Synchronize your database on multiple computers via Dropbox

Note
This article discuss the use of a third party application in conjunction with Pagico. The copyright of the mentioned product(s) belongs to their respectful owners. Features or services of the third party applications may be changed over time.

About Dropbox

Dropbox is a free cross-platform file synchronizing tool, that helps you to synchronize files on all your systems automatically. It currently supports Windows, Mac, and Linux, so it’s perfect to use in conjunction with Pagico, so you can easily use the same database on multiple computers without having to carry your thumbdrive all the time.

Step 1: Get Dropbox

So, to get started, you need to get the Dropbox application on your system first. There are two storage plans available from Dropbox, one is free with 2GB storage space, and a non-free plan that provides 50GB of storage space. For our example here, the free 2GB plan would be more than enough.

After downloading and installing the program, you will be asked to register a Dropbox account and associate your computer with your account. Once you’ve done so, you’ll have a “My Dropbox” folder set up on your system. This becomes your synchronized folder, meaning that all the files and folders within this “My Dropbox” folder, will be synchronized automatically across all your registered devices.

Step 2: Put your Pagico database into your Dropbox folder

Now, it’s time to put (move or copy, whatever you prefer) your Pagico database(s) into your Dropbox folder. By doing so, all the changes you made to the database will be automatically synchronized across all your registered computers and devices.

Step 3: Register your other computers with Dropbox

Everything is now completed, except for that you only have one computer registered with Dropbox. So now it’s the time to register your other computers with Dropbox. Simply follow the Step 1 above on your other computers, and choose “I have a dropbox account” instead of creating a new one when asked. Then, once associated, the Dropbox application will automatically create your “My Dropbox” folder on your new computers, bringing you the most current version of your Pagico database.

Conclusion

Although we haven’t extensively tested this solution, it appears to be the perfect solution to synchronize your databases across multiple computers, and we haven’t experienced any issue yet. One thing to note is that you want to avoid data conflicts — meaning that you’ll always try to work on the database on one computer at a time. If multiple changes are being made on several copies of the database at the same time, nobody can guarantee about the data integrity so far.


Related posts:

  1. How can I synchronize my databases across my computers?
  2. Display To-do lists on your desktop (Windows)
  3. Why do I have a /opt folder (on Mac)?
  4. The new data engine in Pagico v4

5 Notes

  1. Eckes
    Posted October 1, 2009 at 2:56 pm | Permalink

    Hello, I tried the DROPBOX idea, but it seems that there are some files that won´t synchronize! Does anyone tried the system and experience the same problem? Thanks, Thomas

  2. Posted October 1, 2009 at 7:40 pm | Permalink

    @Thomas,
    What are the “some files” that you were referring to? Please beware that your data that are in your Inbox is not supposed to be synchronized in this way. They are stored in a different location and will require the upcoming Pagico Cloud Service to handle the synchronization.

    I hope this helps!

  3. Eckes
    Posted October 6, 2009 at 1:52 am | Permalink

    @Ryo,
    I just reinstalled the database on dropbox and right now it seems to sync perfect, without any misstake. I´m not quite shure what happend, but there were two / three files that wouldn´t be synced. If I experience another issue I´ll post it.
    Thanks, Thomas

  4. Posted October 7, 2009 at 12:40 pm | Permalink

    @Eckes,
    Okay, and please keep me posted if the issue occurs again. I’m very curious to know what it is. :-)

    Thanks!

  5. Thomas
    Posted February 23, 2010 at 7:58 pm | Permalink

    The sync via dropbox don’t work correctly. Get problems with the lists. Any solution yet?
    @eckes: How did you “reinstall” the pagico database?

    Regards
    Thomas

One Trackback

  1. [...] Many of you who work on multiple computers already knew that you can take advantage of Dropbox to synchronize databases easily. The Dropbox solution has been working perfectly fine and we’re very happy with it. However, [...]

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