The Types of Things People are Using SYNC for

[Dantounet]

- replaces unison to backup pictures and documents between laptop/nas/server..

- soon, use to share videos with non-geeky family (instead of doing rsync which I need to monitor as they may fail due to weak internet connection)

[Camaban]

I´m just trying out a solution with BTSync for K-12, where the teacher publishes work files locally in his MacBook and all the students get the files (pictures, templates, webarchive) on their respective computer (Macs) as read-only (no syncback). No need to publish them on the central web based system and download them to the same folder anymore.

This would be completely awesome with an iOS app/API for the same task.

Doesn't the read-only share do this?

[gunverth]

Doesn't the read-only share do this?

Do what?

[Camaban]

Do what?

What you're trying to figure out.

Unless there's something more complex there I'd missed.

Such as (on re-reading it) that you're wanting something that'll do this on iOS.....

[tfullerton]

As a relative novice but with good end user skills I think this Bit Torrent Sync is fantastic and i was wondering what others are using it for.

I personally have only been using it for about 2 weeks, seems to work fine and I use it for two principle purposes.

1. I have added my Endnote Referencing Library to my sync file and it syncs perfectly across my work and home computers (both Macs)

2. Having gone back to university at age 50 I not find myself with one son doing undergraduate commerce and myself completing a masters so we have a folder of "goodies" study stuff that we share seamlessly as he is no longer living at home. Works like a charm.

Would anyone else care to comment on how this wonderful program has enhanced their lives.

Haven't started using it yet, but would also like to sync Endnote across devices. When I tried to use it from a networked drive, it corrupted the database. How has it been going for you after a month (or more)?

[Camaban]

Haven't started using it yet, but would also like to sync Endnote across devices. When I tried to use it from a networked drive, it corrupted the database. How has it been going for you after a month (or more)?

Possibly a bit different:

Remember, with a network drive, you might have it opened in two places simultaneously. Not possible with this. You've got one copy that gets copied around when you edit it.

I've never tried anything similar with endnote, so I'm not sure how it'll work on that, but thinking of it that way does make sense.

[hernangeles]

I'm using it to sync my work machine (PC) to my home machine (MBP). For the most part trying to figure out syncing my music library at work with my library at home. I'm syncing my work music library to my "Automatically Add to iTunes" folder on my home Mac but there seems to be a bit of a timing issue there. I think my "Automatically Add to iTunes" folder is scanning that folder too quickly and moving my audio files to "Not Added". The files are getting created as "x_song.mp3.!sync" on my home machine. Anybody else trying to do a similar thing?

[peterschink]

I wanted to sync files with friends. First I used mail to send them my secrets. Than I thought about using Facebook to give more friends access to my files. This ended in a long weekend of programming, and here is the result: www.syncfriends.net

It's kind of early alpha. But if somebody want to try it....

[Disappointed Cat]

I'm sure it's nice but don't you think this renders the high security pointless?

[peterschink]

Missunderstanding: You don't share the secrets via facebook. You only store them on syncfriends.net - and only to your friends.

[Disappointed Cat]

If someone is using BTSync for security and freedom of 3rd parties then why would he/she want to store the secrets on a 3rd party site? Even if you encrypt them you'll have to be able to decrypt them in order to actually share it with select users.

The idea of sharing secrets is a good point but I don't think it should be done in a middle man scenario.

[peterschink]

@Lightning Yes, agree. My project is a 3rd party site. But all data is encrypted 'n save. But you're right. I'll mention it on the website.

[Nimmo]

I have been using BT Sync for a while now to sync various things between my own machines (Music folders, Photo folders, game saves), sharing stuff with friends (large collections of documents) and also a folder of teaching materials for some of my friends who teach the same subject as me throughout the country.

Having tried out Dropbox, Owncloud, Teamdrive and many others, this one seems to really suit our needs. No costs, unlimited storage and exceptionally easy to set up and run.

[guru69]

Shared secure Bittorrent downloading

Torrent proxy / anonymizers usually only allow one IP per account. My workaround using your sync:

On my regular Bittorrent machine that has the proxy/encryption/VPN...

Create shared folder for incoming torrent files

Create read only share folder for received torrent downloads

In regular Bittorent I set the incoming sync folder as my watch folder. I set my download directory to the received torrent downloads share. I also set BitTorrent to delete/move the torrent upon load (so sender knows it went)

On any machine with the shares, just drop a torrent into the incoming folder and can securely/anonymously download from anywhere and get the file upon arrival. Not as fast, but much safer and I don't need to setup a full torrent client.

Android Sync workaround

Since there's no android client yet, here is my workaround using your current sync and 2 computers:

On rooted android, installed Samba Filesharing. It creates network share of SD drive upon Wifi connection when I get home (automatic with Locale/Tasker)

On one home machine, mapped the share as drive Z:

In BTsync, I shared the Z:\ folders for my TitaniumBackup, Nandroids, Pictures, etc

When I travel within Wifi range, Samba enables, lights up my Z: drive, BTsync sees it and syncs all my stuff.

