In a recent article, I talked about GPass, a Gnome password manager. I’ve previously written about password managers for OSX (programs that remember your passwords so you don’t have to), but had never seriously looked for one for Linux before. I looked, and lo and behold, found two that looked promising. I tried out GPass first, and found it suitable, but nothing that blew me away.
In this article I’ll talk about the second password manager, called Revelation. Again, it’s not really anything I’m going to go nuts about (it’s a password manager!), but to my view, it’s better suited for the job than GPass. It should be noted that the last GPass update was a couple years ago, while Revelation seems to be more actively developed.
Glancing at the two interfaces, one notices that GPass and Revelation are pretty similar. A nice toolbar at the top, with buttons for adding and deleting items, a button for saving your password file, and the option to edit a particular item. You can also go to the website for an account (for instance, clicking the Execute button in GPass or the “Go To” button in Revelelation will take you to Gmail, if that’s the account you had highlighted). In addition, however, Revelation offers the option to show a search bar, which makes finding that one particular password, whose account might be hidden deep inside a couple of nested folders, simple as could be.
Revelation also offers a nice Panel applet, so you can search through your Revelation passwords, and see them even without Revelation. Revelation’s Panel Applet also has the ability to navigate, if possible, to the website for your account. You can start Revelation from here as well. In fact, about the only thing it appears you can’t do is actually manage your password file. You can’t create folder, or edit existing accounts, nor can you create or delete accounts.
If you’re worried about security… don’t. As the Revelation website says, Revelation’s passwords “are stored in an AES-encrypted data file with cipher block chaining.” In other words, you don’t need to be worried about some random person gaining access to your password file. In fact, you can’t even use the Panel Applet without inputting your password! When the program is open, the website warns, you need to be a bit worried, since your passwords are stored as clear text in the system clipboard, but otherwise you should sleep well knowing that your personal information is just that – private.
Just like GPass, Revelation has the ability to create passwords for you. So if you’re in the process of creating a new account with a website, and don’t want to use the same password you’ve used on every other password since your AOL days, just have Revelation pick one for you. You can be sure it will be a secure one. And that’s another feature. If you’ve ever been on a website and been told that your password wasn’t strong enough, Revelation will do the same thing. So if your password is something simple, like “123123123,” don’t be surprised if Revelation questions it. You can certainly use it, but Revelation (and security professionals in general) would suggest something a bit harder to guess.
One area where I feel Revelation is the clear winner compared to Gpass is in variety. GPass allows you to create new items and new folders (for categorizing your accounts), and so does Revelation, but for GPass, that’s all it does. Revelation, on the other hand, allows you to create accounts specifically tailored to what you need. Revelation has templates for websites, credit cards, ftp servers, email accounts and more. There’s even an option for Door Locks, which I assume is for keypad entry, but it could also be used for security systems as well. And then, of course, there’s the “Generic” option, for accounts that just don’t fit anywhere else.
If you’ve used another password manager for Gnome previously (something like GPass, Figaro’s Password Manager, MyPasswordSafe, or Password Gorilla), and have seen the beauty of Revelation but are worried about having to input all that data again… don’t worry. Revelation is able to import all that information, so you can be up and running with Revelation in no time. And if, for some reason, you at some point decide to use a different password manager, there are no worries there either, because Revelation can export your password information to those formats, as well as to plain text, and more.
All in all, I think Revelation is a fantastic password manager. It’s free, fast, friendly and full of features. If you’re looking for a good way to store all your personal information, you could do worse than to try Revelation. So go ahead, check out its web page and read all about it. Then download it and give it a try. You’ll be glad you did.
