What is "normal" iCloud syncing behavior?

[mwarner]

I am confused as to how/why iCloud syncing is working with BookEnds.

Specifically, I leave BookEnds open on my work Mac all the time. When I go to BookEnds, the pop-down window often comes up asking me to enter my iCloud password, regardless of whether or not the "keep me logged in" box is checked or not. At other times, I have to enter both my user name and password and then go through the two-step authentication pass code process with my phone and Mac. Is all of this behavior under the control of Apple? Are there any logical rules to how this works (e.g., if one does not sync within X hours, iCloud starts asking for a password and then if longer it starts asking for an entire login)?

Many thanks for the input.
Mark

[Jon]

Apple changed some procedures and now our users are being asked to verify their status too frequently. We think we have a fix for this, which will be included in the next update, 13.0.2. Barring any problems we hope to have that ready before the weekend.

Jon
Sonny Software

[Serge]

1Password is another app using CloudKit “outside of the Mac App Strore”. With the same re-login problem (authentication token expires every 8 hours) and the same conclusion that, unfortunately “it isn’t something we have control over. iCloud authentication is handled solely by Apple”. You can read more here.

[alanterra]

So, I said that I would never use iCloud again when Apple decided to break it during an OS upgrade. I can't remember which upgrade, but it may have been iOS 8 + Mavericks. In any event, all my iOS devices were using a "new" iCloud which my MacOS devices couldn't access, because the upgrade for MacOS wasn't available yet. So all my apps which used iCloud stopped synching (and "sunc"), including my password manager.

I decided that Apple does not care about its customers, that relying on its cloud offerings was not a good idea, and that I should just rely on Dropbox.

Just my 2¢.

[Jon]

If you want to sync with iOS there's no other option.

But consider this: we explored using Dropbox APIs for Mac sync and spent almost a year writing the code. Then Dropbox suddenly announced they were no longer going to offer this service and gave everyone one year to find another option. Thank goodness we hadn't deployed...

Jon
Sonny Software

[alanterra]

The world is stacked against those who want to offer reliable software. I feel for you.

[calonso]

I installed the update (13.0.2) but the iCloud login request issue continues. Is this something that we will have to live with?

[Serge]

The changes we made in 13.0.2 have improved the situation somewhat, but it's still an annoying problem. As you can see from my previous post, other developers are seeing the same issue. We have contacted Apple Dev support about this problem. Either Apple will have to fix it or, If there is a solution we can implement, we will fix it as soon as possible.

[mathefff]

I use Bookends on two Macs. It seems the login is required every time I change the machine. As long as I don't log in on the other computer, there is no Apple ID request. I did not test it with the respect of 8 hours or tracked time between the logins.

[kga1978]

Hey folks - is there any update on this? Bookend sync has become almost unusable for me because of the constant login nagging - at least once every day on each of my computers. I haven't experienced this behavior with other programs storing data in iCloud (e.g. 1Password), so is there something specific to Bookends going on here?

[Jon]

Apple developer support told us that this was a "known issue" and that are no workarounds. Sounds like a bug to me. In any case, we are working on it and if/when we have an alternative (or Apple fixes the problem) we'll let everyone know.

Jon
Sonny Software

[tristanlane]

argh...

now it won't sync because of an SSL error preventing connection to the server...

happening on two installs, one wired and one wireless. internet connection normal.

another icloud issue?

[Jon]

As of today (January 17, 2018) we are finding that Apple has stopped asking for us to log in every day to iCloud before performing cloud sync. So at least for now it seems Apple has fixed this problem. To those who reported this problem, please comment on this thread if it is fixed for you, too, or not.

Jon
Sonny Software

[MattN]

I haven't had an iCloud nag for at least a couple of days now either.

[tristanlane]

As an update, Cujo the firewall device appears to now block the iCloud syncing for Bookends.

I have flagged this with Cujo thanks to Serge's excellent support for Bookends.

Evidently whatever has happened in iCloud hasn't yet been caught up with at cujo.