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When I develop web applications I'm frequently need to sync files from a working folder to external server or another folder. I like keeping my code separated from the web sever.

In open source world there is the eclipse with file sync that does the job pretty well. Unfortunately I can't find any good replacement for Visual Studio.

I've only found two generic solutions: - Winscp which is pretty good but stucks when a file is locked and ask for confirmation. Which is quite annoying. - DSynchronize which works pretty well (ie. doesn't ask questions) but doesn't have filters so I can't tell it not to sync my .svn files or web.conf :(.

Do you know any good way to achieve realtime synchronization in Visual Studio or windows?

I doens't have to have gui in fact I would love to see a command line solution like a powershell command that outputs modified files.

Piotr Czapla
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2 Answers2

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I've ended up using Mercurial (to skip the .svn files) and DSynchronize to sync files

Piotr Czapla
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I would give a try to immortal classic - rsync. There is cygwin enabled implementation for Windows called cwrsync: http://www.itefix.no/i2/node/10650 . With proper configuration (potentially with some fine tuning with scripting as well) it will do perfectly.

If you would like to have bi directional synchronization, the Unison may be the answer: http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/

If you are looking for something even fancier, you might give a try to one of distributed file systems available, like CODA (I'm afraid decent Windows systems aren't supported yet): http://www.coda.cs.cmu.edu or native DFS solution from Microsoft, however I'm afraid the set up is too hassling (if not impossible in your case) since it's targeted for enterprise solutions: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc753479(WS.10).aspx

Of course DFS option probably won't support filtering you are interested in.

Nick
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juckobee
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  • None of the utilities you mention are realtime. Are they? – Piotr Czapla Sep 21 '11 at 17:21
  • Distributed files systems are supposed to operate realtime, but in practice the replication mechanism is always a subject of some scheduling/queuing hence in my opinion it's just a question if it's done internally or you have to set up it on your own. I believe rsync is lightweight enough to be run it in a schedule with fairly limited time delay using Windows Task Scheduler. You could even go a step further and trigger rsync task on certain event ("save" in Visual Studio?) rather by timer. The question is if VS publishes appropriate event OOTB. – juckobee Sep 22 '11 at 11:13