Need Safari extension reeaaaal bad!
News from WWDC 2022 - support for Manifest 3 is coming. A nice overview of the planned changes can be seen in this video.
Could anyone just publish a converted extension for safari? This would make Passbolt much more attractive for new customers, even if the app then contains a few bugs.
Hi and welcome @desinox!
We aim to provide a browser extension for Safari. And yes, youâre right, we can use tools to convert an existing web extension into a Safari web extension. But, still, there are a lot of issues that we encountered with a simple conversion.
The extension is not usable at all without modification but, we did some R&D to see what needs to be fixed in order to provide a working extension.
It turns out that itâs not as simple as it seems at first glance, we faced different incompatibilities due to our approach in the architecture of the code and also with the fact that Safariâs JavaScript engine is not 100% aligned with the other browsersâ engine.
Although we have a much clearer idea now that we run that experimentation we planned to provide an important update for the currently existing web extensions first.
You might know already but Google Chrome and Firefox will stop supporting our current version of the web extension manifest in January 2023 (especially Google Chrome) which constrains us to put it as a priority (the changes are too big to be done later).
And as we need to change some part of the architecture of the code, we see it as an opportunity to solve some issues we encountered for the Safari web extension.
Thatâs why we put it in this order.
And also, there is no ETA at the moment for the Safari web extension.
Cheers,
Steph
2 Likes
Thatâs a very thoughtful approach. Thanks for letting us know.
Would it be possible, as an intermediate step, to allow the iOS app to be used on the Mac? This should be possible at least for Apple Silicon Macs. This would make the whole Passbolt experience practically browser independent. Perhaps even an integration in the Mac password engine could be similar to what exists in your iOS code âŚ
I really can understand why Safari isnât supportend.
After the death of IE11, Safari took itâs place by being the worst browser to support.
There are so many not or wrong implemented web standards in that thing.
Well under iOS there isnât an other option for the engine, so I think most iPhone users wouldnât get the difference, as there browsers are all safari at core.
Lack of Safari support is still a significant issue today for our company.
At the very least, a Mac app that supports Passbolt that would load from a URL (this is what Slack does today) would be wonderful.
1 Like
Would it be feasible to allow the iOS app to be run on Apple Silicon Macs? This should solve at least part of the problem, i.e. removing the reliance on a second browser.
1 Like
@mkerz-dcc we were exploring this, we had a prototype but there are still some issues with password autofill / keyboard, etc. so we didnât enable it.
2 Likes
Today,
Safari is still 20% of the market, and Passbolt seems to prefer support Firefox 6% of the market.
@remy did you mean that there is a Desktop Application in developement for Mac?
If you can relate to this topic it will be great: Desktop Application (Mac/Windows)
@clovs there was an attempt at converting/extending the ios mobile app to desktop (or at least tablet) app but it was not deemed a feasible endeavour. So weâre back to square one.
Historically we favored Firefox yes, as it was the first browser supported by Passbolt. Now we support all browsers that have a âregularâ implementation of web extension format (e.g. brave, edge, firefox, chrome, etc.). Safari being apple product it has itâs own quirks and ways of working that differs from other browser for example when it comes to how webextension are loaded or how permissions work. Weâve done a prototype that kind of works but that is not ready for production. As mentionned earlier our goal is first to finish the migration to Manifest V3, then add safari support. Bear with us, we donât have hundreds of developers on the payroll yet.
1 Like
As @Nugorra, I can also understand why Safari is not supported.
If if you had a real Desktop App federing the all stuff (the vault).
Would it not be easier and more secure to make some browser extension
that just speak to the DesktopApp (the vault)?
Yeah because, all the stuff in a browser extension scare me a little 
That would be a big shift of architectures. Also there are a lot of companies that donât want desktop apps, so it would need be one of the webextension mode.
Mailvelope did this a while back (and we even helped), they have an option where the extension would talk to gnupg directly, for people who donât want the crypto to be in the browser. From what I have heard from Thomas, the project lead there, itâs a support nightmare as these integrations are brittle.
2 Likes
Iâm not an Apple user but was reading about the Orion browser. It is reported to work with Chrome and Firefox extensions. Has anyone tried it?
So I was watching the Update to webkit and wwdc2022âŚ
The person was signing into the App demoing âPassKeysâ and the username was âgarretâ Lol. Reminded me of a familiar name 
Just an update. I think Making a Safari plugin might have just gotten easier⌠i think, due to the introduction of Passkeys.
To checkout the username âgarretâ itâs at 02:04-02:06
Regards,
Bond
2 Likes
Itâs always seemed to be commonly spelled with one T, so this is a surprise to see. Full disclosure: itâs not me, and yes my parents named me after a furniture store.
Thatâs interesting, I just assumed someone might have taken the username âGarretâ and you simply added the extra âtâ. Good to know 
That thought never even crossed my mind until now. Completely forgot that thereâs a furniture store as well. You shall own that store one day
Sorry for the off topic sidebar lol
Regards,
Bond
2 Likes
Hello,
I am moving from Kaspersky and itâs very difficult to find a password manager supporting all browsers/desktops.
As @clovs suggest a desktop application can certainly help suporting more easily all browsers.
It would be a big shift of architectures at first, but a game changer at the end.
And a real european alternative!!
3 Likes
I made a little search about building a Safari app extension, and how adblockers do.
And to do it you have to build an xcode application,
this application will be displayed in your Application Folder with other desktop Apps.
Ok there is no interface, but itâs like a desktop app.
If you open it, it open a desktop window and you can have a link to safari or have some parameters about the safari extension.
From the Apple Developers Documentation
But at the end this is just a Desktop Application, with only the Safari extension part.
Donât hesitate to upvote this thread => Desktop Application
8 Likes