5 ms·

How about a working, documented plugin API? Or sync clients that work? Instead of taping more random crap onto a base product that only barely works?

Kye 8y ago
edit: I thought they were talking about ActivityPub since the issues look similar to ones people raise about it. Whoops. - I am of two minds here: 1. Minimal specification worked for HTTP. 2. Most problems with HTTP come from it being minimally specified. ActivityPub is exploding the way HTTP did. At worst, it's as imperfect as HTTP. At best, it's a way to get people used to federation for whatever comes next and improves on it.
- StavrosK 8y ago
  He's talking about NextCloud, not ActivityPub, by the way. My experience has not been that it "barely works", it works quite well for me.
- artonge 8y ago
  I think parent talk about nextcloud and their plugin documentation being pore and their slow sync client. I agree with him, they put a lot of energy on non crucial features when a lot of their core features could be improved.
  - IOT_Apprentice 8y ago
    That sounds eerily similar to Plex and their focus these days.
phito 8y ago
This. Their sync on android sucks big time. I go to my gallery, select 20 pictures and send them to Nextcloud, only to find only 5 of them have been actually uploaded. It happens every.single.time. Gonna switch to Seafile really soon.
- lowercased 8y ago
  interestingly, that was my experience using google's own image sync on ios and android as well (a few years back, to be sure).
- prophesi 8y ago
  Can't confirm this experience. I have auto-upload enabled, and I've never had any issues with my pictures not syncing. Did you check the upload status on your phone during this time? Pictures can get very heavy, and it might just need more WiFi time to upload 20 of them.
  - kop316 8y ago
    I also have auto-upload enabled, and syncing works perfectly whether I am on the same network or an outside network. Perhaps the grandparent commentor is using an older version of the android client or server?
    - berkes 8y ago
      I do see some issues with really large files. Files over 50Mb. My server has limits imposed and the resulting error is not communicated back to me on the app. The app merely states "Failed to upload". For me, this is the only issue I ever get, but without knowing the cause it does feel very "random". In my case, I managed to track it down and, by knowing what causes the sync issue, I can avoid it, or ignore it. Could be that grandparent has this issue too bu her/his server is set to much lower limits even?
      - kop316 8y ago
        That could be it. IIRC, the upper limit of file upload size was tied to RAM (had something to do with PHP and how it handed uploads)?
  - Jnr 8y ago
    Their auto upload on Android doesn't work properly. On iOS they offer initial upload of all files, on Android it doesn't happen.
SJk7TAy 8y ago
Call support and claim your refund. (But I'd guess you haven't paid them a penny and use what they have developed for free.)
- Forbo 8y ago
  Can you show me where I can purchase a support plan for a single user? All their offerings start at 50 users from what I can tell.
  - jospoortvliet 8y ago
    Sorry, we don't offer that. We focus, instead, on paid support for larger enterprises, ideally well over 100 users. This way we don't get tempted trying to monetize home or small enterprise users, but instead have an incentive to provide them something that works out of the box so they 1. don't ask questions on the forums/twitter/etc and 2. advocate for what a great solution Nextcloud is! So, it should 'simply' be good enough for home and SMB users. If it is, we failed, and I'm sorry for that and hope we can fix it! Of course, nothing is ever perfect, especially given the unlimited ways people use Nextcloud and the hundreds of thousands of Nextcloud servers out there...
EGreg 8y ago
Just out of curiosity, what do you think of https://qbix.com/platform https://qbix.com/platform? It is more of a toolbox for building NextCloud or anything else. But all the components have been tested on all platforms and work (and are secure). It has a working, fully documented plugin API.
justin_oaks 8y ago
I was all excited to set up Next loud on my Raspberry PI. Got it up and working and then I found out that it doesn't do two-way sync, which was what I was hoping to use it for. I wholeheartedly agree that they should focus on more important features.
- ohthehugemanate 8y ago
  Sorry, what's two way sync in your meaning? I use nextcloud in my home with a mix of clients, all working on the same files. Changes propagate up and down to/from all clients. Maybe you mean something different?
ohthehugemanate 8y ago
I'm interested to know what problems you've had with the sync clients. In my household we use it on a mix of windows, Linux, Android, and iOS devices and it's extremely smooth.
- antocv 8y ago
  Sync problem on android nextcloud app - it was very slow, showed zig-zag pattern on bandwidth usage. That bug was solved but nextcloud app still does not utilize all of bandwidth. Can not fail and resume, basically there can be months of pictures lost since it resumes, crashes dies, does not resume next time. The android app that is. Disclaimer: I fixed some of these bugs, so seeing the source-code was repulsive enough, but there just isnt anything else better as far as I know.
  - jospoortvliet 8y ago
    Thanks for helping to fix the bugs, that's the best way of getting this improved ;-)
- bayesian_horse 8y ago
  One nice little problem is that in my installation we have a couple of zombie files. Whenever we try to delete them, some users' clients doesn't want to delete it and reuploads it. Short of resetting and redownloading these clients' sync state, nothing else has worked to resolve this issue.

