Author Topic: Super Flexible File Synchronizer Pro says Zaine (Read 67,529 times)

KenR · « **on:** March 09, 2007, 10:54 AM »

If Zaine says it, I believe it and you can too!

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Although its a typically excellent German program, it has a very Japanese name, and the two words I’d use to describe Super Flexible File Synchronizer Pro (SFFS) are fast and accurate. The UI is also well thought out. Best of all, it gives you control over exactly what goes where and how it syncs — at the point of synching. It’s also great for exact mirroring, and while Super Flexible File Synchronizer Pro should really be considered a commercial app; that is, an enterprise one, given its deep feature set. Its trial version is fully functional, letting you thoroughly test and compare it to other synching apps, so give it a shot!

http://www.thegsblog.com/?p=155

urlwolf · « **Reply #1 on:** March 09, 2007, 05:20 PM »

Has anybody compared this to syncBack? I own syncBack, but I'm a bit disappointed by it. is this really faster than others?

Another contender (maybe) for people changing large files often (i.e., digital photos?) is laplink's speedsynch stuff...

urlwolf · « **Reply #2 on:** March 10, 2007, 02:52 PM »

Backup4all can do one-way synch (useful to have say a remote FTP copy) as well, using the mirror option (no compression). Not useful if you update the files in both locations, that's for sure.

BTW, Super Flexible might be a good program to get a DC discount for. Zaine, are you up for the task (since you discovered it).

urlwolf · « **Reply #3 on:** March 10, 2007, 03:01 PM »

Also, how about beyond compare for this task (sync'ing)? It is definitely cheaper, and it works well.

GHammer · « **Reply #4 on:** March 10, 2007, 05:46 PM »

I have licenses for a number of tools and SFFS beats them all.
Some have poor UI, some don't support this or that method, some insist on zipping. None do the things that SFFS does, does them as accurately nor with as little impact on my system.
One thing I like with SFFS is that the config is stored in an INI instead of a database or reg entries.

A discount would be a good thing, but the tool is worth the asking price.

taichimaster · « **Reply #5 on:** March 10, 2007, 06:21 PM »

Thanks KenR and Zaine for pointing out this nice program. It does look flexible though a bit pricey. Discount on this would definitely be nice. Go Zaine!!

I have been using Dillobits InSync for my mirroring needs. I found it much faster and accurate than synctoy or syncback.

tomos · « **Reply #6 on:** March 10, 2007, 08:02 PM »

Quote

The only sync app I’ve found to be as accurate is DirSync, but it’s not as fast as Super Flexible File Synchronizer Pro. It has both a wizard step-by-step mode or an advanced mode. Profiles are simple to setup, easy to alter, and can be scheduled remotely. Worth every penny to protect your files.

(from the review)

I presume "It has both a wizard step-by-step mode or an advanced mode. Profiles are simple to setup, easy to alter, and can be scheduled remotely" refers to SFFS.

...
but DirSynch is less than half the price

SFFS would want to be a lot faster or you want to be synching lots of stuff ...

urlwolf · « **Reply #7 on:** March 11, 2007, 11:28 AM »

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I have been using Dillobits InSync for my mirroring needs. I found it much faster and accurate than synctoy or syncback.

Looks like as soon as one digs up a bit SyncBack is not that great.

I like some things about SB, for example the fact that you can hit pause and resume a profile, and that options are (finally!) nicely structured and with an icon.

But in my tests SFFS is really fast. SFTP and webDAV (and amazon S 3!) is a plus. Another interesting feature is the "detect moved files" feature (lot less transfer).

Taichimaster, could you run a simple test comparing your favourite Dillobits InSync against SFFS? that'd be great.

urlwolf · « **Reply #8 on:** March 11, 2007, 11:45 AM »

In my case (I dunno if it's a bit extreme) I want to have a current mirror to an external HD (updating often, maybe every 2-3 days, and a remote backup (to a server) updating maybe monthly.

I have 14 Gb and 115,000 files that I want to synchronize. That's quite a load for the remote job, so I need to split the job into smaller profiles, and upload the differences at different, random times. So any improvements in speed would be appreciated.

