I’ve synch’d some folders to my iPad (iPhone synching is still problematic as noted in posts from others). However, I do not always want to carry those same items on my iPad. How do I unsynch them? I followed directions and replicated the folders to my synch folder, so if I delete them from the synch folder they are also deleted from the original location. I can find no way in DTTG to delete a folder or file from the iPad.
Instead of replicating entire folders to the Sync folder, try creating folders under the Sync folder and then replicate the documents to those folders. Then you can delete replicant documents from folders under the Sync group without also deleting them from the rest of the database.
Well, but then if I delete the replicated file it disappears from its original location. Same problem, but on an individual file basis. I thought about duplicating the file instead of replicating, but then the file does not get updated when changes are made. Isn’t there a way to “unreplicate” a file or folder? Or, alternatively, to tell the system you want to delete just one instance of a replicant?
The file should only be deleted from its original location if you have replicated the folder. By deleting an item contained in a folder that is replicated, you are indicating that you want all replicants of that folder to be the same. The behavior is the same as replicating a 3 paragraph document and then deleting the second paragraph from one of the replicants-all instances of the replicant will reflect the change.
However, if you create new folders under the sync group and replicate only documents to those folders, deleting a replicant anywhere in the database will delete only the one instance. You can ‘unreplicate’ a folder by deleting it. You can ‘unreplicate’ a document by deleting it. But you must keep in mind that the documents in a folder that has been replicated are not replicants themselves-the folder is. I know this sounds confusing-we discussed this at length during the beta cycle, but it is a logical behavior if you remember that by replicating a folder, the documents contained in it are not the same as documents that are replicated.
I’ve found it safer and less confusing for me to not replicate any folders, but instead create new folders and replicate the contents of the existing folder to the new folder.
Thanks for the explanation. Very helpful.
I’ve several folders replicated to Sync folder, and I have found a way to safely delete them: simply drag the folder you want to delete and drop it in its original folder. This will create two identical, repeated and replicant folders which can coexist. Then you delete one of them: the second one remains and loses its replicant state.
Hope this helps.
Either of the posted solutions seems to work well. Thanks for the help.
I have found that if you Replicate folders to the Sync group then you can just delete the replicated folder from the Sync Group and it will ONLY disappear from the Sync Group.
However you can’t delete subfolders that exist under the folder that is Replicated, otherwise the deletion will be replicated to the original location as well.
When I tried the drag and drop folder method suggested above, this is not allowed for subfolders, only a Relicated folder, so this solution is more work than simply deleting the folder in the synced group. Unless I misunderstood.
So in summary ‘unsync delete group’ works quite well if you’re happy to unsync a complete tree of folders. If you’re not then create a new Group (at level 1) in the Sync Group (so that it exists separately) then Replicate the subfolders you want under that (i.e. to level 2).
You are then able to unsync the subfolders (at level 2) by deleting them from the top group in the Sync folder.
Unfortunately deep layers of nested folders are a problem
OK… so in my ignorance, not understanding these things in advance, I replicated a folder with 5 sub-folders, each containing several documents. Everything moved, but the documents in the sync folder are neither duplicates nor replicants. They all appear to be originals although my originals still exist in the regular folders below. Now I need to undo that, but I’m not sure I understand everything in this discussion. I’d like to do the “create new folders and replicate documents” thing, but I don’t want to lose anything that’s in the folders right now. If I delete the main folder in the sync folder, will it damage or lose any of the original files? Also, there are a few (maybe 5 or 6) replicants in those folders that were replicants before I made the changes.
Thanks
Jim
Jim, if you replicated a folder with sub-folders and the sub-folders contain documents, the only item that is a replicant in the Sync group is the top-level folder. All of the sub-folders and all of the documents are not considered replicants (excluding of course all the documents that are individually replicated somewhere else). You can confirm this by selecting the top-level folder and showing the info for it-it should indicate that a replicant of the group exists.
If you delete the top-level, replicated group from the Sync group you will be fine. If you delete any of the individual documents or any of the sub-folders, then those too will be deleted from the original location as DEVONthink will make both instances (replicants) of the top-level folder identical with respect to content.
Let me get this clearly. There seems to be no way to temporarily turn off syncing to make changes to the database on the host mac? Additionally there is no initial way to easily replicate 10000 documents in hundreds of folders/groups all nested? And there is no way to undo vast numbers of files/groups once in the sync. This is mac like and easy to explain to my clients!!
No, that is not the case at all. You can easily replicate hundreds of folders/groups with thousands of files to the Sync group. The important takeaway in this discussion is that when you replicate a group, you are telling DEVONthink that you want each replicated group to mirror all other replicants of that group. If you delete a document, or a group, from a replicated group then DEVONthink will delete that document, or group, from all replicants of that group. If you add a document, or a group, to a replicated group then the same thing happens-the document or group is added to every replicant of that group.
By the way, this has nothing to do with DEVONthink To Go. The same behavior will occur with any replicated group in the DEVONthink database, and this is how DEVONthink has always worked. The important point to keep in mind in all this is what the definition of a replicant is within DEVONthink. You would expect that deleting a paragraph from a replicated document would make the change in all replicants of the document, and deleting anything from a replicated group produces the same result. It is just not possible, or logical, to replicate an entire group to the Sync folder and then selectively delete documents from that group and not expect the changes to be made to all replicants in the database.
Thanks Greg!
Your coherent/helpful/useful explanation of replication belongs in the documentation. 
OK Then what is the best way to sync an entire database with multiple levels of folders/groups so that the bottom documents at the final nodes or leaves of the tree are replicated?
I just want a simple duplicate my database on my iPod option.