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Safari-to-1Password search bookmarklet for iOS
1Password on iOS is the best way I've found to manage secure passwords, but the 4.0 version did not make it easy to search for passwords straight from Safari, iCab or another browser (well, not Chrome, which doesn't support bookmarklets). The recent 4.1 release added several bug-fixes and added two URL schemes: Added support for ophttp:// and ophttps:// URLs. To open 1Password from Mobile Safari, simply type "op" in front of the address. Added support for onepassword://search/search_text to open 1Password and perform search. Unfortunately, opening 1Password's browser from Safari (or iCab) isn't really what I want. I want to be able to use iCab and retrieve login information from 1Password. Generally what I want to do is search 1Password for the current domain, but it's not an exact science. For example, if I'm at "www.instapaper.com" I might want to search for "instapaper.com" or just "instapaper". I could have just thrown up an empty prompt, but I didn't want to type any more than I had to, and I still think it's easier to delete what is not necessary than type what is necessary. What I needed was a compromise. Instead of an empty prompt or just automatically searching for current domain, I decided to combine them, and put up a prompt showing the current domain information pre-filled, but editable. It works like this: 1) Tap the bookmarklet and JavaScript prompt will appear with the current domain name pre-filled in the editable area: 2) If you're happy with what's in the prompt area, just tap 'OK' (But in my example I'm going to assume I want to search for 'instapaper' instead of 'www.instapaper.com') 3) Once you have the search term you want, tap 'OK' and Safari will ask you to confirm if you want to open this in 1Password: After you tap 'Open', 1Password will open (prompting for your Master Password if necessary), and then search for the term. Voilà! You can find my bookmarklet at Github. (Again, please note that I don't know JavaScript very well, so I've pieced this together from other examples. If you can make suggestions on how to improve it, please do, either here or at Github.) Update 2013-02-11: Thanks to Duane Toler for suggesting an improvement in the comments below. I have updated the Gist so you will get his corrected version, which will search for the root domain (i.e. 'google.com' rather than 'www.google.com'). Note that the version in the comments has a mismatched quote, but the Github version does not. Remember, you'll need version 4.1 of 1Password on iOS for this to work. Other 1Password for iOS articles you might be interested in: 1) ios-browser-pw-integration: This is proof of concept code that shows how an iOS password management app (like 1Password) could use URL schemes and JavaScript bookmarklets to communicate with mobile Safari and Chrome to make it easier for users to fill in login forms on websites. 2) MacStories has some more information on using the new search terms, including a bookmarklet to open the current page from Safari in 1Password's internal browser.
Secure browsing on iOS in Safari or iCab Mobile
A friend who values her privacy asked: "How do you delete Google search history on an iPhone?" There are two ways to do this, the first of which is to go to the Settings app, scroll down to 'Safari' and then click the 'Clear History' button as shown above. The second can be done from inside Safari itself. Tap the 'bookmarks' icon on the toolbar, then select History (note: if you don't see 'History' tap on whatever button is shown at the top-left until you see 'Bookmarks' at the top of the screen), then tap 'Clear.' This might be easier to understand visually, so here are some screenshots: Private Browsing in Safari Mobile Safari now has a 'Private Browsing' option to prevent history items, searches, cookies, and form data from being stored. Private Browsing is great for short web browsing sessions, but what if you want to be able to keep your history and cookies and bookmarks but not allow anyone who uses your iPhone or iPad to be able to access them? You can't do that with Safari, but you can do it with iCab. iCab Mobile: Everything Safari does, and much more iCab Mobile (AKA iCab) is a US$1.99 app that continues to be my browser of choice on my iPad and iPhone. I reviewed iCab last year, but let me focus on some of iCab's privacy features here. iCab offers Private Browsing, of course, but it also offers many more privacy controls than Safari, such as the ability to delete history, cookies, saved form data, HTTP Auth credentials, databases, and local storage. You can also set it to automatically delete history, cookies, databases, and/or local storage when quitting the app. As if that wasn't enough, you can password protect the entire application, so anyone else who launches the app is unable to see your bookmarks, history, or anything else. Once password protected, it's possible to enable a 'Guest Mode' to let someone use iCab but still keep your information protected. In my opinion, iCab is also better at everything else you use a browser for. iCab sync bookmarks, filters, search engines, and/or settings using iCloud. It lets you change the Browser ID (User Agent) which can be handy for sites that restrict access to certain kinds of browsers or automatically redirect mobile browsers to a stripped-down version of the site. You can download files right to iCab, and then either store them in iCab or open them in other apps. You can even upload those files to Dropbox. Images can be saved from websites directly to Dropbox. The only downside to using iCab is that Apple does not allow any browser except Safari to be set as the default browser, so any web links clicked in other applications like Mail will continue to open in Safari. In practice that doesn't bother me too much, because Safari is a very good mobile browser. If I want to open a page from Safari in iCab, I can do one of two things: I can tap on the URL and change the "http://" or "https://" to "web://" or "webs://" -- which opens the current page in iCab -- or I can install the Open in iCab bookmark. iCab Mobile also supports x-callback-url which helps iCab interact with other iOS applications. If you don't know what x-callback-url is, don't worry about it, but if you do know what it is, you'll be glad to know iCab supports it. To some people, spending two bucks on a browser when Safari is free sounds like wasting money. To me, spending two bucks for a much better browser is a complete bargain. iCab is the 3rd-party app that I use most often on my iOS devices, and it continues to be improved at a much faster rate than Safari.
