Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with synchronize

What tools are there for synchronizing photos to audio by time in a slideshow?

friedapplepie — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 09:59:15 -0800

What tools are there for synchronizing photos to audio by time in a slideshow? I have a set of digital photos taken manually, at about a photo each second but not quite. I have audio recorded at the same time, and I'd like to be able to match the photos up to the audio by time. What's the best way to do this? Mac tools are preferred, but I'd love to hear all suggestions. Thanks!

How do I properly sync Outlook with Google?

mr_silver — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 06:58:51 -0800

I'm trying to find a way to synchronize Outlook Calendar (on Windows) with Google Calendar that actually works - as my current solution doesn't. Bonus points if I can sync contacts as well. I want to synchronize Outlook with Google and then use Google's Exchange support so that I can get this information on whatever phone I'm using at the time.

At present I use Google Calendar Sync and a periodic export and import of a CSV containing my contacts.

This sucks for several reasons but the main one is that the Google application is buggy and has a habit of randomly deleting appointments. This is a well known bug and no fix seems to be coming any time soon. It's happened enough times for me to want to get away from the application.

The second major one is that exporting a CSV from Outlook and then importing it into Google isn't really syncing, a pain in the backside and prevents me from making any changes on the go because they'll just get lost.

I've done a search on the internet and there seems to be quite a few options - none of which appear to be free and several of which that want you to pay a monthly fee.

So, my question is - can you recommend any Windows applications which are free and sync calendar and contacts with Google?

Be free, Belkin Mouse. Freeeee.

spec80 — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 08:57:32 -0800

Why is my new wireless keyboard working, but not the wireless mouse it came with? Players:
Old Belkin Wireless Keyboard and Mouse (not sure of exact model - but the receiver plugs into a USB and ps/2)
New Logitech Cordless Desktop Wave (keyboard and mouse, receiver plugs into a USB)

I unplugged the old Belkin stuff, took out the batteries and plugged in the new Logitech stuff. It looks like the receiver is synching to both the keyboard and the mouse but while I'm able to use the keyboard, I'm unable to use the mouse.

I've tried restarting the computer. I called Logitech support and he had me synching and resyching and powering up and powering down, etc. I've looked online and I don't think I am searching correctly. Right now, I am using the new keyboard and the old mouse. I can't find anything on my add/remove programs about Belkin in case I needed to uninstall something.

I don't think it's the mouse because this is the second new Logitech wireless keyboard/mouse in 2 days that I've had this problem with. I have called my IT department and put in a request but it usually takes a few hours for someone to come by.

What am I doing wrong that the mouse isn't being recognized?

Back me up, Scotty!

sprocket87 — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 16:02:02 -0800

Recommend a good tool to remotely backup/synchronize large folders to my home NAS. Here's what I have:

- Laptop with 100+ GB music library; misc documents, photos, and other data that needs backed up
- Netgear ReadyNAS Duo 750GB at home (supports pretty much everything - rsync, (S)FTP, WebDAV, etc)

Here's what I want to do:

For my MP3 library (100GB, 20k files, 4k folders) - mirror or synchronize any changes from my laptop (remote at work) to my home NAS. I've tried a TON of apps already with varying degrees of success. The major problem seems to be that to do a mirror, the apps have to perform a full "audit" scan of the destination (NAS) share to see what needs updated/copied. Problem is, with 20k files, that takes f-o-r-e-v-e-r, at least using FTP or WebDAV.

Ideally, I'd like a real-time backup app that monitors some selected folders (like My Music) and kicks off an automated upload for any changed files. This (a) makes it fully automatic and (b) [in theory] faster - doesn't have to synch each time, just upload based off a good known synch. Problem is, I've yet to find the right tool to accomplish all these things correctly.

Note: I'd be happy as a clam to use rsync, which the ReadyNAS supports, but I'm sending from a Windows client and my options are limited. I've been racking my brain trying to get DeltaCopy to work, but it keeps timing out when attempting to connect to the NAS. I have port forwarding, etc, working fine on my router, so I can't really figure out why rsync is failing.

Note 2: The ReadyNAS does have optional support for SSH and Telnet, I believe, but it involves some trickery to get working and I think it might void my warranty...

Synchronize databases....3...2...1... NOW!

advicepig — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 18:50:53 -0800

What's the best way to keep data one way synchronized between an internal Mircosoft SQL Server database and a web facing mySQL database? So we have an internal system that's based on SQL Server. I've created numerous DTS packages for moving SQL Server data from the inside SQL Server to a SQL Server at our ISP with some complex transformations, but what I really need to do now is move data from our internal SQL Server to a mySQL database.

Here are some requirements and complications.

