Persistent Bitwarden UI and maintain unsaved data

[anon15241427]

@Nathan_Neulinger

I’d be fine if the “auto save” was to a “Draft” of some sort, but not auto-save overwriting the actual entry.

• I agree with this idea, it would be better to have a draft.

[Nathan_Neulinger]

If it had that capability of capturing that upon a click outside - yes, that “do you want to exit without saving” would eliminate so many “ah, crap” moments.

[anon15241427]

@Nathan_Neulinger What do you think of this general idea?

image description

1. Concept name: “Deep freeze”
2. All fields are disabled, only if the user wants to modify, change the data… in which case the data can be changed, modified.

How it work? use cases - my idea

1. Use case 1: User adds information.
2. Use case 2 - “Autosave”: If there are any fields changed - a copy is saved containing the fields or the field changed - the copy stays in the draft folder. - “based on Evernote”
3. Use case 3 - “Deep freeze”: By default everything is disabled until the user wants to modify or add something. “my new idea… for community Bitwarden”
4. Use case 4 - “A confirmation message to see if the data has been saved or not”: This occurs if the user leaves the add item page without clicking the save button. It also happens in another way, if the internet connection goes down - the user has a message on the screen if he wants to save or not. - “Persistent Bitwarden UI and maintain unsaved data”

Notes

1. In all cases i tried to help the Bitwarden community to avoid any data loss
2. “Best formula”: “Persistent Bitwarden UI and maintain unsaved data”+“concept: Deep freeze”+“Autosave”

[anon15241427]

@everyone @bw-admin @Nathan_Neulinger What do you think of this general idea?

case 1

Notes - case 1

1. User adds information. By default everything is disabled until the user wants to modify or add something.
2. If there are any fields changed - a copy is saved containing the fields or the field changed - the copy stays in the draft folder.

case 2

Notes - case 2

1. This occurs if the user leaves the add item page without clicking the save button.
2. It also happens in another way: If the internet connection goes down - the user has a message on the screen if he wants to save or not. - “Persistent Bitwarden UI and maintain unsaved data”.

idea

1. User adds item. Note: Item is disabled until the user clicks on the field they want to change or add. This prevents the data from being corrupted.
2. If the item changes, call the autosave function.
3. If the user has not confirmed the changes send an confirmation message to see if the data has been saved or not.

Why is your idea interesting and relevant?

1. This avoids indefinitely repeated data by the auto-save function.
2. This prevents the data from being corrupted.
3. Prevent data from being lost or not saved.

[JohnT]

Super vote for this. Relatively new bitwarden user. I must have already done this 5 times on 5 different sites - make a new login in BW, have it generate a new password, paste into the website, poof the BW window is totally gone and my login unsaved. Maybe it’s still in the clipboard.

Other annoying case is creating a login, have to click to another screen to set up an OTP, and there’s no way to keep BW open too. So I have to click to open BW, click on the login, figure out if i need to click an icon or just the item itself, click edit… wait I didn’t copy the secret yet and now I have to start again.

These are all in firefox extension, haven’t tried other methods yet.

IMO the window should just stay open when editing in all cases.

[bw-admin]

Hey @JohnT, have you tried clicking the pop-out button in the top left for a persistent window, or using the Firefox sidebar functionality?

[never]

As the title suggests, I’d like to request a draft feature for new items/credentials. Meaning as soon as you begin to create a new item, that item’s state is saved as a draft item (perhaps under a new folder called “Drafts”). Once the item gets saved, the draft version disappears.

Think of it like composing an email in Gmail: as soon as you start writing, a draft has been saved which updates as you add to it.

I’m not proud of this, but I’ve lost credentials a few times because of this. Particularly on mobile, it’s easy to switch away from BW while registering on a new site, and forget that you haven’t saved the new item in BW. But it’s happened to me on desktop too.

In cases of using burner emails etc for privacy, this would mean you get locked out forever. This happened to me once, hence this request.

Thanks for your time

[bigsmile]

I love Bitwarden web browser extension. I click on the web browser extension icon to make the Bitwarden window appear.

However, the moment I click anywhere on the web page, the Bitwarden window disappears and I have to reclick on the web browser extension icon to bring the window back.

It would be nice if there was an option to make the Bitwarden window persistent and you had to click an X on the window to make it disappear rather than it disappearing by itself.

[bigsmile]

@dh024 My post above was a separate post and has been merged into this topic.

I just wanted to clarify that this topic is about making the UI persist when there is unsaved changes. My feature request is about keeping the UI persistent even when there are no unsaved changes. I’m not sure if that makes a difference. If it is doesn’t then it is fine to keep it in this topic.

