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1Password 3

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# 1Password data file sync solutions

All of your 1Password information—including Logins, Secure Notes, Software Licenses, Wallet items, and more—is saved in a data file named 1Password.agilekeychain. If you want to be able to use your 1Password information on more than one computer, there are a number of third-party solutions for keeping this file in sync, our personal favorite being Dropbox.

## Dropbox

Dropbox is a file syncing and sharing service that works on Mac OS X, Windows, Linux, iOS, Android, and Blackberry. It skyrocketed in popularity in recent years because of its security, fast sync speed, reliability, and flexibility. It offers 2 GB of space—far more than the Agile Keychain needs—for free! When you install Dropbox, it creates a folder on your computer that looks and acts like any other folder. The difference is that when you save or update files in this folder, the changes are immediately synchronized with your Dropbox storage space “in the cloud” and any other computers on which you’ve installed Dropbox.

Dropbox features “versioning,” which means it maintains previous versions of a file in case you ever need to recover an old edition. While all files are kept private to your account by default, Dropbox also allows you to share files and folders with other users and even collaborate on them.

Because of these and other features, including support for 1Password’s unique Mac-based “file bundle” format, Dropbox is a great choice for syncing your 1Password data file between all your computers. In fact, 1PasswordAnywhere works great from Dropbox’s website! Here’s how you can configure Dropbox syncing on your Mac.

## MobileMe and iDisk

Because of the issues we and our customers have experienced when using iDisk to sync the 1Password data file, we recommend against syncing via MobileMe’s iDisk. Instead, please use one of the file-based syncing solutions described in this document.

## Other Sync Solutions

The 1Password data file is a file bundle that also uses resource forks (metadata), you should find a sync tool that’ll understand those file formats. It is possible to sync without those file formats across computers but this may require 1Password to rebuild the data file each time to rebuild the missing forks.

There are many third-party sync solutions made by other software companies, including SugarSync, FolderShare, ChronoSync, rsync (arRsync), and Unison. While this is not an exhaustive list, it includes some popular options and is a great starting point for finding a solution that suits your needs. If there are certain known issues, the information will be provided here at the bottom of this document.

If you need a solution to sync with 1Password on your iOS device(s), Dropbox is currently the only option. Here’s how you can get automatic syncing across all your devices with Dropbox. Dropbox also support both file bundles and resource forks as of version 0.8.

File-based sync solutions are very simple in nature, and simple is good! By being simple, these tools are fast, robust, and many (like Dropbox) even provide revision history so you can “go back in time” and restore accidentally deleted information. As well, they are usually able to sync a changed file to all your machines in just a few seconds. By doing things so quickly, the chance of modifying the same file on multiple machines simultaneously is greatly reduced.

## Issues with other Sync Solutions

### SugarSync

SugarSync does not support either file bundles or resource forks, as mentioned by the SugarSync Documentations. You’d need to close 1Password before syncing to the other computers and repair the keychain on those computers after the sync is done.

### ChronoSync

The following settings are required to sync the 1Password data file correctly:

- Unidirectional Sync Only (Make sure you set it to sync from the newest to the oldest computer)
- Dissect Packages ON (In the Options panel, under “Special File/Folder Handling”, switch to “Custom” and check “Dissect Packages”)

### RSync

RSync tools should use the -E or –extended-attributes on Macs which will copy the resource forks along with the extended attributes

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