Manual configure wifi sync

[MacFreek]

Hi, I finally purchased lifetime license for my 3 family members. I had no issue setting up multiple vaults and syncing them from iPhone, Mac or Android to my Mac. However, the Windows 10 laptop of my wife can't find any servers when I select "wifi sync".

I'm sure this is some firewall issue on Windows 10, and I suspect the desktop can community just fine with the Enpass server, it is just the initial server-discovery that does not work. I do have the server address and port (convienantly display in Enpass). How to I manually enter the address of the Wi-Fi Sync Server on the Windows client? Right now, I can only click "Wi-fi sync" and see it searching and searching for a server. I would expected that after a few seconds (or a minute) I would receive a message "no server discovered" with the option to manually enter the server IP address.

Is there a way to manually enter the server IP address? And if now, would you kindly consider this as a feature request? Thanks!

[Tarun Singh Rawat]

@MacFreek

I've reported this issue to the Enpass technical team. They are currently investigating it, and I will reach out to you with updates as soon as I receive them.
#SI-3967

[Amandeep Kumar]

We have forwarded your request to the concerned team as a feature suggestion, and we will update you once we have more information.

In the meantime, please try the following troubleshooting steps as a workaround:

1. Disable the VPN on all devices.
2. Go to Firewall settings -> Firewall and network protection -> Allow an app through firewall.
3. Click on Change settings.
4. Find Enpass Password Manager in the list and check the box next to it.
5. Ensure both Public and Private checkboxes are selected, then click OK.
6. Create a Wi-Fi server on your desktop and search for it from another device using Enpass.

[MacFreek]

Tarun and Amandeep, thanks for your suggestions. I got it to work by fiddling with the firewall settings.

My feature request remains, because I doubt that I'm the only one experiencing firewall issues, or that this is the last time I encounter it. For the record, indeed it was the multicast DNS package (which is the network traffic that ensures service discovery for the server) that somehow did not reach Enpass, and connecting to the server (on another computer) worked just fine. So indeed, giving me an option to manually fill it in (like I could with my phone) would still be useful as a backup option.

Thanks for considering this.

[Pedro O]

I'm having the same problem with a work laptop and I cannot change the network settings. I can create SSH tunnels so if I could specify the address I would be able to make it work.

[MacFreek]

@Pedro O: I can explain what my work-around was, but it is a bit technical and I doubt if it helps you, sorry. In my case, I was trying to link Enpass on a Windows laptop with a my vaults on a Mac desktop. For whatever reason, the multicast DNS messages that the Mac was broadcasting did not reach the Windows computer. Now I did two things:

1. I tried to open as many firewall ports as possible. Admittedly, this is not a good advice in general, and for me it actually didn't seem to work at first, but perhaps it was required. I don't know, I did it anyway. In Windows Security (In Windows 11, this is an app, separate from Windows Settings), go to the "Firewall & network protection" tab. Here, make sure "Private network" has the word "(active)" behind it. Than, click "Allow an app through firewall". This opens a new window, where I first had to press "Change settings" before I could make any change. Here, I made sure that the tick boxes were ticket (for "Private" (network) in particular) for the following apps: "Bonjour Service" (if it is listed), "Enpass Password Manager", and "mDNS". Note that Bonjour (old name of DNS service discovery) and mDNS (multicast DNS) is the mechanism how an Enpass server announces itself over the network.

2. Now, for whatever reason, it still did not work. Before you proceed, open enpass, and try to add a Vault, till you reach the "Select Server" with the "Looking up for servers..." spinning 'ball'. mDNS services broadcast their presence on the network every 30 seconds or so, and the results are cached. Something seems to go wrong with the caching on Windows, and despite waiting longer than 30 seconds, the server never showed up. However, I found that if I query the advertised service, it will show up, even on other devices. So what I did was use a little app written by Lily Ballard of Tildesoft, called "Discovery" (formerly Bonjour browser) to query the Enpass service. I did so on my iPhone, making sure it is on the same wifi network as the Enpass service. Just open the app, find any service of type "_enpasswifisync._tcp", open it, and click it again for more details. For whatever reason, as soon as I did this on any computer on the same wifi network as the Enpass service, at that same time, it also shows up on the Windows machine, I was able to proceed. Unfortunately, this Discovery app is only available for Mac and iPhone (links point to the app stores), and I do not know of an alternative for Windows or Linux (there is an command line tool called dns-sd, but I never tried that).

So if you have a Mac or iPhone on the same network, you can give the DNS-SD discover app an try. It seems like a long shot, but perhaps it works. Let me know the result.

Edited September 18 by MacFreek