1. The internal SQL Server system doesn't have any obvious way to see what's changed in a days work.

2. The mySQL server should know when a row was last modified!

3. We can have as many supplemental tables on either database, but no changes can be made to the exisiting SQL Server tables.

4. Assume SQL Server 2000 and the mySQL version is rather up to date, but completely flexible on the mySQL side.

Are any of those database synchronization tools out there decent? The internal database is mission critical, so it's vital that it not be fouled up.

Copying files - duplicate filnames

Busy Old Fool — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 04:30:41 -0800

I want to copy files, ignoring & logging it if the target directory contains files with the same name. (Ubuntu 7.04) I have a large number of CD-Rs & DVD-Rs containing files (mostly mp3s, but I don't think that's particularly relevant to the problem at hand) organised which I would like to copy to my hard disk, on a Ubuntu 7.04 system.

For each disc, I want to issue a single command (via command line or GUI, it doesn't matter) and have all the files recursively copied to the hard disk, retaining the directory structure. If a file with the same name already exists in the same directory in the target filesystem I would like it to be skipped and for this to be logged. I don't want the copying process to be interrupted with overwrite/ignore-type messages.

Ideally, the identical filename situation would *not* be logged if the files were also identical in size (or even better, if they had the same hash). Also in a perfect world, the log would contain not only the names of skipped files, but also their size.

The --update argument to cp automates the 'identical filename' issue, but it is concerned with whether one file is more recent than another and that is not important to me.

I've looked at Unison File Synchronizer, but can't see a way to get it to do what I want.

Thanks!

Pimp my feeds

JonnyRotten — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 07:09:24 -0800

I keep up with alot of rss feeds. I read them at work on my breaks, and then at home before bed and in the morning before work. I would like a reader that will synchronize between the two locations so that I know where I left off at work, or at home. I allways forget my USB memory stick, so having a portable app doesn't work well for me. I haven't found a web based RSS reader that was fast enough, and designed the way I like it, I like to have my feeds grouped into folders, and read them one at a time by clicking on the item and reading the article. I tried the bloglines sync with Snarfer, and it really doesn't work the way it should, because it will mark items read from home, and then when I get to work, mark the items unread.
I tried feedreader on my usb stick, but I always forget it plugged in at home when I'm rushing around in the morning. I don't really care for the scrolly interface of google reader, and the web interface for bloglines marks entire feeds read as soon as you click on them, which doesn't suit my one or two articles at a time lifestyle.

Ideally it would just sync via magic voodoo similar to google browser sync syncs my bookmarks.

How can I sync Yahoo and Outlook (and/or Yahoo and Thunderbird)?

SampleSize — Sat, 17 Feb 2007 19:52:40 -0800

How can I sync Yahoo and Outlook (and/or Yahoo and Thunderbird)? I've been using the free Intellisync for Yahoo for years to sync Yahoo contacts and calendar with Outlook on my PC, but it has stopped working and there hasn't been a new version since forever. Googling for another product to achieve the same result has gotten me nowhere. Any suggestions?

Once I sync one last time, I plan on switching to Thunderbird. It would be great if, going forward, I could sync Yahoo with Thunderbird, so any suggestions for that would be appreciated too. If necessary, however, I'll just stop using my desktop calendar and contacts and go exclusively Yahoo.

Software for audio collaboration?

frenetic — Wed, 06 Sep 2006 19:21:08 -0800

I'm collaborating with someone on multiple large music projects (200-500 megs each). I'm looking for a way to have the projects in a central repository and allow us to upload and download only our changes to and from the repository. I thought of Subversion or CVS (though I've barely ever used them). Looking into them a bit I don't think I have much use for version tracking in these audio projects and I assume it would take a ton of hard drive space to track every single little change. So maybe they're not what I'm looking for.

I'm basically looking for a quick and easy way for us to synchronize our projects without having to re-upload and re-download the whole thing (say via FTP) every time. Is there an easy way to accomplish this? We're both on Windows and I have a Linux server at my disposal (which might be nice to use as an off-site backup.)

Is there a free Windows utility that will synchronize local directories with a remote one by (S)FTP?

skryche — Tue, 08 Aug 2006 05:08:53 -0800

Is there a free Windows utility that will synchronize local directories with a remote one by (S)FTP? There are some files (HTML, DOC -- small stuff) that I work on at home (on two separate computers) as well as at work. Instead of some flash drive solution or emailing them to myself, I'd like a program that runs in the background on each computer and synchronizes any changes I make to a local directory with one on my FTP site. Does such a thing exist? And: is it free?

A wrinkle: in the situation where the program attempts to upload and somehow discovers a newer version on the FTP site, I'd like for it to ask me what to do.

