File sync problem and possible solutions

It is well-known fact that an overwhelming majority of people are quite lazy, especially programmers. The latter invented functions and subroutines, classes and components in order not to code things twice. In this very case it seems that a sort of creative laziness can bring huge benefits to the world we are living in. But what if a person is not lazy enough to invent a brilliant idea or use an existing one? I was that person for last several years.

My problem was connected to my work. Not to the work itself but to the fact that I usually work at the office as well as at home and I want to get the whole working environment with me wherever I go. By the environment I mean not only projects that I’m working on (this case is handled rather well with the help of hg or subversion) but the entire set of files, documents, may be some music, electronic books, etc.

I tried a number of ways. The most long-lived one was an approach with a flash drive usage. I had to plug-in it every time I came to the office and upload the updated files onto my computer. Before I left the office I had to do the reverse operation – copy updated files back to the flash drive. The same routine was waiting for me at home. If I forget any of these operations – I get out of sync and simply can’t continue my normal working process.

The other options that I tried:

• Working from home via VPN + Remote desktop. This is not very useful especially when your ISP is not stable. It requires that both computers are on, network speed is rather high.
• Using a FTP server in order to  sync 2 computers. Not convenient, counts on your manual actions. But doesn’t require that both computers are on.
• Using one of Opera unite applications such as File Sharing, or Document Sync + Document Courier bundle. The latter one is very promising though. Opera-based solutions don’t require external ftp server although the maximum size of synchronizable directory in case of DS+DC must not exceed 350 Mb.
• Microsoft FolderShare – the same as the previous one but from Microsoft. Requires a specified application to be installed. Files are stored on your computer but the application provide access to it from the other ones. So again, both computers must be on in order to access shared files.

During those unsuccessful attempts to get a bit of happiness with all that stuff I suddenly realized what I actually wanted. It was simple and genius at the same time: all I wanted is to have on both computers a folder that can automatically synchronizes with some external internet storage. No more.

So my next step was to find an internet service of such kind. But no luck. Actually, there are tons of internet services which provides you with backup capabilities of any sort but not with auto synchronization. Moreover, I started to think that there is no such service and I had to invent my own one. 
Finally, after fruitless searches I found one, but it was worth hours of googling. In fact, even google couldn’t help me as I found the answer in Wikipedia =).

So the solution is – Dropbox! It does exactly what I want, simply syncs a folder in you computer with a cloud, so there is no any necessity to keep your computer working after the sync procedure is completed. It listens to the file system events and uploads updated files immediately. You don’t have to do anything special, just install, configure and that’s it! I really loved the service. It helps to forget about sync problem and concentrate on something really important. It provides free of charge account with 2 Gb limit and it seems that it is enough for me, at least for now. There is a small video presentation on the main page, so I suppose that it is worth watching.

Don’t get me wrong, this is not an advertisement of any kind.  I decided to write the post just because I really, really impressed by the finding. Hope you’ll like it too. They say – “Happy dropboxing!” =).