Looks like SFFS doesn't let you select sub-folders (maybe because of its design and the "detect moved files" feature.

Ideally, a sync program should keep a catalog (as backup4all does) to quickly see which folder one has worked on in a particular day. Mind you, maybe checking the OS's "recent folders" would be enough, or just monitoring HD I/O. That would save time in rescaning the entire drive every time a profile is run.Anyone with a similar situation?

Benchmarking all the programs compared would be great.
Looks like a good review is brewing here... Anyone up for the job?

urlwolf · « **Reply #9 on:** March 11, 2007, 12:01 PM »

Actually, a category in itself would be those programs do 'patches' (aka delta backup), that is, they copy/move only the bits of the file that have changed. Any of these delta backup programs should beat traditional ones at speed.

Unison is one of them. Note that the same authors have started a new project: Harmony. So Unison is kind of unsupported, and looks like something that needs an important time investment.

Commercial software that does delta backup:
Novell's ifolders, According to http://www.ifolder.com/ [ifolder.com]: " iFolder is a simple and secure storage solution that can increase your productivity by enabling you to back up, access and manage your personal files-from anywhere, at any time. Once you have installed iFolder, you simply save your files locally-as you have always done-and iFolder automatically updates the files on a network server and delivers them to the other machines you use. Sponsored by Novell, the iFolder project is built on the Mono/.Net framework to integrate seamlessly into existing desktop environments. ".

The flash presentation says that it uses delta backup, but it is not featured in the description. Problem: only usable acrross the net, no HD backup possible.

Price: $51.99
It seems that v 3 is OSS, although that must be the server? I dunno, slashdot commentaries here.

Another delta backup tool: Suresync. price=$69, same as SFFSP-WTF

. It does provide real-time syncing and delta backup using an addon (sold separately), I mailed them for a quote.

Looks like it really has lots of features!

Depending on how expensive the addon is, and how unusable/time-consuming Unison is, this could be an interesting pick. It can do HD backups fine.

urlwolf · « **Reply #10 on:** March 11, 2007, 12:24 PM »

UPDATE :
According to Inray's comment in fileforums, in terms of speed, it seems that the fastest is robocopy (not tested). this is a cmd utility, but there is a GUI here

Unison uses the rsync algorithm, should be the fastest since it does the smartest move: copy only the bits that change, not the entire file.

There is an excellent review/tutorial of unison here

urlwolf · « **Reply #11 on:** March 11, 2007, 02:35 PM »

An even easier tutorial to install unison on winXP

PlayPhil · « **Reply #12 on:** March 11, 2007, 02:48 PM »

Well, my needs for file syncing are fairly simple, updating my file archives primarily and specific directories on occasion. For this purpose I find Karen Kenworthy's Replicator to be all I need, easy to setup and use, and fast enough. I also like the fact I can easily filter out what files or file types I do not want included in the Data Backups (desktop.ini for example).

I also use Karen's "Once A Day" util (same page) to fire batch files when I bootup for incremental backups of a few specific dirs.

I might add I do not use proprietary compression formats (ZIP etc) for Data Backups, nor do I upload using FTP, so these utils may not suit those who do, or it's subsequent steps in your procedure.

urlwolf · « **Reply #13 on:** March 13, 2007, 06:41 PM »

Ok, Super Flexible does delta updating too. Not over ftp though.

urlwolf · « **Reply #14 on:** March 13, 2007, 08:20 PM »

Well, in my tests (.mdb, .rar files) after checking the box for "use partial file updating" it simply copies the entire content.
Either it doesn't work, or it is really convoluted.

Docs are sparse, it feels like this feature is still being implemented (doesn't work with ftp).

urlwolf · « **Reply #15 on:** March 13, 2007, 08:34 PM »

Just tried unison, and it has the same problem: it copies over the entire file. I dunno what i'm doing wrong, this cannot be that difficult.

This is important because just playing music, I may end up updating a mdb file daily, that is 57mb x 265 = 20gb of storage in a normal, uncompressed incremental backup.

Doing delta sync would save a lot of disk space on this.

