So I've been pursuing a research project for the last year or so and have been locating and saving material related to it, as well as doing some of my own writing in the area. I keep that material in a particular folder. That's all fine and good. The problem is that I want the ability to work on the project while I'm at any of 3 different computers--computers that are often located in 3 different locales, some of which are even remote from my LAN. So, how to host the same folder on all three machines, and keep it current with the most recent changes made on any of the 3 computers?
I intend for this to be a manual process, i.e., one that will involve me manually running some program or script on each of the three machines, in order to update the folder. I should also mention that I have access to a shell account where I can run a number of utilities that can facilitate this--so a 4th computer, technically speaking, is involved as well. I envision the shell account functioning as a sort of central hub for keeping said folders in sync: a sort of master copy of the folder can be stored there and each of the three machines can syncronize with that folder as need will arise.
I'm still trying to puzzle out how to pull all this together and am looking at the sorts of software/utilities that can accomplish the task. I've only tested out one option thus far--bsync. I opted for that in an initial foray for its simplicity: it's just a python script that enhances the functionality of rsync (a great sync utility, but one that does not do bi-directional synchronization). So all I needed to do was download the script and make it executable.
Using the utility, I was able to put the most current copy of the folder at my shell account by just running bsync MyFolder me@my.shellacct.com:MyFolder (the MyFolder directory must already exist at the remote address). So I've at least made a beginning.
That said, I'm still in the early stages of investigating approaches to do the sort of bi-directional synchronization I'm after. Tests with bsync have gone well so far but, if I'm understanding correctly, this utility does not deal well with sub-folders--which could be an issue in my use scenario; it seems bsync will work best on a folder or directory that contains only files, while my directory has a few sub-directories under it.
Other possible options I've found are csync (which uses smb or sftp), osync, bitpocket, and FreeFileSync. The first 3 of these are most attractive to me since they are command-line utilities. FreeFileSync is a graphical utility, though it does appear that it can be run from the command line as well. I should also mention unison, which I've looked at but not pursued--the reason being that it apparently requires that the same version be installed on all concerned machines, which is something that will be unrealistic in my case (Arch runs on 2 machines, an older Ubuntu on another, and BSD on the fourth).
So, what is your bi-directional synchronization software preference? Any further tips or pointers to add on accomplishing this task?
