Installing Kee with KeePassRPC for KeePass Password Safe (instructions)

1

These instructions explain how to configure Kee to use KeePass as the storage location for protected passwords. If you use Kee Vault it is not necessary to follow these instructions, although advanced users may still wish to - read about using Kee with Kee Vault and KeePass first though.

Quick instructions

  1. Install KeePass dependencies (Windows users can skip this step; Linux and Mac users need to install the latest version of Mono - usually called “mono-complete”)
  2. Install KeePass Password Safe 2
  3. Create a folder called Plugins inside the KeePass installation folder (note the capital P)
  4. Download the latest KeePassRPC.plgx file from the latest release page and move it to the Plugins folder
  5. Start KeePass to enable the new plugin
  6. Install the Kee browser add-on from https://www.kee.pm if you’ve not already done that
  7. Configure the link between Kee and KeePassRPC by following the step-by-step instructions displayed on screen in your web browser and the popup dialog displayed by KeePassRPC
  8. Spend a few minutes going through the interactive tutorial to quickly learn how to use Kee.

More details

Kee communicates with KeePass Password Safe 2 to store your passwords (unless you are using Kee Vault instead). You will need to install the KeePassRPC plugin for KeePass Password Safe 2 which enables this communication. It is as easy as putting a file in the right place on your computer and restarting KeePass.

If you don’t already have KeePass installed on your computer you’ll need to do that first so that your passwords can be securely stored.

Detailed step by step instructions are included below.

  1. Install KeePass dependencies (Windows users can skip this step)
    1. Linux and Mac users need to install the latest version of Mono. By default some operating systems will not install all parts of Mono so you would need to specifically ask for the complete package to be installed - it’s usually called “mono-complete”
    2. We have no Mac system to test on so we’d appreciate any update to these instructions that provide more detail for Mac users
  2. Install KeePass Password Safe 2
    1. Windows users:
      1. Just download and run the standard KeePass installer but make sure you download version 2 (professional)
      2. The installer can be found here: Downloads - KeePass
      3. Adjust the installer settings if you want but typically you just have to click “next” a handful of times.
      4. Note where the installer put the KeePass.exe main program file - this is the “KeePass installation folder” referenced below.
      5. Create a folder called Plugins inside the KeePass installation folder
      6. Load the web page for the latest release
      7. Download the KeePassRPC.plgx from that page onto your computer
      8. Move this file to the “KeePass installation folder”
    2. Linux users
      1. The following commands should get you up and running but be wary of executing them without consideration to your specific distro. You will probably need to make at least some small adjustments
      2. # add ppa repo to access latest version of KeePass
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:jtaylor/keepass

# update local repo details to ensure the latest KeePass is selected later
sudo apt-get update

# Install Mono
sudo apt-get install mono-complete

# Install KeePass
sudo apt-get install keepass2

# Create Plugins folder (note the capital P)
sudo mkdir /usr/lib/keepass2/Plugins

# Install curl and jq (required only for ease of installing the latest version of KeePassRPC)
sudo apt install curl
sudo apt install jq

# Put the latest version of KeePassRPC into the Plugins folder created earlier
curl -s https://api.github.com/repos/kee-org/keepassrpc/releases/latest | jq -r ".assets[] | select(.name | test(\"KeePassRPC.plgx\")) | .browser_download_url" | xargs sudo curl -s -L -o "/usr/lib/keepass2/Plugins/KeePassRPC.plgx"
    3. Mac users
      1. Unknown
  3. Start KeePass to enable the new plugin.
  4. Verify that the correct plugin version is installed:
    1. In KeePass, go to the Tools menu and click “Plugins…”
    2. In the dialog that loads, find the entry for KeePassRPC and verify that it matches the version you downloaded
  5. Install the Kee browser add-on from https://www.kee.pm if you’ve not already done that
  6. Configure the link between Kee and KeePassRPC by following the step-by-step instructions displayed on screen in your web browser and the popup dialog displayed by KeePassRPC
  7. Spend a few minutes going through the interactive tutorial to quickly learn how to use Kee.

