Syncthing is almost always the best option. You'll have to explain what about it is unacceptable if you want the best alternative.
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I'll give a dumb idea, maybe KDE Connect and an rsync cron lol
Ohwow, did not know it could do that. Been using KDE Connect for years and yes, this works.
Thanks - that's it for me. ^^^ This idea wins, y'all.
You can rsync from your Linux pc to your phone via SSH over port 8022 (you'll need Termux), and schedule when the script runs with a cron job. Here's some documentation:
what's the problem with syncthing?
It's a little wonky getting it set up at first, but once it's going it's fine.
Android file permissions are goofy.
I always have issues with syncthing. Either when I am changing devices which would be okay, but oftentimes i find out it didnt sync for a long time and i always have to open the app on the phone and web interface on the computer to start it up again. Not sure why.. So I am in market for alternatives as well...
Check out Resilio.
I've used both for 10 years now, rarely have issues with either, and I sync (with Syncthing) hundreds of gigs between about 8 devices, with about 20 different sync jobs, every day.
You do have to configure ST exactly how you want it, and know what that means.
I've been able to move the config 3 times now as I've migrated systems - you stop the service, copy the config files (ensuring the new system has the same folder structure), then start it there. Not for the faint of heart.
I do think Resilio is a little more robust, but it's much harder on memory/battery for mobile - so much so I don't let it just run on my phone and only use it when I want to sync specific files over (using it's Selective Sync feature).
The only problem I've has is when a file or folder name contained certain emoji. Some worked, some didn't. No idea why. So I just renamed them and everything was fine.
Syncthing-fork is a completely different project than Syncthing.
Syncthing-fork merely uses Syncthing under the hood. Syncthing itself is maintained by a completely different team from Syncthing-fork. The Syncthing-fork team packages Syncthing into an Android-compatible wrapper with a touch-friendly interface.
Syncthing itself was not affected by any of last year's drama.
Syncthing is a really great peer-to-peer file sync for me. If you want something like Immich (which uses a server), but for general files, there's a bunch of options. I use Nextcloud, but there's many others that are smaller in size (since Nextcloud is pretty big).
What are your requirements the make Syncthing not acceptable? That will help us offer other solutions.
Two other tools you can use are FolderSync on Android - it just uses standard network protocols (FTP, SFTP, SAMBA, etc), so it's much harder on battery than Syncthing.
Resilio Sync is similar to Syncthing but works very differently. I use it along with Syncthing.
I too use Nextcloud & Joplin on all my machines. I also have LocalSend on desktops & phone as another option for quickly firing something over. Because I'm a nerd I also keep a copy of LocalSend portable on my keyring flash drive "just in case I need it" (I'll almost certainly never need it).
Could use something like nextcloud as a ready made option, not the greatest for things where there's frequent updates on large files though since it doesn't send just partial updates. To some extent it depends on what your use case is exactly.
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I've seen in this thread:
| Fewer Letters | More Letters |
|---|---|
| NAS | Network-Attached Storage |
| SFTP | Secure File Transfer Protocol for encrypted file transfer, over SSH |
| SMB | Server Message Block protocol for file and printer sharing; Windows-native |
| SSH | Secure Shell for remote terminal access |
4 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 7 acronyms.
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my solution for android file sync is always rsync with termux. i just have a shell script for my desired operation and have the shortcut on my home screen using termux widgets. it's not automatic but i just run it periodically when i make some changes and want to sync.
https://f-droid.org/packages/com.chiller3.basicsync
There is a new fork of syncthing. It aims to be minimal with most of the heavy lifting done by the familiar web gui
It's not auto-syncable but PlainApp works great for me. Only needs a phone app installed, works in the browser on a lappy/PC
https://github.com/newhinton/Round-Sync - Android rclone port.
Its done on a schedule but I backup once a day to backblaze b2 using my own keys for full e2ee by wrapping the b2 remote with a crypto remote. Been set it and forget it for about 3 years. Supports many other cloud or self hosted remotes.
Its not in any store last I checked. I use https://github.com/ImranR98/Obtainium to manage installing and updating.
I am currently looking into openCloud and also web dav. Disadvantage is that both are kinda like mounted drives on Android and not all apps can access that for some reason.
i put stuff on a nextcloud (a paid hosting) and sync via that eg my Joplin data etc. I don't use Syncthing. I have nothing against Syncthing, I have just not needed it.
I also occasionally use LocalSend to transfer one off files, but KDE connect has plenty of options in that respect as well.
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