If you ever had to work in several computers during a day, then you might find the tools, DirSyncPro and Microsoft Groove, very useful. Both of them work at least on local network.
The first one, DirSyncPro, is really easy to use. It moves files which missing in a particular location B to this location from another location A where they are not missing but present so that in the end, all files stored in A, are stored in B as well. Nonetheless, this software does not remove any file from either A or B in contrast to Microsoft Grove or Windows Live Sync which are slightly different applications.
If you have seen yourself in this situation, you will know that remembering what computer is the one in which you stored the last version of a particular work file might get tiresome. So, with this tool this trouble has ended because you will be able to have the same updated data in all the computers you want to work with.
Another use of this tool is keeping updated all the digital pictures and videos that many people like taking but not so much manage its storage. If you have several computers and you can not transfer your pictures and files always to the some computer, then you do not have to worry any more for bringing them together. The only thing you will have to do once in a blue moon is running this tool to synchronize the different computer’s folders through your local network.
A third use which is very common for the mentioned tool is synchronizing pen drive’s data with those from a computer’s hard disk. For this you will not need local network.
The second tool that I would like to cite is helpful to synchronize files which are in different computers when both of them can go online some time. This one is called Groove and it comes with Microsoft Office 2007. To use it you just have to do right click on the particular folder and click on the option entitled “Groove’s folder synchronization” from the dropdown menu.
Like I said, this tool also does not only allow synchronization through a local network but through a server which is in the Internet. This server is very useful because it store changes made to the files and notify those changes next time you open your Groove account from another computer. The tool also gives the chance to update those changes. The main limitation I see is that it has 2GB as maximum folder’ size when synchronizing. Therefore, this tool usually will be valid for folders with small files like those from Office.
Nonetheless, if what you really want is synchronizing folders with pictures and videos that you store in different computers now and then, then this last tool will not be useful because 2GB is not enought for this kind of use. In this case I would suggest using just DirSyncPro as I commented in this same post.
Besides the previous two tools described above, I want to talk to you about Windows Live Sync. It seems it might work better than Microsoft Groove for home users because it is a lighter aplication and does not consume so many computational resources. And in the end, this last application (Windows Live Sync) behaves pretty well.
To end with I want to warn you about a posible danger that might arise after using any of this applications to keep an updated copy of all your data in all your machines at the same time. The danger comes when you erase by accident data in any of your computers. You will have to be quick by disconnecting from the Internet the other synchronized computers. Otherwise you might lose your data from all of them. That is why I suggest that if you make use of this kind of applications, it is strongly recommended that you program backups may be every week or even every day depending on your needs with any specifical tool from those available, whether open source or not, for this purpose.