If your computer has multiple KeePass users signed in to it at the same time, you will also need to understand and change the KeePassRPC port

System requirements

Firefox 78.0 or higher
KeePass 2.48 or higher

Windows 7 or higher

  • Microsoft .NET 4.5 or higher

Windows XP and Vista are no longer officially supported; they might still work if you install the latest .NET Framework but we strongly recommend upgrading since it is no longer possible to secure your password data on top of these insecure operating systems.

Linux

  • Mono version ? or higher

Mac OSX

  • Mono version ? or higher
  • You should find it works if you get the latest version of OSX, Mono and KeePass but no promises

Troubleshooting

If you’ve followed the above steps and the add-on doesn’t work properly, have a look at the Troubleshooting documentation, especially if you’re confronted with an error about the plugin being incompatible with your version of KeePass.

Documentation improvements

Please feel free to suggest improvements to the instructions in this topic if something can be made clearer or worded in a better way.

3

I’d rather lean towards simpler instructions that might not be as efficient on disk space usage but are more likely to be resilient over time. If the consensus is that this subset of packages is reliable across all distros at the moment and is reasonably likely to stay that way, I’m happy to update the instruction though.

4

Hey !
I have news for mac installation :slightly_smiling_face:
1.Downloading WineBottler
2. Open the DMG, and copy Wine and WineBottler to your applications folder.
3. Download the KeePass setup file.
4. Open WineBottler
5. Click advanced in the top bar
6. Make sure it says new prefix
7. Select the box that says "This is the installer, execute it"
8. Locate the KeePassSetup.exe file from within WineBottler
9. Scroll down a little and make sure it includes the open source .Net framework mono
10. Make it include wine.app
11. In winetricks, find and check dotnet45 (MS .NET 4.0)
12. In winetricks, find and check forcemono (Force using Mono …)
13. Give the app an identifier
14. Build your app!
15. It will take a long while (You may have to download .NET 3.0 and restart the build process)
16. Execute it, and it will copy the prefix.
17. If it closes, open it again
17. If you need plugins, copy them to ~/Library/Applcation Support/ then find the identifier
18. Done

I found this guide here https://superuser.com/questions/995881/permissions-to-browse-outside-of-home-directory-when-using-mono-to-run-exe-on-ma
And it’s working fine with kee or other plugins so I guess it’s good !

Granted it’s not as simple as pushing a button but it’s still easy for users don’t worry.

1 Like
5

I am new here so this might be known already but I found that I had to create the plugins folder with a different name, rather

sudo mkdir /usr/lib/keepass2/plugins

here (Ubuntu 16.04 LTS) I needed

sudo mkdir /usr/lib/keepass2/Plugins (Note: capital P).

This will be the target folder to move “KeePassRPC.plgx” to.
Hope it helps someone.

1 Like
6

Good spot @mdo.

This is a result of a change to KeePass 2.34 and higher which now explicitly requires plugins to be loaded from a folder called “Plugins”. Of course, on Windows the filesystem is case-insensitive so it doesn’t matter whether the folder is capitalised or not. I’ve updated the instructions and will search around for and update any other older documentation that might cause confusion for Mac or Linux users.

7

Thanks for updating the documentation. There is still one little issue I guess (?):

Inside KeyPass (I am on version 2.38) under Tools/Plugins is a button “Open Folder” which opens the “plugins” folder at the moment (rather “Plugins”). I guess this needs changing in KeyPass and here we are talking Kee only (?) so I am reporting this in the wrong place?

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Yeah, have a look at the KeePass forum. If nobody has already raised the issue, you should report it there.

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Thanks, have done that now.

https://sourceforge.net/p/keepass/discussion/329220/thread/f522831f/

10

Can you alternatively place KeePassRPC.plgx somewhere under your home directory on Linux (Ubuntu)?

On a multi-user system, it may be easier to get keepass2 or mono-complete (from the Ubuntu repository) than the current KeePassPRC.plgx. The user should be able to do that by themself, just like installing Kee from the Firefox extensions repository.