Beta expired and no new download offered

johnmacg
johnmacg
Community Member

I am a fully paid up 1Password user but for some time I've been participating in the beta program. From time to time a beta version will expire and i get a link to update to the new version. Today it expired and I was given no opportunity to update. I now cannot use 1 Password at all and I need to get information from it urgently. Help!

Incidentally, I've done a new sign-up for this forum with a different email address because I've obviously been a member in the past with my usual gmail address and I have no record of my password. Foolishly, I probably put it in 1Password!


1Password Version: Unable to see
Extension Version: Ditto
OS Version: Lollipop
Sync Type: Dropbox

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Comments

  • Hey @johnmacg. We sent out a beta update yesterday, but I'm not sure why you didn't get the email. Can you please sign up for our beta newsletter again, just to verify that you're on our list?

    In the meantime, you can work around this issue by manually changing your system date, so your Android will still allow you to use it. I suggest that you change the system date to September. However, you may have to try a different time period.

    You should then be able to launch 1Password normally and sync your vault. Then you will have a safe copy backed up of your agilekeychain before you update the app. At that point, since your vault is safe, you will be able to update the beta version without losing any data.

  • EnerJi
    EnerJi
    Community Member

    I just wanted to weigh in briefly and express how unbelievably frustrated and disappointed I am in the way Agile Bits handled this beta expiration.

    You've known for three months that the beta would expire today - waiting until the day before to push out an update, on a day when many people might be traveling for the holidays, is incredibly short-sighted and dare-I-say-it, amateurish.

    Like many, I DID NOT receive an email notification (let alone an in-app or device notification), despite being in the beta with the same email address almost from the beginning of the Android beta program.

    Like others, I was locked out of 1Password for several hours due to travel and poor connectivity leaving me unable to update. Like others, I received a permission error when I tried to upgrade due to Android 6.x. Like others, I was unable to get into my email to retrieve an OLD email (that was no longer cached offline) in order to find the link to download the new APK.

    Guys, the holidays are stressful enough. This is at least the second time a beta has expired either before or very soon after a new beta was pushed.

    THIS JUST SHOULD NOT HAPPEN. THERE IS NO EXCUSE.

    I don't care if you were hoping to push a "big" update and a last-minute bug pushed the timeline. An extended expiration beta should have been pushed at least two weeks ago, "just in case" the timeline was pushed.

    P.S. Please fix your email listserv, as apparently many people are not receiving them. Who knows how many email updates we've missed.

  • scgf
    scgf
    Community Member

    I've tried re-joining the beta list twice more now and still not got an email confirmation or link to the new beta. How can I get hold of it?

  • EnerJi
    EnerJi
    Community Member
    edited December 2015

    @scgf Not sure if I should post here or if it will even work, but I imagine the mods will remove if not appropriate.

    removed by AgileBits

  • peri
    edited December 2015

    Hey @EnerJi. I'm so sorry for the trouble the beta update has caused you, and especially during the holidays. I certainly feel you with the holiday stress. My birthday is during the Christmas season so it's super stressful for me as well with all of the get-togethers, cooking, cleaning, shopping, planning, traveling, and what not. Your sentiments are not lost on me. :)

    As you speculated, we did not intend for anyone to get locked out of the beta. We cut it too close this time, and it seems that a lot of people weren't able to update in time. I'll let the team know that this was too small of an update window, especially given the season.

    I did indeed remove the APK link, as we prefer to keep that available to our beta testers, and no publicly available. :) I have privately messaged, scgf with the link they need, and they're all set now. Thanks for the help!

    With regards to the listserv, the newsletter link I provided is to make sure that people are on our beta newsletter mailing list, and if not, they'll be instantly emailed a download link to the beta. We don't send out a newsletter for every beta update, though--just for the bigger ones.

    The minor updates get emailed to the address that users have registered with HockeyApp, and a notification pops up in the app when the app is launched.. When we release any beta update, the email will go out to HockeyApp's list with the news of an update. I received the update email from HockeyApp on the 22nd, but I'm not sure if others did or not. It may be that some people use a secondary email account for HockeyApp, and don't check it often. I know I have one or two email addresses that I don't check regularly.

    So I hear you loud and clear, and given that many people didn't get the update email before the beta expiry, I'm letting the team know that this was problematic for many of our testers, and that we need to give a longer timeframe for updates from now on. :)

    Thanks for your feedback and happy holidays!

  • macdonst
    macdonst
    Community Member

    How do I get the updated beta? Hockey app is still showing one from May and I didn't get an update link via email?

  • dymos
    dymos
    Community Member

    FWIW I ran in to this problem as well and performing an uninstall and subsequent reinstall of the 1password app from the play store got me going again, I'm not sure if I'm on the beta now but I've signed up again for the beta list :unamused:

  • Hey @macdonst. I've just messaged you the link you need. Please let me know if that does the trick!

    @dymos, The version available in the Play Store is the stable version, as the beta is only available through HockeyApp currently. I've sent you a private message with the download link to the beta APK if you'd like to switch back. Let me know how that goes!

  • dymos
    dymos
    Community Member

    @peri ah thanks! I'm back on he beta now :chuffed:

  • That's good news! :)

  • mzel
    mzel
    Community Member

    Same problem as everybody else here. Can you PM me the link to beta version?

  • dmacx
    dmacx
    Community Member

    Please send me a link too, And please switch the beta program to Google Play. Then we get our updates right through Google App Updates and not this outdated Hockey App. I never get an email and I can't install the beta on a new phone, because there is no chance to get the link. Time to switch to Google Beta.