For FTP backups, savings are fundamental anyway.

urlwolf · « **Reply #16 on:** March 14, 2007, 07:31 PM »

Quote from: urlwolf on March 13, 2007, 08:20 PM

Well, in my tests (.mdb, .rar files) after checking the box for "use partial file updating" it simply copies the entire content.
Either it doesn't work, or it is really convoluted.

Docs are sparse, it feels like this feature is still being implemented (doesn't work with ftp).

Correction: After a quick mail exchange with Tobias (the author), SFFS DOES do delta updating and it works. You just have to activate the logs and look at them.

This is looking like an absolutely killer app. people here working with backup4all, syncBack etc may get a lot faster transfers, and maybe indexing too.

Another killer feature is that SFFS can cache the tree in the destination, which should improve indexing. One can set how often the tree gets refreshed.

No news on how to make unison do delta updating though.

iphigenie · « **Reply #17 on:** March 14, 2007, 08:02 PM »

now to get a DC rebate

urlwolf · « **Reply #18 on:** March 15, 2007, 11:39 AM »

news on unison delta update.
It uses rsync, so it does work only when using a remote connection.
If you copy from local to local, no delta update.
Interesting.
So SFFS seems to be unique in that.

To make SFFS work like a backup program, say backup4all do:
(1) create your normal profile, left to right.
(2) Select "add timestamp to filename" (note: do not use delta updating here)
(3) Keep as many versions as you like (say 10)
(4) zip files if needed
(5) create another profile by copying the first one, but swap the paths, so it's "right to left"
(6) test it

nontroppo · « **Reply #19 on:** March 16, 2007, 04:45 PM »

Deltacopy is a reliable free rsync app for windows, and can do local as well as remote sync:

http://www.aboutmyip.com/AboutMyXApp/DeltaCopy.jsp

urlwolf · « **Reply #20 on:** March 16, 2007, 07:23 PM »

Thanks nontroppo, that was very useful. Deltacopy didn't really work for me but rsync itself did. Concretely, I'm using this rsync for windows: cwRsync
My particular case (backup to dreamhost using rsync) is covered here.

nontroppo · « **Reply #21 on:** March 16, 2007, 08:18 PM »

hm, send the devs your bug feedback; it works flawlessly for me...

what i really want however is rdiff-backup natively for windows (incremental backup with restore per delta) - anyone know of a package out there?

and thanks for that dreamhost howto - finally something to do with all that space!!!

urlwolf · « **Reply #22 on:** March 17, 2007, 02:08 AM »

Quote from: nontroppo on March 16, 2007, 08:18 PM

hm, send the devs your bug feedback; it works flawlessly for me...

what i really want however is rdiff-backup natively for windows (incremental backup with restore per delta) - anyone know of a package out there?

and thanks for that dreamhost howto - finally something to do with all that space!!!

The only "native" (you mean not a unix port?) win delta backup apps I have been able to find are SFFS, and suresync (expensive, needs an addin to do delta backups).

Yep, DH is totally worth it if only for the amount of space they give you, and the shell.

I was falling in love with SFFS, but rsync is doing a great job and I don't mind (almost prefer) scripting. It doesn't take much in term of system resources. The advantage of SFFS is that it can cache the 'right tree' (useful when it's a large tree)... but rsync is really fast counting files, and very portable.

What's the difference between rsync and unison then? Why is unison not capable of doing delta backup locally (if this info is correct!)?. If unison is based on rsync, it should.

I guess rsync is just a mirror, whereas unison is able to resolve conflicts and thus better to be used when you update both sides independently.

urlwolf · « **Reply #23 on:** March 17, 2007, 01:43 PM »

Note: something like this:
http://www.rsnapshot.org/

Would be great if working on windows. It would nulify the need for things like backup4all (it takes 275mb of ram when operating!).

urlwolf · « **Reply #24 on:** March 19, 2007, 01:19 AM »

Ok, seems like for windows, there are some mature incremental backup solutions based on ryinc.

http://bbdev.fluffy.co.uk/svn/box/chris/win32/releases/boxbackup-chris_general_784-backup-client-mingw32.zip