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Vaultwarden: Unofficial Bitwarden compatible server written in Rust

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Re: Vaultwarden: Unofficial Bitwarden compatible server written in Rust

#21

Post by Jnr »

cloogshicer wrote: post #5

I evaluated this for a small business but came to the conclusion that self hosting this security critical software would cost more in work hours for initial setup and maintenance than just paying the cloud fees for a few years. Genuine question, in what scenario is the self hosting setup and maintenance worth it?

Not a business here, though using certain self hosted tools has paid off in work as well.

So as a hobbyist, when you have a handful of services you are self hosting, adding another one makes more sense.

And running 5+ different services is probably cheaper in the long term.

If you have the skills, initial setup takes minutes. If you lack the skills, it is a good idea to invest your time into learning those skills, they are very handy if you work in the software development field. It certainly has become very useful at work for me.

For me personally updates, backups, restores and deployments of containers are mostly automated and on average I don't spend more than an hour per month to maintain all of the already running services.

Also I don't see the time as being wasted, since I enjoy doing it. Watching TV or playing video games is probably worse and I still do that as well, same as many other people.

Re: Vaultwarden: Unofficial Bitwarden compatible server written in Rust

#22

Post by dewey »

HeatrayEnjoyer wrote: post #19
csomar wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I subscribed for two reasons: 1. To support their efforts and 2. They accept Bitcoin (and of course I paid with Bitcoin although the whole payment processing was garbage).

Bitcoin really isn't that anonymous

The parent didn't say they use Bitcoin for that feature though?

Re: Vaultwarden: Unofficial Bitwarden compatible server written in Rust

#24

Post by zikduruqe »

darthrupert wrote: post #23

I have successfully used this for some time, but migrated away to just pass because synchronizing a pass "db" with syncthing tends to work much better.

Pass, then syncing to a bare git repo inside your own network is the simplest way to go.

Re: Vaultwarden: Unofficial Bitwarden compatible server written in Rust

#26

Post by davidee »

After being fed up with AgileBits' (1P's owner) shenanigans (hiding critical threads on their user forum, ignoring customer voices wilfully, being generally dismissive of criticism), I decided to give Bitwarden a try.

I used it in conjunction with Vaultwarden for a year with the idea that I'd evaluate it as a family-wide replacement for 1P.

In the end I went back to 1P.

1P does some things amazingly well. Here's the shortlist:

- It loads quickly. This wasn't the reason I went back to 1P, but it loads an order of magnitude more quickly than any of Bitwarden's clients: Windows, Linux, iOS, Mac. Bitwarden is slow, slow, slow. I was willing to put up with it for freedom. I wanted Electron 1P to be awful. It's not. Electron Bitwarden kinda is...

- The (I can't believe I'm saying this) killer feature: being able to sort passwords by date (or well - being able to sort at all). If you use a password manager long enough, you'll have a lot of passwords. Sometimes you need to find one manually. Bitwarden made this far more difficult than it needs to be. There's no way to sort the passwords. You have to use the (lackluster) search.

- 1P can put your most recent passwords, secrets and make them easily accessible by default. Yep, more sorting issues. This is particularly helpful in my work related to software and infra development. There are often a lot of secrets, especially during spikes. It's nice to not have to hunt for them too much.

- Shared vaults are better with 1P. Easy to move secrets, easy to de-dupe. Etc. etc.

Everything about Bitwarden is fine for a single, technical user, but it's not for sharing secrets with non-technical family members at any scale. It's just too clumsy with too many sharp edges.

I really, really wanted to leave 1P behind. But I came back to it. And I don't regret it.

Re: Vaultwarden: Unofficial Bitwarden compatible server written in Rust

#27

Post by afavour »

cdman wrote: post #7
cloogshicer wrote: post #5

I evaluated this for a small business but came to the conclusion that self hosting this security critical software would cost more in work hours for initial setup and maintenance than just paying the cloud fees for a few years. Genuine question, in what scenario is the self hosting setup and maintenance worth it?

Another reason for NOT self hosting: I want the passwords for my family to be available in the event something happens to me. The probability of Bitwarden being more resilient (at least mid-term) is much higher than any self hosting solution I would come up with.

This is genuinely an underrated problem. This extends to a bunch of tech things in my life… if our Plex server were to fail everyone would be able to survive but we have a whole smart home setup with Home Assistant and if that fails the lights are going to stop turning on correctly.

I’ve made a pact with a similarly techy friend of mine that should something happen to either of us the other will step in and maintain in the short term, transition to something more hands off in the long term. But I still pay for Bitwarden for that extra level of reassurance.

Re: Vaultwarden: Unofficial Bitwarden compatible server written in Rust

#28

Post by candiddevmike »

cdman wrote: post #7
cloogshicer wrote: post #5

I evaluated this for a small business but came to the conclusion that self hosting this security critical software would cost more in work hours for initial setup and maintenance than just paying the cloud fees for a few years. Genuine question, in what scenario is the self hosting setup and maintenance worth it?

Another reason for NOT self hosting: I want the passwords for my family to be available in the event something happens to me. The probability of Bitwarden being more resilient (at least mid-term) is much higher than any self hosting solution I would come up with.

Periodically print out the passwords that are important and put them somewhere? Won't you have this issue with any slightly sophisticated tool?

Re: Vaultwarden: Unofficial Bitwarden compatible server written in Rust

#29

Post by Macha »

HeatrayEnjoyer wrote: post #20
tjoff wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The passwords are still stored client side, they won't disappear. Your family won't be able to add new passwords, but they can export them at their leisure.

It's often not possible to open a vault until internet access is restored

In which client? There's no technical requirement for that to be so.

I do find the Firefox browser extension sometimes logs me out (this is separate to the vault lock timer which just asks for a password, the extension basically resets to asking for a user ID)

Re: Vaultwarden: Unofficial Bitwarden compatible server written in Rust

#30

Post by k8sToGo »

rkwasny wrote: post #25

Unfortunatelly I had to move from Bitwarden after I realised it's sometimes impossible to unlock the password store without connection to server.

That’s why I stayed with KeePass. I can easily restore a file from my backups, but in case of BW, I’d have to set up the whole server first.
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