ChrisH

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Posts posted by ChrisH

  1. Having a front-end that's built around HTML/CSS/Javascript makes the UI itself highly portable across platforms

     

    Sorry, but being a web developer myself I can tell you for a fact that nothing that uses Internet Explorer 9 as a basis can ever be highly portable. Not even to other IE versions.

    I repeat myself, but I would have gone all the way and used a real web interface. If opening a browser is too much for the average BTSync user then surely a client app with an embedded BrowserView would have been feasible.

  2. In the same way that a read only key can be used to transfer a share key now, the same function could be used to just transfer a list of subfolders/key pairings.

    I'm not saying it's a bad idea or not possible somehow - I'm just saying that this requires some fairly major changes in both client and protocol, so I would not hold my breath for a prompt realisation.

  3. You could do this today by having a general "download share" with the "master" secret (of which you only give out the readonly secret to your members) and several "upload" shares, one for each contributor. With some background job you would then either copy the uploaded files to the download share or create symlinks - this could probably be triggered by BTSync API, so it would be near-instant.

     

    Pro: Works now, no change to BTSync required

    Con: You cannot use the Contributors' bandwidth for downloading to the members at once. The initial seed would all need to be done by your bandwidth alone (until at least one member has enough data to seed). This could be mitigated by having the contributors sync the "download" share as well. Also your "upload" server would be a SPOF at least for sharing new content.

     

    I think this subfolder-sub-secret stuff is a nice idea, but the changes required to not only the BTSync client but also the protocol are somewhat prohibitive.

  4. If I have a folder "Documents" that I want synced on my desktop, laptop, and tablet but not my phone, can Sync exclude a device from syncing certain folders?

    Yes, you can set up many different folders with separate secrets and only the devices that have the secret to the folder can sync it.

     

    If I want all the pictures from my phone to sync to my desktop (for backup purposes) and then I delete some pictures from my phone (to free up space), will the pictures disappear from my PC? and if they don't will the pictures just reappear on my phone again when it syncs? In other words, does it always sync both ways?

    They will disappear from your PC (but moved into an Archive folder - BTSync can be configured so it will never clean that archive folder up).

     

    It does not always sync both ways, you can have readonly secrets that only receive files and changes, but never send them. Which won't help with the phone scenario.

  5. IIUC you say that people does not read docs that's why they are unaware of the fact Sync is beta. Fair enough (though not that good for people). I'll check how we can make it more clear.

    Well, it's always easy to blame the user (I'm a product manager myself - I know). But I would certainly say you don't exactly advertise the fact anymore. It's not mentioned in the (official) FAQ, it's not mentioned anywhere on the product page, it's not mentioned in the 1.4 blog post (http://blog.bittorrent.com/2014/08/26/introducing-bittorrent-sync-1-4-an-easier-way-to-share-large-files/) and like I said it's not even mentioned in the app itself.

    And if the new 1.4 UI is as easy-to-use as you claim in the aforementioned blog post, frankly the average user should not have to read the docs in the first place ;-)

     

    So yes, I should you should make it more clear. A simple "beta" after the version number on the download pages and in the app itself should be enough.

  6. I'm just saying that as a normal user that just goes to the website, downloads the app and installs it, you never read "beta" anywhere. I'm sure it's mentioned somewhere in the documentation and blogs and whatnot, but nowhere prominent. It doesn't even say beta anywhere in the app itself.

     

    So I still think it's unfair to expect the average user to know he is using an unstable beta product.

    Bittorrent can't have it both ways. Either they make it very clear it's a beta product and then it's okay to use that as an argument if there are changes and errors, or they don't and it isn't.

  7. Yes, but that uses only the central BTSync relay server(s) which are easy to block.

     

    The problem with ortreums idea is that you need one node that is known to the client in order to find any relay nodes at all. If that one node is not a central server, you'll have to configure it by hand or scan the network at random or use some kind of multicast, all of which methods have their specific drawbacks.

  8. Have the freedom to delete said things from the server or home PC as desired, without one affecting the other.

    That's not going to work. You might make your home PC a read-only node, so deleting files there won't affect the server, but deleting files on the server WILL move them to .SyncArchive on your PC.

     

    Edit: Disregard the above - I was probably thinking of the wrong thread.