[Solved] Is BTSync right for my situation?

[RMFlagg]

Hello everyone,

   I have been using Dropbox in my business for the past 7+ years and recently we have been having problems with it, so I am looking for alternatives.  All the machines are running Linux Mint 17.2 right now, but they will all change once the next Ubuntu LTS comes out.

   Here is what we do with it.  It's fairly simple (I think), but speed is the most important thing.  We have three computers in the store, with the most important being at the front counter and it tracks inventory along with things like employee time clock.  It needs read/write access to all the files in the synced folder

   The second most important machine is at our customer service counter and it needs to exchange files with the front counter and vice-versa.  It also needs r/w access to all files.

   The third machine is the computer in the server room that is a backup/print-server/etc.  It does not need r/w access. 

   There is  a fourth computer, my laptop, and I want it to also sync up with the others, but it is not part of the local network all of the time.  It also needs full r/w access.

   Here are my concerns/needs:  Obviously all the accesses that each machine needs.  As you can see three out of the four need full r/w access.

   Speed.  I know that BTSync checks for changes every 5 or 10 seconds, but I was wondering if this can be changed to something faster.  One second, immediate?

   Preference to the local network.  Can BTSync be set to prefer the local network and then worry about the outside world after?

   How does BTSync handle file collisions?  If two computers try to make a change to the same file at the same time, what happens?  How is it resolved?  Can one computer be listed as more important than the others and it's changes override the others?

   Please let me know if you need more information, I know that I might have left out important bits of data.

Thanks for reading,

RMFlagg

 

[GreatMarko]

58 minutes ago, RMFlagg said:

Here is what we do with it.  ... speed is the most important thing. 

Over a local network, Sync will always be faster than Dropbox. In tests, it's been demonstrated to be over x16 times faster - see this blog post.

58 minutes ago, RMFlagg said:

Here are my concerns/needs:  Obviously all the accesses that each machine needs.  As you can see three out of the four need full r/w access.

Sync will allow you to have different permissions for each device you're syncing with. So you can have 3 of them set as read-write (so changes you make on any of them will propagate to all others), and the 4th set as read-only (so changes you make on that device won't be synced back to others), etc

58 minutes ago, RMFlagg said:

Speed.  I know that BTSync checks for changes every 5 or 10 seconds, but I was wondering if this can be changed to something faster.  One second, immediate?

Yes, this is configurable via the folder_rescan_interval setting. However, for many OS's change detection is almost instantaneous - it very much depends upon whether the underlying OS reports when files changes, which Sync can detect in near "real-time", of if the OS doesn't do this, Sync has to fall-back to routinely scanning for changes itself. See also this Help Center article.

58 minutes ago, RMFlagg said:

Preference to the local network.  Can BTSync be set to prefer the local network and then worry about the outside world after?

You can force Sync to only sync over your local network. You can also "rate limit" syncing, and set this to only apply to external syncing (i.e. over the wider internet) and not to local syncing (i.e. over your LAN)

58 minutes ago, RMFlagg said:

How does BTSync handle file collisions?  If two computers try to make a change to the same file at the same time, what happens?  How is it resolved?

Sync will determine which file is "newer". The older version will be moved to the folder's .sync/Archive folder and enumerated accordingly. Please see this Help Center article.

58 minutes ago, RMFlagg said:

Can one computer be listed as more important than the others and it's changes override the others?

Whilst you can't change the "priorities" of your devices, you can designate some as "read only" - i.e. any changes made on that device won't be synced back to other devices.

 

In conclusion - yes, Sync will be far better suited for your particular needs than Dropbox!

[RMFlagg]

Thank you, GreatMarko!