement for the majority of our users and if misuse whatever the reason why can make life harder for the user. For the vast majority of our users I don't believe offering the ability to edit the URL before saving will be a benefit but I can see it causing confusion when they find open and fill isn't working as it should.

    I could easily be wrong and it may be others see value in your proposal but my gut feeling is 1Password will not offer this convenience any time soon.

This discussion has been closed.