password management

I’ve been using KeePass to keep track of all my passwords for several years now, since 2007. I use KeePass 1.x on my Windows machines, KeePassX on my Mac, and iKeePass on iOS. I keep my KeePass file on DropBox, so it stays in sync on the Mac and Windows machines, no problem. And iKeePass pulls the file in from DropBox every time I open it. (I don’t think I can save changes back to DropBox though. If there’s a way to do that, it’s not intuitive.) iKeePass works well enough, but it’s not great, and it hasn’t been udpated since 2012. So, I’m (once again) looking for something better.

I started using an app called DataVault in 2010, but I never really got that far with it. I had the Mac client and iOS client working, but syncing was a hassle, and it was just easier to stick with KeePass. I think the syncing situation with DataVault has probably gotten better since the last time I looked at it, but I really don’t want to go back to it.

This week, I decided to see what was out there in the way of alternative KeePass clients for iOS. I tried MiniKeePass, which is a free open-source program, with source available on GitHub. It’s being actively maintained, and can open files from DropBox, so that’s all good. But, to open a file from DropBox, you have to go into the DropBox program itself, find your KeePass file, then choose MiniKeePass from the “open in” menu. So it’s a bit unwieldy. Once it’s opened, you can just pull it up from within MiniKeePass, but it will never update automatically. To pull in a new version of the file, you have to go back to DropBox. So, it’s a nice enough program, but not quite perfect.

I’m thinking about giving up on KeePass and giving 1Password another try. I’d messed around with it previously, but never really talked myself into committing to it. There were various issues with older versions that kept me from getting too excited about it. But I think I may take another shot at it. They currently have Mac, Windows, and iOS clients, so that’s good. And they support keeping the database in sync with DropBox, so that’s also good. (I’m not sure how seamless that is on iOS, but it’s likely better than iKeePass or MiniKeePass.)

One possible sticking point: 1Password used to support import from KeePass, but they dropped that in version 4 (I think), and I don’t know if they added it back for version 5 (but I don’t think they did). But, really, I should probably take this opportunity to clean up that database and re-organize everything. I’m just not looking forward to how much work it’ll take to do that.