DropBox Alternatives For Linux

[kerravonsen]

Thought I might as well share my investigations: http://kerravonsen.dreamwidth.org/942632.html

Comments

[jewelfox]

I've personally looked into this some. Of the things on that list, SparkleShare is the only thing I've considered; I personally find that "third-party things tend to break" is not nearly as large a concern for me as "I might spend all day trying to get this to work and either fail or break it tomorrow." I also find that things designed to be accessible to a nontechnical audience tend to appeal to my sense of aesthetics much more, and to address more of my personal needs and concerns, as my use case scenarios are much closer to those of a nontechnical audience.

For me the biggest con of SparkleShare is that everything of mine would be made public, since I don't have my own server capable of running git (I use shared hosting). Another big problem is that I use an Android smartphone and a Nook Color as well, and would like access to my files on those devices.

Because it works with all of the above, I'm currently using Dropbox for sync, and I have a lot of things on other third-party services like Evernote as well. I'm considering moving to OwnCloud hosted on PortKnox though, which is already where my calendar is, and I'm using OpenPhoto for image hosting and a self-hosted WordPress install for writing (although I need to finish setting it up). Using GNOME's web browser to set up my WordPress site's admin console as a web app was exquisite; the distraction-free writing mode really is.

Edit: I'm also considering using my SparkleShare folder as a way to manage the open-source projects I work on, since it would sync with Gitorious without my having to intervene. All I'd have to do is set up the project online, and then change the directory I save things in ... if I understand correctly.

Edit x2: I also find that tools designed for a nontechnical audience tend to require less cognitive overhead to use. It's different if I'm already familiar with something and tied into using it for nontechnical reasons, which is one reason I write on Dreamwidth much more than on WordPress right now. But for me this usually makes the difference between "I can do this but I don't", and "I can do this and I enjoy doing so."

[dragonwolf]

Am I the only one that sees irony in the "third party things tend to vanish" line (considering the commerical world basically says "use commerical stuff, because FLOSS things tend to vanish")?

On a side note, regarding git-based solutions in general - depending on what, exactly, one is looking to accomplish with these solutions, another option is to pair git with Capistrano and a local file-change-watching daemon to automate most of your syncing. The trade-off here is, of course, no unified GUI interface, but tons of control.