Synching For Dummies

Two questions on Dropbox sync:

  1. I have a Mac Pro and a Macbook Air. I’m syncing a database called “Test.” Does the entire database reside both on the hard drive of the Pro and the hard drive of the Air, with the Dropbox folder merely enabling the sync? Or if not, where does the complete database data reside?

  2. When I uncheck Apps in Dropbox preferences, is there a downside or tradeoff I should be aware of that might affect my other uses of Dropbox?

Thanks!
HRM

  1. Yes an entire copy resides on each machine. DropBox is just a common location for the Sync data. Remember, do NOT store your databases in a DropBox folder.

  2. Exclude the Apps/DEVONthink folder.

In order to synch my databases, I’ve long been keeping them in a DropBox folder and have just been very careful to never open them in two locations at the same time. I’m thrilled that DTPO now has a native synch option so I don’t have to use that old DropBox system. So my question is this:

  1. It sounds like I should remove the actual Database file from the DropBox folder where I’ve always kept it, then synch that to DropBox using the new synching function in DevonThink. That way the database will live on my dard drive (rather than in DropBox) but a version of it will be uploaded to DropBox for synching onto my other machines. Is that right?

See

and

and

for information on how to move from dropbox sync to DEVONThink dropbox sync.

The database already lives on your hard drive. (This is a common misunderstanding about DropBox. If you sync two machines via DropBox, you have 3 individual copies - one on each machine and one on the DropBox servers.)

Also, a copy is NOT Synced to DropBox. Syncing data is sent to DropBox to be shared with other installations of DEVONthink. You cannot browse or share your database in DropBox.

Cheers! 8^)

Thanks very much.

(This is a common misunderstanding about DropBox. If you sync two machines via DropBox, you have 3 individual copies - one on each machine and one on the DropBox servers.)

If Dropbox made this quickly visible and explicit on their website, I bet they’d get a lot more skittish customers to join up.

Hm, on that topic, I wonder whether there is a more clever solution to using Boxcryptor than what I currently do. I currently have a local sync store on my Boxcryptor drive. With that solution, I seem to have all data twice on my hard drive - once for the DevonThink database and once for the local sync store. Can I get around this somehow? From your explanations, it seems the native Dropbox sync has one copy less.