  • crism
    crism
    Community Member

    Same issue here. Can you send me the link, too? :+1:

  • davamoore
    davamoore
    Community Member

    Please add me to the list of people to whom you're sending the beta link. I've been a user of 1Password apps (iOS and Android, paid and beta) for years, and am somewhat surprised by the lack of communication re: this beta expiration and missing/unavailable update. As with so many others, I was traveling for the holidays when the app stopped opening on my device and have had to muddle through -- a bit difficult during peak online shopping season!

  • davamoore
    davamoore
    Community Member

    One more thing to add: I re-signed up for the beta newsletter, as you instructed in the second post, above, but still haven't received my confirmation that I'm now on that list. Something seems amiss...

  • davamoore
    davamoore
    Community Member

    Link received, and it worked. Thank you!

  • I’m sorry to hear the beta expired for some of you, especially for folks that are travelling during the holidays. I PMed the download links to everyone that requested it, so check your inbox for them! The download link is the same as the one from Nik’s newsletter, and it points to the latest available beta version, which is 4.5.3b2 currently.

    Hope that helps! Let us know if you have any questions.

  • @dmacx Really happy you brought this up. We are reviewing Google Play for beta distributions at the moment! :)

  • crism
    crism
    Community Member
    edited December 2015

    As a developer I can recommend the beta channel a lot. I don't know how you guys release the Android App but it could fit perfectly in your release process.

  • Thanks for the feedback, @crism. We'll certainly be looking into this soon. :)

  • EnerJi
    EnerJi
    Community Member

    @peri Thanks for listening, and I hope your holidays have not been too stressful this year.

    I wanted to follow up on this part of your post:

    The minor updates get emailed to the address that users have registered with HockeyApp

    I don't recall ever registering an email address with HockeyApp, nor having ever received an email from them. Is this an iOS vs. Android difference, perhaps? Just to be on the safe side and thinking I might have not followed the beta sign-up instructions exactly, I re-registered for the beta newsletter a day or two ago, but similar to @davamoore, I have yet to receive any acknowledgement or confirmation.

    As an aside - I test several beta apps via Google Play, and it works much better than HockeyApp, with features like transparent auto-updates, for example. Would be nice to see you guys move to that platform so I can turn off the "enable third-party software" feature.

  • Sorry @EnerJi. That was my mistake. I've since talked to the team and I realized my problem. I receive the HockeyApp updates since I'm on the internal testing list. I should've verified that before responding. Sorry!

    For our beta testers, you'll be notified of the update when exiting and relaunching. You can also visit the HockeyApp link at any time (available in Nik's newsletters) and it will always lead to the latest beta build.

    That said, I've passed your feedback along to the team. We're looking into alternative channels for distribution (and Google Play tops the list) which will allow us to push updates automatically. so that this sort of thing doesn't happen again.

    Thanks for the well wishes! My holidays were great except that I ate way too much. I hope holidays were as well (minus the beta hiccup of course). :)

    Let me know if you have any other questions. Happy New Year!

  • pbroyles
    pbroyles
    Community Member

    @peri - Experiencing the same issues as described above. Can you please send me the link to the latest beta? I've also re-signed up to the newsletter, still awaiting my confirmation email. Thanks!

  • @pbroyles I just sent you the link, please check your PM. Thanks.

  • macdonst
    macdonst
    Community Member

    @saad I received the link and it worked but how do I get HockeyApp back to giving me beta updates?

  • @macdonst You should receive an in-app notification when a new update becomes available on HockeyApp. The download link to the beta should remain the same, so if you want to manually check, you can use it to find the latest beta version.

    To get important information from us, make sure you are signed up for our Android Beta newsletter! :)

  • EnerJi
    EnerJi
    Community Member

    @saad

    You should receive an in-app notification when a new update becomes available on HockeyApp.

    Which is not a reliable way of quickly informing users of an update, because it only works at startup, i.e. when launching the app after a reboot (rare) or after Android finally kicks the app from memory. Which for me, can still be several days. Hence the issue over the holidays with several people being locked out of the app. I really hope nothing like that happens ever again.

    There should be a push notification to inform users of the update. Which, come to think of it, you would get by default if you just used Google Play to push the beta.

    To get important information from us, make sure you are signed up for our Android Beta newsletter!

    Haven't received any beta news on the beta newsletter in months*. Would it have been too much trouble to send an email notification a few days before the app expired asking people to make sure to exit out of the app to receive the notification to upgrade? Oh and informing us that the upgrade wouldn't work on those of us early adopters (as many beta users are) using Android 6.0, and providing a courtesy link to download the updated version?

    *I just checked to confirm, and the last Android newsletter was received from Nik Lal on July 4. Either there is a problem with my receipt of your newsletters, or they sure don't come out very often. Not hard to see why people think Android is a neglected platform.

  • TWong1200
    TWong1200
    Community Member

    I've registered a handful of time to join the beta team and have not once received any emails to confirm my request, as stated I would from the sign up page. How do I get involved?

  • macdonst
    macdonst
    Community Member

    @saad I'm registered and haven't received an email since July of 2015.

  • @EnerJi It was indeed bad timing, and I apologize for the inconvenience. We don’t plan to release a beta update so close to the expiration of the previous build. We will try to avoid this going forward.

    The last Android beta newsletter was from the summer for version 4.5. We save them to announce big features, but I think it might have been appropriate for this use case.

    The biggest news is that we are switching to Google Play for beta distributions starting with the next update. This should eliminate these problems. Please keep an eye out for a newsletter in the next few weeks that will highlight how to get the new beta from Google Play when it becomes available.

This discussion has been closed.