The key here is automation; if I have to sync manually I will eventually forget and lose track of which machine has the latst copy.

How can I automatically sync a file on a Mac?

sfluke20 — Sun, 02 Jul 2006 20:32:26 -0800

How do I automatically synchronize (via SFTP) an application data file at launch/exit of an application on a Mac? I have some software that I run on multiple Macs that stores all of it's data in a single file hidden away in the Library somewhere. I'd like to automatically download this file, launch the application, and then automatically upload it again when I quit out of the application.

It would also be nice if I could archive it as a dated filename at the same time.

How do I easily, quickly and twice daily sync two computers

elmaddog — Tue, 16 May 2006 12:44:12 -0800

I want to easily and quickly synchronize my work laptop with my home office desktop every evening when I get home, and visa versa just before I leave for work. What software and what hardware do I need. Cost is not a primary issue, but time and convenience are. A seamless "plug this here" "two clicks there" operation is my goal. Machine 1/2 is backup for machine 2/1 every 12 hours.

Bi-Directional Synchronization of database changes in mySQL and Access

mic stand — Wed, 19 Apr 2006 09:33:26 -0800

How can I implement bi-directional synchronized table changes in a mySQL database and Microsoft Access? I have webhosting with Dreamhost which has PHP and mySQL. I've created a mySQL test DB, installed mySQL Administrator locally and created the mySQL ODBC connection. I've made the ODBC connection to Access and brought in a sample table.

If anything changes in either the sample Access table(s) or the mySQL DB table(s) (i.e. adding a field or data population), I would like those changes to populate to both locations.

My primary reason is: I am much more familiar with Access and would like to continue to use it for queries (until my SQL skills are more refined). However, when I implement a web form and collect data, I understand that data will go to my mySQL database (correct?).

I do understand this exists: Access2mySQL Sync, but am looking for free alternatives.

Thanks for any input!

Help me manage my life (i.e. my calendar)

special-k — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 17:41:29 -0800

I add appointments to my calendar at work (desktop) and home (laptop) but miss appointments because I am at the wrong computer or away from both. Help me stay synchronized. I have a nice powerful desktop at work where I add appointments (from phone calls and emails). I also make appointments with people (face to face) on my moleskine which I then enter onto my laptop (if I dont return to the office the same day/next few days). How do I keep both calendars synchronized?

I run Windows XP on both with Mozilla Sunbird as my calendar (I can switch to Outlook if that would make things better). Is there a tool (or service) that will automatically keep both calendars synchronized? I have tried synching with Yahoo! but that didn’t work because I could never always remember to sync before leaving work/home.

In a nutshell, I need a service that
a) Can keep both calendars synched automatically (both computers are always online so some software that runs whenever an appt. is added or deleted would be ideal)
b) Lets me add appointments via the web (when I am away from both computers. This is not critical)
c) Is free (I cannot afford to pay a lot of money for any service).
d) bonus if it can sms my cellphone for select appointments
I have searched askmefi for this (no answers to this kind of question) and a service called Trumba looks like it would work but is too expensive.

Any ideas that might work for me?

Sync Windows Mobile to Mac?

kookoobirdz — Sat, 25 Feb 2006 14:42:22 -0800

Thinking of abandoning Palm OS for Windows Mobile, and Windows for Mac. Can I still sync? Please let's avoid a four-way fanboy war here. Just asking about syncing. As my reasons to stick with Palm OS dwindle and the variety of new, slim, and yummy devices running only Win Mobile draws me out into what once would have been sacrelige country, I'm also being drawn more towards Mac for home use. I know everybody has their sales pitches for each of those systems (and the sea of devices), but I'm not looking for that kind of input.

What just occurred to me is that if I go Win Mobile, and I go Mac, neither of which I've ever used, will I still be able to synchronize my handheld to my computer? My first thought was almost certainly not. But with versions of Office for Mac, for example, and all those creative third party apps out there for people who straddle the Mac/Win world, I figured it was worth asking.

Obviously I'd want to sync the PIM functions, but I'd also want to sync everything else, like documents, spreadsheets, etc, and like all the little third party apps. I'd want it to work just like synching Palm to Windows currently. Is this possible? Is it:
A) a built in function
B) a clean third party app function
C) an ugly hack function
D) not possible
E) other - please explain

By the way, I've never used Windows Mobile, but I'm assuming there's a large body of neat-o third party apps and a developer community and all that as there is with Palm. Right? An app for just about anything you can think of? Lots of shareware and freeware?

