5 ms·

When I started using syncthing some years ago it worked, but it was still a bit brittle. I ran over time into several situations where the sync would just stop

by onli 8y ago

When I started using syncthing some years ago it worked, but it was still a bit brittle. I ran over time into several situations where the sync would just stop or not start, be slow, some error happened somewhere and the GUI did not show them properly, there was no built in reacting to file modification, just a regular sync interval. It was good enough to be used, but certainly not done yet. Yesterday I installed it again on my main PC (part of a migration from a different linux distro) and I was impressed: The notifications when adding new devices arrived with a very small delay, syncing just worked, file monitoring is now built in, the error message related to that (inotify limit) was helpful. Syncthing came a long way and is great software, congrats for reaching 1.0!

ioddly 8y ago
I switched to Syncthing from Dropbox a few months ago. While there are a handful of warts, the actual syncing seems to Just Work (TM). I am massively impressed with this, as building even a centralized file hosting service is quite the undertaking. I donated and I'd encourage others to do it as well, link on the homepage: https://syncthing.net/ https://syncthing.net/
- avtar 8y ago
  > handful of warts What type of issues?
  - ioddly 8y ago
    What I'm thinking of are synced ignore lists of some sort. I think I read in the issue tracker that this is something they plan to change eventually. And related, sync % reflecting ignored files. For example I've ignored a bunch of transient things like node_modules so my backup server sync is permanently at 70% even though it's actually up to date with all the files I want synced.
    - uvatbc 8y ago
      I do this in two steps: 1. An "stignore.txt" at the root of a shared directory. This gets automatically synced to every device. 2. "#include stignore.txt" in '.stignore' that I need to manually write on every new device.
StavrosK 8y ago
I've been using Syncthing for a few months, and it has been bulletproof. Truly set and forget. I was extremely apprehensive when I started, but it convinced me. I wholeheartedly recommend it.
- dietr1ch 8y ago
  I started shortly after Dropbox deprecated BTRFS and told me to move to a "better" FS like FAT. After the initial setup, which wasn't that hard after all, but took more effort than doing nothing and continue on Dropbox I was amazed. My setup became better as now my phone is a real client that syncs files, not just a file browser that can "star" and cache some files, and there's more granularity on what's shared.
  - bscphil 8y ago
    For those who don't know (including me) could you explain what you mean by deprecating BTRFS? I don't understand how the file system is relevant to a file syncing app like Dropbox.
    - Volundr 8y ago
      Neither does.. well anyone. Dropbox decided to drop support for BTRFS and pretty much any other Linux file system that isn't ext4, and to my knowledge still hasn't explained their rationale to this day. See: https://www.dropboxforum.com/t5/Error-messages/Dropbox-client-warns-me-that-it-ll-stop-syncing-in-Nov-why/m-p/290065/highlight/true#M42255 https://www.dropboxforum.com/t5/Error-messages/Dropbox-clien...
      - acct1771 8y ago
        Sharing the reason is either a legal risk, or a loss of competitive advantage risk (some optimization that only works when their whole pool is in particular format).
    - wlesieutre 8y ago
      As of last November, Dropbox only supports ext4 on Linux, NFTS on Windows, and HFS+/APFS on Mac. Couldn't tell you the technical reasons for the change, but they're listed here: https://www.dropbox.com/help/desktop-web/system-requirements#desktop https://www.dropbox.com/help/desktop-web/system-requirements...
mitgraduate 8y ago
Probably i use syncthing in the most odd way. I've around 70 servers with syncthing on them and i am using it with Route53 for use as CDN. One thing i am missing is that, i want to sync in a way that it's aware of the network topology and syncs from the nearest network first. The downside is that all your data lives on every server. Is there a smart way to sync only needed data using p2p for CDN application?

by onli 8y ago

ioddly 8y ago

I switched to Syncthing from Dropbox a few months ago. While there are a handful of warts, the actual syncing seems to Just Work (TM). I am massively impressed with this, as building even a centralized file hosting service is quite the undertaking. I donated and I'd encourage others to do it as well, link on the homepage: https://syncthing.net/ https://syncthing.net/

avtar 8y ago
> handful of warts What type of issues?
- ioddly 8y ago
  What I'm thinking of are synced ignore lists of some sort. I think I read in the issue tracker that this is something they plan to change eventually. And related, sync % reflecting ignored files. For example I've ignored a bunch of transient things like node_modules so my backup server sync is permanently at 70% even though it's actually up to date with all the files I want synced.
  - uvatbc 8y ago
    I do this in two steps: 1. An "stignore.txt" at the root of a shared directory. This gets automatically synced to every device. 2. "#include stignore.txt" in '.stignore' that I need to manually write on every new device.

StavrosK 8y ago

I've been using Syncthing for a few months, and it has been bulletproof. Truly set and forget. I was extremely apprehensive when I started, but it convinced me. I wholeheartedly recommend it.

dietr1ch 8y ago
I started shortly after Dropbox deprecated BTRFS and told me to move to a "better" FS like FAT. After the initial setup, which wasn't that hard after all, but took more effort than doing nothing and continue on Dropbox I was amazed. My setup became better as now my phone is a real client that syncs files, not just a file browser that can "star" and cache some files, and there's more granularity on what's shared.
- bscphil 8y ago
  For those who don't know (including me) could you explain what you mean by deprecating BTRFS? I don't understand how the file system is relevant to a file syncing app like Dropbox.
  - Volundr 8y ago
    Neither does.. well anyone. Dropbox decided to drop support for BTRFS and pretty much any other Linux file system that isn't ext4, and to my knowledge still hasn't explained their rationale to this day. See: https://www.dropboxforum.com/t5/Error-messages/Dropbox-client-warns-me-that-it-ll-stop-syncing-in-Nov-why/m-p/290065/highlight/true#M42255 https://www.dropboxforum.com/t5/Error-messages/Dropbox-clien...
    - acct1771 8y ago
      Sharing the reason is either a legal risk, or a loss of competitive advantage risk (some optimization that only works when their whole pool is in particular format).
  - wlesieutre 8y ago
    As of last November, Dropbox only supports ext4 on Linux, NFTS on Windows, and HFS+/APFS on Mac. Couldn't tell you the technical reasons for the change, but they're listed here: https://www.dropbox.com/help/desktop-web/system-requirements#desktop https://www.dropbox.com/help/desktop-web/system-requirements...

mitgraduate 8y ago

Probably i use syncthing in the most odd way. I've around 70 servers with syncthing on them and i am using it with Route53 for use as CDN. One thing i am missing is that, i want to sync in a way that it's aware of the network topology and syncs from the nearest network first. The downside is that all your data lives on every server. Is there a smart way to sync only needed data using p2p for CDN application?