What is kdewallet for?

[Timothy Murphy]

José Matos wrote:

>> For some reason, laptop 1 only asks me once
>> for my wallet password when I reboot,
>> and never if I hibernate.
> 
> It is configured that way.
> 
> System Settings ->
> Account details -> kde wallet -> access control
> 
>> However, laptop 2 repeatedly asks for my kdewallet password 
>> when I launch an application.
> 
> There is an option on access control that literally
> says:
> Prompt when an application accesses an open wallet
> 
>> Can I safely disable kdewallet?
>> I really don't understand what it is for.
>> I just find it a nuisance,
>> and it doesn't make me feel any safer.
> 
> The wallet
> allows you to store passwords in a single place guarded by a master
> password. It is extremely effective for what it was
> designed.

I'm afraid my query was based on a misunderstanding.
I assumed that KDE wallet was a new invention
intended to supplement kwallet.

As I understand it now, they are the same thing
confusedly given two names.

In my f-menu I have two items,
kwalletmanager and KDE Wallet .
Clicking on kwalletmanager does nothing that I can see,
but I note that after clicking on it
there is an application /usr/bin/kwalletmanager running.
It is not clear to me what this does,
or how one is meant to interact with it.

As I recall, there used to be a wallet icon in the panel
if one was using this mechanism
but I haven't seen since many Fedora distributions ago.

> Examples:
> knetworkmanager
> ...

> The advantage is that the passwords for these
> services are not stored on a plain format and that is really a good
> thing.

I appreciate the point of the wallet mechanism.
As I said, I thought KDEwallet was an addition to this,
rather as kdenetwork is an addition to NetworkManager.