HiveWallet - bugfixing update on Android. Need to access your keys? And.... What's next?

HiveWallet.app just received an update to the android version, fixing a long lasting bug, preventing actual usage on Android...

If all is well it should work again for you! I had to remove the "inapp billing" module, which was used for in-app account creation. For now the android version is linking to signup.hive.io for that.

Reminder: HiveWallet is not your ultimate Hive Private Keys backup app!

When importing and creating accounts on HiveWallet, the app warns you to always keep a safe, offline, copy of your keys... At least your Master Password or owner key should be kept and stored safely outside the realm of the app. You should never count on HiveWallet to safekeep your one and only way to access your private keys to your Hive account.

That said... Maybe some of you ignored this comment, or did not understand the importance and, well... devices being devices... some error happened and HiveWallet is no longer working for you and it was your only place to store your keys?

1. By using third party apps like imazing or android file browser you can browse to the APPDATA-folder which contains the HiveWallet files.
2. In here you can find a so-called "wallet.json"-file.
3. This file contains an encrypted cipher text.
4. Decrypt the encrypted ciphertext- string using your original encryptkey (passphrase) you used for HiveWallet to unlock your wallet file. Sample code:

var decryptedwallet = JSON.parse(f.read());
var encryptedkeys = (decryptedwallet['ciphertext']);

var decryptedValue = slowaes.decrypt(encryptedkeys, encryptkey);

console.log(decryptedValue);

Future of HiveWallet - EOL of the development stack?

HiveWallet originally started as SteemWallet, because, inspired by a discussion with @pharesim, back then there was no working simple mobile wallet for Steem. As I am a app developer by day I thought it would be great to come up with a proof of concept and then I just kept on building until it had basic blockchain support. Later on extensions were build like the Dapp browsing capabilities and for example to option to buy accounts directly inside HiveWallet app using in-app payments.

The software I have been using for all my mobile app development, since the day I started, is Appcelerator's Titanium framework. A couple of years ago Appcelerator has been bought by a bigger IT company Axway. And since then they kept on coming with new versions of the software, continuing to support new OS versions (every year a new version of iOS and Android is released), but after 10+ years the final verdict had been reached earlier this year: The End of Life / Sunset period of Appcelerator had been announced.

Kind as Axway is, they will move all code into open source github repos by March 2022, but it is yet to be seen whether a community effort is made to maintain and upkeep continuous upgrades needed for the pace at which new OS'ses and mobile devices are released.

For HiveWallet this means: The apps work as of now. I will monitor how the Appcelerator community will (or will not) embrace the opensource mantra and keep the project alive. But I will also consider alternative options like Flutter and React for a new rewritten version of HiveWallet. But for me that would mean to re-engage with a new dev stack, as most of my time was inside Appcelerator's offering, which is ending (by the looks of it) by now.

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Also: IRL we are building a 🏡 house. From the ground up. This is crazy. I treat it like organising a HiveFest. It is taking up a lot of my time, but I like it. Learning a lot. Putting quite some time in this, it means developments on HiveWallet are somewhat on the afterburner atm.

That said, HiveWallet is completely opensource: github.com/roelandp/hivewallet!

🙏🙏🙏

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• Have a great holiday season ahead!

roelandp