[dh024 (David H)]

Hi @bigsmile - let’s keep these merged since fulfilling the feature request in either case is a solution to both issues.

Also, have you tried the ‘popout’ feature on the Bitwarden browser extension? If you click on the arrow icon in the top-left corner of the extension, you can float a persistent window. And if you use Firefox as your browser, you can also load Bitwarden in the sidebar. Cheers!

[bigsmile]

Thanks! Sadly the popup still causes the window to go behind. I can arrange the windows to put it side by side, but it would be neat if could be made persistent. Thanks again for your help!

[dh024 (David H)]

Ah - I see what you are asking for now. Thanks for the clarification.

You might consider voting for this feature request, then:

Inline autofill menu (formerly known as overlay popup interface)

Implement an overlay popup content script that will assist with autofilling in-line within the website. The popup will overlay the website using shadow-DOM techniques. The overlay will be opened by clicking an icon that is presented with login form fields on the page. Example: [image] Original issue: Overlay Popup · Issue #3 · bitwarden/clients · GitHub

[bigsmile]

Thanks for your continued help! I guess I’m not explaining well! I am referring to making the main bitwarden window persistent (the one you get when you click on the extension).

There are lots of times when I need to copy information from the “notes” area of a website entry in Bitwarden (because the website requires extra information to log in beyond just a username and password). At the moment, when I copy information and paste it, the Bitwarden window disappears. So I have to open it back up and find the site again. It would be so much better if there was an option to make it persistent. Thanks!

[dh024 (David H)]

I don’t believe that the web extension frameworks will permit that. The options I presented (existing and proposed) are as close as you are going to get. Sorry!

[JohnT]

I have tried it now, and yes the popup function does kind of work around the issue, at least it keeps the info there when I click back to the webpage. But it’s very easy to forget to pop it out, and just use the extension window to do something like generate a new one, and my new password disappears into the aether (ok, the buried generation history) before I remember to copy it or hit save.

[bw-admin]

Thanks for the feedback everyone, just a reminder for any new visitors to this thread that Firefox/Opera users can take advantage of the sidebar functionality to create a persistent UI in the main browser window.

[dpattersonnz (David)]

Hi Bitwarden community, first post here, forgive me if this has been requested already:

Clicking outside the extension window causes it to close and lose any unsaved changes. When adding notes to an item for example, I frequently try to copy text from elsewhere on the page (or another app/program), and I click outside intending to select the text, but in doing so I lose any edits and thus I repoen the extension window, find the item I was working on, click to edit the item, and then repeat the process of making changes.

The obvious solution (of course!) is to click Save “” before leaving the window, but I’m a doofus and I don’t always remember to do that. A second option is to click “” to pop out to a new window, which keeps the window open and reduces the chances of me closing it unintentionally AND increases the chances I’ll remember to save. However the pop-out feature is almost always an afterthought when I’ve already forgotten to save in the first place (…and an inelegant workaround at that, since it requires juggling multiple windows… terrible I know!)

Therefore, to help clumsy users like me, would it be possible to enable a feature that:

1. Prompts the user to save changes before leaving the extension window; or

2. Saves changes automatically (and if possible, allows the user to revert to previous save states); or

3. Keeps the extension docked to the browser, i.e. ensures it stays open in the event of wayward clicks; or

4. [insert some other solution here]?

On the scale of everything, it’s such a minor problem, but an annoying one that I’m sure many have run into, and one that I hope invites/inspires an easy fix. Thank you shark den for your consideration.

[bwcu]

Feature name

• Preserve search field text after opening and closing a search result like on mobile app

Feature function

• What will this feature do differently?
  Currently, when searching for an item, picking a result, and closing it, the search field is cleared out. Instead, the search field should stay populated until you clear it yourself. This is how it already works on the iOS app.
• What benefits will this feature bring?
  Right now if you search and want to check out a bunch of the results, you have to re-type the search each time after choosing an item. If the search was preserved, it’d make it easier and faster to check out many results one after another, and then just clear the search when you’re done.

[MP715 (Michael P)]

When editing a vault item, there needs to be a warning about unsaved items if one should click off the browser extension. Or, instead of reverting back to the original, keep edit window active. I must have done this 50 times already (You’d think I’d learn by now). Such a pain to go back in, open the item, click edit, etc etc.

[Murz (Alexey Murz Korepov)]

As I understand, it’s impossible to make the popup window persistent in Webextensions API, so the optimal way is to auto-save the window state (opened item, all data entered in forms, focus on form element, etc) on “window hide” event, and restore it after re-opening. Or maybe even make this ‘auto-save’ always on each state change.