Ipod syncing in the age of DRM

mecran01 — Tue, 25 Oct 2005 12:51:50 -0800

What is your preferred methodology for syncing your ipod between an imac and an ibook so that you don't get duplicate songs/podcasts on your ipod? You can assume that I'm a clueless new owner. I have an imac at work and an ibook at home. I've used Setuni to move music off my ipod onto either machine, but it would be great to be able to sync everything automagically, like when you sync the data in a PDA. DRM is bad. Bonus question: how do I remove duplicate songs *on the ipod*. The dupes feature in itunes is greyed out when I am browsing the ipod. Many thanks.

What's the best means to mirror a webserver directory on a local OS X machine?

tweebiscuit — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 17:41:38 -0800

I maintain a complex website that I update by hand. (Unfortunately, this is unavoidable.) I want my local directory to be an exact mirror of the site, so that when I alter and modify thirty HTML files and I can simply run a script to copy them instead of FTPing them all by hand, in addition to removing deleted files and downloading any server-side changes made by scripts or other users. What's the best means to do this on OS X? I've tried using Transmit's "Mirror" feature, but in my experience its datestamp-calculations are unreliable, and also have the sideffect that anytime I need to reupload or redownload the entire 2 GB site from scratch (if I believe my backup is bad, or if I change servers, for example), I need to synchronize the entire site in the other direction for the timestamps to work out.

I've tried to figure out RsyncX, but I'm not sure it's designed to do what I want, and it's a pretty hardcore piece of software. If it WILL do what I want, I'm all for learning how to make it do it, but I haven't found a good tutorial to that effect yet.

Any suggestions? I'm sure that there are a million people who need and have systems like this, but for the life of me I can't figure it out myself.

Also, any pointers to a good "newbie's guide to Rsync/RsyncX" would be appreciated, since I'd like to start running incremental archived backups as well.

What's the easiest way to synchronize text files between two computers?

hansbleep — Fri, 31 Dec 2004 17:56:04 -0800

I maintain lists of to-dos and other information in a lot of text files. Currently I've been having to shuttle them between work and home via my FTP server, which is about a five step process and rather annoying, espcially when Dreamhost is slow. What is an easier way to synchronize text files between two Windows XP machines that are NOT on the same LAN... with a big emphasis on EASY, preferably two steps or less?

Ical

mecran01 — Mon, 18 Oct 2004 12:48:49 -0800

I am using Ical on my Imac and Ibook. I need to Isynchronize them without using Webdav or .mac. Given that the files generated by Ical are straight text, and complient with the IETF spec., is there some simple, smart way to do this?

Excel Spreadsheet Updating

ajpresto — Tue, 11 May 2004 13:01:41 -0800

Excel query. I have two Excel spreadsheets that I want to have automativally update each other. But, the format that they are in is generally incompatible. These are used as scheduling documents for the place where I work.

One spreadsheet is very wide. It lists each individual person at the top and their personal schedule below it. It lists breaks using "ONE" as the first half of a 30 minute block, "TWO" as the second half of a 30 minute block, and "LONG" as the entire 30 minute block.

The other spreadsheet is much less wide. It has 7 days listed and three columns. One is for "LONG" one is for "ONE" and the third is for "TWO." In each column, each person's name is entered in the appropriate block as defined in the first spreadsheet.

Can I get those two to talk to each other? Can I tell the first spreadsheet that if the word "TWO" is in a certain field to put the name of that person in another field on another spreadsheet?

Windows Syncing Software for Website Backup, But Changed Files Only?

frenetic — Thu, 01 Apr 2004 18:08:53 -0800

Can anyone recommend some Windows software to synchronize a local directory with a remote FTP directory? I want to do nightly remote -> local backups that just download the changed files from my web server, but I can't seem to find software that will do this simple thing.

Multiple PCs

mattr — Wed, 10 Mar 2004 07:20:30 -0800

I use a whole bunch of PC's - three mainly, my laptop at work, and a desktop and laptop at home...I'd like to find a way of keeping my favorites synchronised on all three OR keeping them all in one place on the web and being able to access them...oh, and I'd like the solution to be 'free' and look cool...(is there an easy way to harvest the 500 favorites on my work laptop - and turn them into a web page?)

I use IE6 on all of my PC's....but some web based solution would allow me to access all my links from other machines/browsers.

Anyone using .Mac?

kirkaracha — Thu, 26 Feb 2004 16:07:03 -0800

Anyone using .Mac? I'm considering it 'cause I want to use iSync for my contacts and calendar, but $100/year seems spendy.

How do I use a Palm handheld to synchronize between Lotus and Exchange?

adampsyche — Tue, 16 Dec 2003 15:39:14 -0800

Is it possible to use one Palm-based handheld to synchronize Lotus Organizer at work (for contacts and calendar) and Microsoft Exchange at home? Or two different Exchange servers (we may be migrating to Exchange soon at work)?