Kye 8y ago

edit: I thought they were talking about ActivityPub since the issues look similar to ones people raise about it. Whoops. - I am of two minds here: 1. Minimal specification worked for HTTP. 2. Most problems with HTTP come from it being minimally specified. ActivityPub is exploding the way HTTP did. At worst, it's as imperfect as HTTP. At best, it's a way to get people used to federation for whatever comes next and improves on it.

StavrosK 8y ago
He's talking about NextCloud, not ActivityPub, by the way. My experience has not been that it "barely works", it works quite well for me.
artonge 8y ago
I think parent talk about nextcloud and their plugin documentation being pore and their slow sync client. I agree with him, they put a lot of energy on non crucial features when a lot of their core features could be improved.
- IOT_Apprentice 8y ago
  That sounds eerily similar to Plex and their focus these days.

phito 8y ago

This. Their sync on android sucks big time. I go to my gallery, select 20 pictures and send them to Nextcloud, only to find only 5 of them have been actually uploaded. It happens every.single.time. Gonna switch to Seafile really soon.

lowercased 8y ago
interestingly, that was my experience using google's own image sync on ios and android as well (a few years back, to be sure).
prophesi 8y ago
Can't confirm this experience. I have auto-upload enabled, and I've never had any issues with my pictures not syncing. Did you check the upload status on your phone during this time? Pictures can get very heavy, and it might just need more WiFi time to upload 20 of them.
- kop316 8y ago
  I also have auto-upload enabled, and syncing works perfectly whether I am on the same network or an outside network. Perhaps the grandparent commentor is using an older version of the android client or server?
  - berkes 8y ago
    I do see some issues with really large files. Files over 50Mb. My server has limits imposed and the resulting error is not communicated back to me on the app. The app merely states "Failed to upload". For me, this is the only issue I ever get, but without knowing the cause it does feel very "random". In my case, I managed to track it down and, by knowing what causes the sync issue, I can avoid it, or ignore it. Could be that grandparent has this issue too bu her/his server is set to much lower limits even?
    - kop316 8y ago
      That could be it. IIRC, the upper limit of file upload size was tied to RAM (had something to do with PHP and how it handed uploads)?
- Jnr 8y ago
  Their auto upload on Android doesn't work properly. On iOS they offer initial upload of all files, on Android it doesn't happen.

SJk7TAy 8y ago

Call support and claim your refund. (But I'd guess you haven't paid them a penny and use what they have developed for free.)

Forbo 8y ago
Can you show me where I can purchase a support plan for a single user? All their offerings start at 50 users from what I can tell.
- jospoortvliet 8y ago
  Sorry, we don't offer that. We focus, instead, on paid support for larger enterprises, ideally well over 100 users. This way we don't get tempted trying to monetize home or small enterprise users, but instead have an incentive to provide them something that works out of the box so they 1. don't ask questions on the forums/twitter/etc and 2. advocate for what a great solution Nextcloud is! So, it should 'simply' be good enough for home and SMB users. If it is, we failed, and I'm sorry for that and hope we can fix it! Of course, nothing is ever perfect, especially given the unlimited ways people use Nextcloud and the hundreds of thousands of Nextcloud servers out there...

EGreg 8y ago

Just out of curiosity, what do you think of https://qbix.com/platform https://qbix.com/platform? It is more of a toolbox for building NextCloud or anything else. But all the components have been tested on all platforms and work (and are secure). It has a working, fully documented plugin API.

justin_oaks 8y ago

I was all excited to set up Next loud on my Raspberry PI. Got it up and working and then I found out that it doesn't do two-way sync, which was what I was hoping to use it for. I wholeheartedly agree that they should focus on more important features.

ohthehugemanate 8y ago
Sorry, what's two way sync in your meaning? I use nextcloud in my home with a mix of clients, all working on the same files. Changes propagate up and down to/from all clients. Maybe you mean something different?

ohthehugemanate 8y ago

I'm interested to know what problems you've had with the sync clients. In my household we use it on a mix of windows, Linux, Android, and iOS devices and it's extremely smooth.

antocv 8y ago
Sync problem on android nextcloud app - it was very slow, showed zig-zag pattern on bandwidth usage. That bug was solved but nextcloud app still does not utilize all of bandwidth. Can not fail and resume, basically there can be months of pictures lost since it resumes, crashes dies, does not resume next time. The android app that is. Disclaimer: I fixed some of these bugs, so seeing the source-code was repulsive enough, but there just isnt anything else better as far as I know.
- jospoortvliet 8y ago
  Thanks for helping to fix the bugs, that's the best way of getting this improved ;-)
bayesian_horse 8y ago
One nice little problem is that in my installation we have a couple of zombie files. Whenever we try to delete them, some users' clients doesn't want to delete it and reuploads it. Short of resetting and redownloading these clients' sync state, nothing else has worked to resolve this issue.