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Comment by executesorder66 | Hacker News Reader

I've been looking for something like sync.com but free and opensource. Does such a thing exist?

I'm planning on setting up my own nextcloud server, and they also have their own file manager system (Nextcloud Files), which is great for keeping files in sync across devices.

And although it's nice to edit a text file that's stored on a cloud server from any of your devices, I want to be able to use more powerful desktop applications to edit/organize other files. e.g. beets for music, digikam for bulk organizing the directory structure of my photos. Darktable for editing photos.

Does anyone know of a workflow that lets me do all the organizing/editing on a desktop, but still keep it all in sync with my other devices via a cloud server?

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If you're just looking for personal sync (as opposed to collaboration), Syncthing [1] is a common recommendation, though personally I've had better luck with Unison [2].

[1] https://syncthing.net

[2] https://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/

Thanks, I already use syncthing for some stuff, and it's great.

However I should clarify: One of the reasons I want to move my data to a cloud server is that I am running out of space for more hard drives on my PC.

So syncthing will work for editing stuff on my local and syncing the changes with my cloud server. But I don't want to store all my data on cloud _and_ on my local PC. I want something where it is usually stored on the cloud server, but where I can bulk edit/organize the data selectively on my local machine.

Do you have local (non-cloud) backups? If yes, that's great, but otherwise I wouldn't recommend a cloud-only (or a single backup) approach to storing important data.

I currently have backups on some external drives.

But I plan on also doing backups with blackblaze or somewhere similar.

My plan for the cloud server is just to have a central place to access all my (and my wife's) files from any device. But then my problem is, as I mentioned earlier, how do I bulk edit/organize those files using desktop software?

It feels like you're looking for something like git-annex (https://git-annex.branchable.com/). I've never used it but read a bit about it, here's how you would use it:

- Install git-annex on your cloud

- Tell git-annex that you have a remote there

- Do your stuff on your local drive, push to the cloud when it's done

- If some of the files are not needed locally, tell git-annex to drop them from your local drive. git-annex knows that there is another copy in a safe storage

- If you want to work on some files you don't have, ask git-annex to transfer them to you.

The manual steps might be a bit tedious, so git-annex also has an assistant mode that is a good-enough copy of dropbox (https://git-annex.branchable.com/assistant/). See the archival walkthrough, that seems to fit your use case (https://git-annex.branchable.com/assistant/)

(I have more or less the same need, but haven't committed to doing it just yet)

Thanks, I'll look into it.

SSHFS?

https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-use-...

This might just work, thanks.

I use OneDrive for work. The desktop app has "Files-On-Demand" (enabled by default). It keeps everything in the cloud until you click on a file. Then it downloads a local copy and keeps it in sync with the cloud. You can also manually designate files to "Always keep on this device" or "Free up space". You can take space saving even further with Storage Sense in Windows 10. It can delete local copies of files that haven't been used for a designated amount of time (Never by default).

Is Microsoft better than Google? Probably not. I don't know of any open source or self hosted solution this robust. You might want to consider getting a NAS; which lets you mount a network share on your local PC and use your normal file manager.

I've been looking for something similar too. I've no experience with either, but currently eyeing Seafile https://www.seafile.com/en/home/ or OwnCloud https://owncloud.com. OwnCloud seems perfect, but quite pricey for a cloud-provided instance. Seafile looks good, but there's no cloud provided option unfortunately (i'd rather not self-host).

Could you please expand on why or how you had better luck with Unison and why syncthing wasn't adequate?

I use your workflow - but back (some of) my data up in O365. On linux, I use insync (closed source) to sync my O365 as needed. Insync allows me to select (within a folder) what sub-folders to mirror. It's pretty perfect.

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