Two-Way Sync with Encrypted Folder in Middle

[ToSync]

This is probably a dumb question, but I haven't been able to find the answer in the forum or the support areas. What I would like to do is to sync files on two computers (COMPUTER-1 and COMPUTER-2) by using a third computer that is always online (ALWAYS-ONLINE-COMPUTER) using an Encrypted Folder, so the ALWAYS-ONLINE-COMPUTER only sees encrypted data, but COMPUTER-1 and COMPUTER-2 can sync even if they aren't both online simultaneously. And I would like the sync to be bi-directional, so files changed/added/deleted on COMPUTER-1 are synced to COMPUTER-2, and files changed/added/deleted on COMPUTER-2 are synced to COMPUTER-1. Is there a way to do that?

I created an Encrypted Folder on COMPUTER-1 and added it to ALWAYS-ONLINE-COMPUTER using the Encrypted key. And the files successfully synced from COMPUTER-1 to ALWAYS-ONLINE-COMPUTER in encrypted form. What do I do next? How do I sync the files to COMPUTER-2 from ALWAYS-ONLINE-COMPUTER? Would I use the Read & Write key from COMPUTER-1 (but wouldn't that cause COMPUTER-2 to try to connect directly to COMPUTER-1)?

Thanks for any help.

[nuttall]

Your plan is sound and you are quite correct.

Adding COMPUTER-2 with the read-write key would achieve what you want.

COMPUTER-1 and COMPUTER-2 would have unencrypted versions of the flies, while ALWAYS-ON-COMPUTER would only have the encrypted version.

If COMPUTER-1 and COMPUTER-2 are online at the same time, then files would be synced directly between them, as well as ALWAYS-ON-COMPUTER.

There is no way to force traffic to go a certain way, if all 3 machines are on at the same time, then you would have a "mesh" of 3 computers, with the data synced between all 3. The only difference would be that ALWAYS-ON-COMPUTER would be storing the encrypted versions of the files while COMPUTER-1 and COMPUTER-2 would have the unencrypted versions.

 

Hope that helps,

[ToSync]

@nuttall Thanks for your response!

1 hour ago, nuttall said:

If COMPUTER-1 and COMPUTER-2 are online at the same time, then files would be synced directly between them, as well as ALWAYS-ON-COMPUTER.

There is no way to force traffic to go a certain way, if all 3 machines are on at the same time, then you would have a "mesh" of 3 computers, with the data synced between all 3. The only difference would be that ALWAYS-ON-COMPUTER would be storing the encrypted versions of the files while COMPUTER-1 and COMPUTER-2 would have the unencrypted versions.

That makes sense. I don't care whether COMPUTER-1 and COMPUTER-2 sync directly (which is perfectly fine when they are both online at once) or via ALWAYS-ON-COMPUTER as the middle-man. If I understand correctly, the Read & Write key would somehow connect COMPUTER-2 to both ALWAYS-ON-COMPUTER and COMPUTER-1, such that it would sync with either one (or both) that is online? 

Is there any reason I couldn't take this setup one step further and do something like the following?

• LOCATION 1
  • COMPUTER-1 [using Read & Write key, and configured only to sync over LAN -- no Relay or Trackers]
  • ALWAYS-ON-DEVICE-1 (e.g., Raspberry Pi) [using Encrypted key]
• LOCATION 2
  • COMPUTER-2 [using Read & Write key, and configured only to sync over LAN -- no Relay or Trackers]
  • ALWAYS-ON-DEVICE-2 (e.g., Raspberry Pi) [using Encrypted key]

The idea would be that COMPUTER-1 would do fast LAN sync with ALWAYS-ON-DEVICE-1, and COMPUTER-2 would do fast LAN sync with ALWAYS-ON-DEVICE-2, and ALWAYS-ON-DEVICE-1 and ALWAYS-ON-DEVICE-2 would sync with each other (to pre-download content to each location to be ready for fast LAN sync when the computer is connected at each location). Would that work, or would ALWAYS-ON-DEVICE-1 and ALWAYS-ON-DEVICE-2 not be able to sync with each other if they both use the Encrypted key?

Another probably dumb question:

If I want to sync, for example, my large Photos folder between COMPUTER-1 and COMPUTER-2, could I pre-seed the two folders by copying them manually by USB (so they start off with the same contents so I don't have to sync over the Internet many, many GBs of files)? Could I do that by first creating the Sync on COMPUTER-1 and copying the Read & Write key to COMPUTER-2 and specifying the location on COMPUTER-2 as the identical Photos folder?

Thanks!

 

[Helen]

You can, and AOD1 and AOD2 will be able to sync to each other,  but remember that pre-seeding data to encrypted peer (is that what you mean?) makes no sense - these files will be ignored once you add the folder to Sync. So connect C1, C2 with RW,, and connect them to AOD1 and AOD2 with EncryptedRO key at a time, picking empty folders on Encrypted peers. And still they will create a mesh of 4 peers. 

The other question: yes, you can pre-seed the folder to the RW peer, here's instruction.

[ToSync]

52 minutes ago, Helen said:

You can, and AOD1 and AOD2 will be able to sync to each other,  but remember that pre-seeding data to encrypted peer (is that what you mean?) makes no sense - these files will be ignored once you add the folder to Sync. So connect C1, C2 with RW,, and connect them to AOD1 and AOD2 with EncryptedRO key at a time, picking empty folders on Encrypted peers. And still they will create a mesh of 4 peers. 

The other question: yes, you can pre-seed the folder to the RW pee, here's instruction.

Perfect, thanks @Helen!