Migrating from Strip to OI Safe

I have been a long-time user of an ancient palm m515 handheld. Since getting an Android cell phone, I’ve almost stopped using the palm. But until today, I have still used if to manage passwords.

On the Palm, I have been using Strip v1.0 to store all my passwords. Strip is short for Secure Tool for Recalling Important Passwords. It encrypts all passwords with AES, and on startup you have to enter a master passphrase to unlock all the passwords.

The OI Safe application for Android is similar to Strip. It also encrypts the passwords using AES.

Today I finally got around to importing my passwords to OI Safe. If there are anybody else who has not made the switch, you might find this useful. I used a computer running Ubuntu 10.04 to perform the conversion, but I think most applications I use run just fine on most Unix-like systems.

Step one: export from Palm

For a long time, I have been using pilot-xfer to make a backup of my palm, so I already had an up-to-date copy of the relevant files.

 $ sudo apt-get install pilot-link   # Unless you already have pilot-xfer.
 $ mkdir mirror
 $ pilot-xfer -p /dev/ircomm1 -s mirror

Start the HotSync application on the palm, and sync.

If you are lucky, /dev/ircomm1 is the name of your IR port, and you will end up with a total backup of your palm in the mirror directory. (My Palm m515 is partially broken, so I can no longer sync via USB. I have to use the slow IRDA interface instead. I’m glad that I can now retire the device.)

Check that the  following files are present:

  StripPassword-SJLO.pdb
  StripSystems-SJLO.pdb
  StripAccounts-SJLO.pdb

Step two: obtain the conversion script

OI Safe can import passwords from a comma-separated file. I wrote a small Perl script to export the Palm database in the proper format. Actually, I did not have to write the script from scratch. I just tweaked code that David Dribin and Zetetic (the makers of Strip) had already made, so that the output format was what OI Safe wants.

My fork of the work is available on github. To get a copy, just run:

  $ sudo apt-get install git-core    # Unless you already have git.
  $ git clone  git://github.com/cederlys/Palm-Zetetic-Strip.git

Then, follow the installation instructions in Palm-Zetetic-Strip/README.

Step three: run the conversion

Running the conversin script is easy. Mount your Android device, and then run something like this:

 $ Palm-Zetetic-Strip/scripts/strip-to-oisafe.pl mirror > /media/1234-1234/oisafe.csv

This assumes that the directories created by step one and two are present in you current working directory, and that you Android device is mounted on /media/1234-1234.

You will be prompted for the Strip password.

Step four: import the file to OI Safe

Install OI Safe from the Android Market (if you have not already done so), start it, and enter you master password. Press menu -> More -> Import Database.  Be prepared to wait for a while if, like me, you have more than 200 passwords.

Tags: Android, conversion, migration, OI Safe, Palm, Strip