Do not allow + show an error if user imports a Parity Signer account for a chainId other than the current chain

[ltfschoen]

@axelchalon mentioned:

@parity/qr-signer returns us the address and chainId when scanning the account, so this can be done. However I think it might be easier to simply show the Signer account in the accounts list if we're connected to the right chain (we might want to show a warning at one point if we import a Signer account for a chainId other than the chain we're currently connected to -- otherwise the user might be surprised not to see their imported signer account show up in the accounts list after completing the import).

[Tbaut]

Is this issue for what Axel proposes and the warning? Because I'm not in favor of what the title says (that's different) 🙄

[ltfschoen]

Is this issue for what Axel proposes and the warning? Because I'm not in favor of what the title says (that's different) 🙄

Yes, sorry, fixed now. It appears as though Axel has already added functionality to only show the accounts associated with a chainId that matches the chain currently in use in PR #336

[Tbaut]

I think we should simply not allow the user to import an account from the wrong chain. So "Show warning error if user imports a Parity.."

[ltfschoen]

I think we should simply not allow the user to import an account from the wrong chain. So "Show warning error if user imports a Parity.."

For non-Parity Signer accounts, if a Fether user had a lot of accounts that were associated with different chains on their computer, and then they wanted to change to a different computer. If it were me I'd just copy the whole ~/Library/Application\ Support/io.parity.ethereum/keys/ directory across. Then if I started Fether without a separate Parity Ethereum instance running it would create a Parity Ethereum node using the default Kovan chain, and only the Kovan accounts would appear in the UI.
But if I used the Fether UI I'd have to backup each account individually to a JSON file and I'd put them in folders corresponding to what network they were associated with. And then assuming we had support for multiple chains in Fether, I'd have to start Fether for the first chain and then import each account that I had for it, and then repeat for the second chain, third chain, etc (so if I had 10 accounts on 3 chains I'd have to backup 30 times and import 30 times, as well as switching to a different chain a couple of times.

In this situation wouldn't it be ideal to have a "Bulk recover from JSON Keyfile" option, which just allows the user to select multiple JSON files, and then in the UI shows the filename and prompts the user to enter the associated password and continues to the next one?

For Parity Signer accounts, if a user had previously imported a lot of different Parity Signer accounts from different chains into Fether (say 30 accounts, with 10 on each chain with 3 chains), but then their computer and mobile phone got stolen but they still had their Recovery Words in safe keeping. They could use the "Recover Account" option on Parity Signer to recover each account by entering each set of recovery words respectively for each account to keep their private keys on the device. And then import into Fether each account using Fether's "Recover from Parity Signer" option using the QR codes. Again they'd have to start the first chain, import 10 accounts, then start the second chain, import 10 accounts, etc.

Could we add a "Bulk recover from Parity Signer" option that only allows importing of Parity Signer accounts associated with the currently used chain, but automates the process with less clicking?

It'd already have been quite an arduous process having to enter the sequence of recovery words 30 times to recover all the accounts in Parity Signer.

Alternatively, could we add an option in Parity Signer that "groups" the accounts list by their chainId (currently they are just sorted by name)? So when a user is importing them they can go through each of them sequentially.
If the first group is Kovan, then they can start their Kovan node, and import each one, then start a node for the second group, etc.

[Tbaut]

30 accounts feels very much like an edge case (and not related to this issue is it?). Let's consider it if the needs appears. I wouldn't create an issue at this point tbh.

[ltfschoen]

30 accounts feels very much like an edge case (and not related to this issue is it?). Let's consider it if the needs appears. I wouldn't create an issue at this point tbh.

Agreed 30 accounts is an edge case, and would only be applicable to this issue if we had a "Bulk recover from Parity Signer" feature (which we don't have), because in that case the user may be "advanced" and just wants to import them quickly without any "warnings", but only needs to be warned/reminded once at the start of the process.

[ltfschoen]

I'm able to look into this now that #466 is resolved