Unofficial "Look Up in 1Password" bookmarklet for iOS 5
1Password is one of my most-used iOS apps, since I need it to log in to any site which requires a password. Since the introduction of 1Password on iOS, Agile has provided a bookmarklet which will open 1Password and then search for the current domain. That helps the fact that 1Password can't be fully integrated with Safari on iOS. Unfortunately the bookmarklet stopped working in iOS 5. According to the company's blog, Agile has discontinued the bookmarklet and won't be updating it. They are working on "something better coming up for the future." They went on to add that they want to make 1Password's own integrated browser "more usable as "a Safari replacement, or rather partial replacement." While I will reserve judgment until I see it, I have serious reservations about this plan. I have used iCab Mobile on the iPad for over a year. iCab is a superior browser to Safari, but it is still difficult to use instead of Safari because iOS doesn't allow you to change the default browser. It's hard to imagine that 1Password's integrated browser will be better than iCab. Fortunately, two 1Password users, Kevin Yank and Brendan Averett, have created a new Look Up in 1Password bookmarklet which is compatible with iOS 5. You can either copy that link, or use this: javascript:window.location='onepassword://'+window.location.href.substring(window.location.href.indexOf('//')+2 I have successfully tested it on iOS 5 and 1Password Pro (with both Safari and iCab).
iCab Mobile for iOS is like a pro version of Safari
When I first used Safari on my iPhone, I was blown away by how much better it was than any other mobile browser, but since then, Apple hasn't done much with it. A recent Safari update brought significant speed increases, but there are many other limitations that finally led me to try something else, namely iCab Mobile. Is improving your web browsing experience on the iPad or iPhone/iPod touch worth $2? Before you object to paying for a web browser, let me remind you of a few Apple apps and their alternatives. On iOS, Apple gave you a Notes app, but many people prefer Simplenote or other text editors or note programs because they offer more features. If you subscribe to MobileMe, you have a 20 GB iDisk, but anyone who has tried Dropbox knows that it works much better. Apple gave you iCal, but BusyCal is a lot better. Apple gave you TextEdit in OS X, but BBEdit and TextMate are much better. You can read RSS feeds in Mail or Safari, but do you? Likewise, Apple gave us Safari, which is "good," but iCab offers many features that make it "great."
SlideRocket brings web presentations to iPhone and iPad with HTML5
Since the dawn of time, traveling professionals have sought easier ways to present on the go. Pico projectors! Netbooks! Converting presentations to video to show them on iPhones! Then there was Keynote on the iPad, and it was good. Not great, however: presenters with libraries of PPT content have had to convert them over, and keeping your decks up to date with the latest and greatest from the sales department is a drag. Wouldn't it be better and easier if there was a nice cloud-based solution that played well with Mobile Safari? Enter SlideRocket's new HTML5 player; the freemium web service now supports playing back (not editing) presentations on iPhone, iPad and iPod touch with full-screen video, a handful of good-looking builds and transitions, and all the analytics and version control you want. While the normal SlideRocket player requires Flash or AIR to show content, this one works fine without them. Click on to learn more about SlideRocket's capabilities, and see a video demo of the HTML5 playback in action.
iCab 4.0
File this one under, 'they still make that app?' iCab, the Mac only browser in case you haven't heard of it, has hit 4.0. This version marks the app's triumphant entrance into the 'Cocoa only' club, which means it should run faster (according to the developers, I don't want to start a Carbon vs. Cocoa discussion here). iCab offers up a number of interesting features including per URL 'filters' which let you block specific content from pages (like cookies that come from a site other than the site you're visiting). It also has a few interesting views that show you all the links on a page in a side window, and the source of the page.iCab is shareware, so you can use it for free but you'll then have to deal with a gentle reminder window that helpfully points out that you can register your copy for $25.