Usenet Account Sharing

Created share for incoming usenet downloads folder on Sabnzb box

Using Sabnzb, created Category for my shared folder

When download added, change dropdown in Sab to my BTsync folder before completion

Sab downloads into the sync folder then gets pushed to the final destination(s)

Doing it this way allows you to selectively sync only the downloads you want, regular Sab downloads go to my normal incoming folder.

I'm sure I'll come up with more fun stuff to do with this thing.

Thanks for creating this awesome "swiss army knife" of file syncing!

[exodeus]

I use it to sync the files (My Documents, My Pictures etc) of two different users on two different computers. This means my girlfriend can login to my computer and have the same data there as on her laptop. There is the added bonus of continous backup without a dedicated server. She dropped her laptop in the ocean? Good thing i have a up-to-date backup on mine.

Its fast since it uses our LAN and doesnt sync via a slow cloud server... And its reliable.

Awsome stuff.

[heymananoobyhere]

I'm thinking of using it for:

• Backing up photos from my Ubuntu pc to my Windows pc
  
• Sync my documents over several pc's
  
• Sync my music from my pc to my android phone
  

[tuliouel]

Hi. One of the things I'm using Bittorrent Sync is for syncing the files I couldn't sync with OwnCloud: those bigger than 500 MB or so. It's been great.

[stardotstar]

I created a publicly shared Sync folder, add it at NJDU6IRJTUM5YF24XQVXTY6X43WC3RKX

[Valendr0s]

I sync my photos between my mom's computer (in Nevada), my sister's computer (in California) and my own (In Minnesota). We have 50GB of pictures and various other files. We can ensure none of them are lost and that mine are read-only on their computers and vise versa...

I lost a hard drive a month ago and it synced right back up, no problem. I lost tons of other files, but those pictures were kept safe. I don't have to worry about some hacker compromising some cloud or my files otherwise being the property of some faceless corporation.

[goli]

Hey there.

I'm full service hosting provider.

My customer projects are stored in GIT and I use a deployment script that creates per-version folders on my webserver, changes apache vhost configs (actually, only changes symlinks the vhost points to) and reloads a webserver.

This mechanism works well for deploying new code to my webserver.

Sometimes I need to download file system changes or database changes from the public webserver to my development environment.

I would like to make the "user files" folder of the webspace (those folder that does not contain code or templates but user generated files like images or PDF files) a btsync to have it synchronized with my local development environment all the time. Of course I want to use read-only secrets to make sure not to make "content drive by deployment" by accidentally changing content files on my dev setup.

In addition to this: Some of my webservers in my data center host intranet setups for companies with divisions world wide. Currently I synchronize the formerly mentioned "user files" folders (which contain several of 10th of GB) from my data center webservers to local webservers at my customers offices with rsync. Maybe this can be changed to btsync, wich would eliminate some delay caused by cronjob rsyncing.

Kind regards,

Stephan.

[nils]

I currently use BTsync to keep my Dissertation in LaTeX in sync with a server at home and one in Germany. It works wonders, the only problem I encountered so far is the sad truth, that Bittorrent traffic is filtered at my university.

Apart from that, I have been using the OS X and the FreeBSD version without any crashes.

[Faded_Jeans]

Upload files to a website. That folder syncs with two remote offices. Clients can provide things like original artwork, and then poof, it soon appears at local offices. If it ran as a service, then servers wouldn't need to have anyone logged in for it to be running silently in the background.

[Faded_Jeans]

Web forms drop leads into a non web available folder in csv format. That is sync'd with a folder at a remote office running ACT!. An ACT! plug in reads imports the leads, and then deletes the files. Handy.

[kingofkya]

I am useign it to sync vbStudio projects between pcs.

Also for backup up of windows user folders, along with bacula to make daily backup of sync folder.

Basically using it like crash plan.

[Mister Scarface]

I'd been hitting the storage limit on my dropbox so I looked in to setting up my own cloud storage.

I share a music folder with ~8 people for DJing, with music files whose metadata is constantly being updated.

I looked into ownCloud and it seemed up to snuff. Purchased a domain and shared hosting from dreamhost -- setup was simple enough. But damn, the Windows client was buggy and borderline unusable. The only way to tell if you were uploading was from the taskbar icon changing color. There was no way to see what files you were uploading, how much data you were using, etc. I looked on github and this issue has been open for 6 months...

So I gave BTSync and try and holy shit it's exactly what we need. I'm looking forward to more of the fubctionalities dropbox has, but this program seems to be pretty stable for the ~1200 files we have.

I'm not too technically inclined, so I don't know if this is already possible or just imfeasible, but it'd be cool I'd you could add a server (shared hosting) and there was a web gui to access your files from anywhere, share links to files, versioning, etc.

BTsync is the dropbox killer app... Inherently free and scalable. Good work!