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Possible Duplicates:
Which is the best application to Sync two folders?
Keeping folders synced between several machines

What is a good tool to automatically sync two folders when changes are made to either one of them. I want to sync a folder in the Mozilla Tree (My Greasemonkey Scripts) with a folder on my desktop.

Any suggestions?

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    No, I'm asking for automatic.
    – Tyler Carter
    Commented Aug 2, 2009 at 3:19
  • OK, I missed that bit.
    – pgs
    Commented Aug 2, 2009 at 3:25
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    Lol how many ways are there to synchronize a folder and post a question about it on SU? ;-)
    – Ivo Flipse
    Commented Aug 2, 2009 at 10:24
  • See also: superuser.com/questions/349/…
    – Rowland Shaw
    Commented Dec 7, 2009 at 10:35

9 Answers 9

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I am assuming that your sync'ing is within the same machine.
If its across machine, please say so.

File Synchronization and Data Backup with Microsoft SyncToys

SyncToy (ST) is free file synchronization software designed by Microsoft to aid the user to synchronize, copy, backup and maintain folders of files on computers. Unlike most other methods, ST acts very fast in synchronizing the files in folders by copying, renaming and deleting files. ST is much simpler to configure and user-friendly.

Also read the Automating Sync Toy section in this article.

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If you want the contents of the two folders to be exactly the same, why not just create an NTFS junction point on the folder? This will effectively make the same folder available in both places. Any change you make from one location will instantly happen in the other location, because both locations are actually the same folder.

The NTFS Link shell extensions will let you easily create and manage these junction points (and hard links also) from the Explorer context menu.

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For a simple commercial utility, you can try SecondCopy by Centered Systems, or for a more powerful (but more difficult) utility, you can try the free version of SyncBack.

Sorry -- haven't been a user long enough to post the direct links to both...

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I use Allway Sync. Works for me. http://www.allwaysync.com/

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The easiest way to do this is to write a script that copies the file based on the archive bit. he archive bit indicates every file that has been changed. The archive bit exists for the precise purpose of knowing when a file is in need of a backup.

The manual command to do this is below... 

xcopy c:\fileroot\myfile.txt c:\filecopy\ /A
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Try RichCopy. A free utility from someone at Microsoft. Apart from doing what you ask, it is also optimized for the copy process and is faster than most tools I've used to copy multiple files.

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I really like Dropbox

* Sync files of any size or type
* Share large files and photos easily
* Automatic online backup
* Access your files anywhere
* Sync between operating systems
* Track and undo changes to files
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Similar to Dropbox is SpiderOak, which lets you sync arbitrary folders, I think they write their UI in Java though, so it's a bit slugish.

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  • If you're on OSX or Linux (I know the OP isn't, but someone else may find this helpful), you can run the tool via the command-line with a --headless option to cut down on GUI slowness.
    – Telemachus
    Commented Sep 27, 2009 at 13:30
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mesh.com is a great solution. Microsoft Live Mesh syncs folders among macs, pcs and the online desktop. I've been using it for months to sync userjs scripts, college documents and anything, really.

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