New SkyDrive program Question

[DrJohnSmitherson]

It seems that this program will function like Mesh. I have the SkyDrive program on 2 machines. If I put a file inside the SkyDrive folder on Machine 1, it will make a physical copy to SkyDrive and to Machine 2 as well right? It's not like some link right? They will still be viewable offline right?

[THolman Veteran]

I haven't tried it on two systems yet, but from what I can tell that's how it should function. If I upload something to SkyDrive it makes a file on my PC, and vice versa. The only thing I've noticed is that if you create a file with one of the Office Web Apps, then it seems to just send a link to all of your devices, to be viewed online. You can download it from there, of course. Otherwise, it seems to copy the file.

[DrJohnSmitherson]

Hmm ok. I have a bunch of Family Pictures saved into a folder on Machine One and Machine Two that are kept updated by Mesh. I also uploaded them to my SkyDrive to share with family. So will I now have duplicates on both machines since I have them in a separate folder and now in my SkyDrive folder?

[THolman Veteran]

Yeah, I've been using it for exactly the same thing, and I've got duplicates of all of them now. But they're small enough (the SkyDrive ones are JPG - the real photos are TIFF), so it's not making much of a dent. Just a bit annoying if you search for one, but I'd rather they handle it this way than Mesh, for the most part.

[DrJohnSmitherson]

Yeah, I've been using it for exactly the same thing, and I've got duplicates of all of them now. But they're small enough (the SkyDrive ones are JPG - the real photos are TIFF), so it's not making much of a dent. Just a bit annoying if you search for one, but I'd rather they handle it this way than Mesh, for the most part.

Ok. I like that Mesh can let me put folders anywhere which is nice. Too bad they didn't combine the two programs. :/

[rfirth]

Ok. I like that Mesh can let me put folders anywhere which is nice. Too bad they didn't combine the two programs. :/

You can put folders anywhere in the new Skydrive app. You have to use symbolic links so that those folders look like they are also in the Skydrive folder. For instance, to sync your Documents folder with Skydrive:

From the command line, in the C:\Users\%User%\Skydrive directory...

mklink /J "Documents" "../Documents"

For music:

mklink /J "Music" "../Music"

This will create a "folder" in your Skydrive directory that is actually a folder somewhere else on your system. But since it is accessible from the Skydrive directory, it will be synced.

[DrJohnSmitherson]

You can put folders anywhere in the new Skydrive app. You have to use symbolic links so that those folders look like they are also in the Skydrive folder. For instance, to sync your Documents folder with Skydrive:

From the command line, in the C:\Users\%User%\Skydrive directory...

mklink /J "Documents" "../Documents"

For music:

mklink /J "Music" "../Music"

This will create a "folder" in your Skydrive directory that is actually a folder somewhere else on your system. But since it is accessible from the Skydrive directory, it will be synced.

Very nice! Thanks for the tip!!

[DrJohnSmitherson]

You can put folders anywhere in the new Skydrive app. You have to use symbolic links so that those folders look like they are also in the Skydrive folder. For instance, to sync your Documents folder with Skydrive:

From the command line, in the C:\Users\%User%\Skydrive directory...

mklink /J "Documents" "../Documents"

For music:

mklink /J "Music" "../Music"

This will create a "folder" in your Skydrive directory that is actually a folder somewhere else on your system. But since it is accessible from the Skydrive directory, it will be synced.

How could I use this to sync,for example, a folder on the desktop on Machine 1 to a folder of the same name on the desktop of Machine 2

[winaxter]

I got a question, but didn't want to start a new thread just for it.

Has anyone gotten shared folders working like they do in dropbox? I created a shared folder with my friend, but it won't sync down to his skydrive folder, he can only view it on the browser. Is there something we're doing wrong? or is this just not possible atm.

[rfirth]

How could I use this to sync,for example, a folder on the desktop on Machine 1 to a folder of the same name on the desktop of Machine 2

Machine 1: As before.

Machine 2:

Before you install the SkyDrive client, setup the symbolic link in the same way. So first you have to create a SkyDrive directory and create the symbolic links with the names of the folders that SkyDrive will dump content into.

Now, when you install SkyDrive and tell it to use that directory, tell it to go ahead and use that directory that already exists. It will create folders for things that don't already exist. But since your symlinks already exist, it will dump the content into the correct places.

It should then download the content onto Machine 2, and at the same time push content to Machine 1 - anything in the, say, Documents folder on Machine 2 that wasn't on Machine 1.

[aberg]

You can put folders anywhere in the new Skydrive app. You have to use symbolic links so that those folders look like they are also in the Skydrive folder. For instance, to sync your Documents folder with Skydrive:

From the command line, in the C:\Users\%User%\Skydrive directory...

mklink /J "Documents" "../Documents"

For music:

mklink /J "Music" "../Music"

This will create a "folder" in your Skydrive directory that is actually a folder somewhere else on your system. But since it is accessible from the Skydrive directory, it will be synced.

Great! But i am not clear of the difference between /D and /J ?

[rfirth]

Great! But i am not clear of the difference between /D and /J ?

To be honest, I'm not either. If you use /D, the command prompt window has to be run as administrator, while /J does not need admin privileges. But I don't know the actual difference between the two. I got it working first with /J, but /D also seems to work.

Edit: Looked it up again. Shouldn't make any difference for what we're trying to do, but you can check it out here:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/2007.02.vistakernel.aspx

[aberg]

To be honest, I'm not either. If you use /D, the command prompt window has to be run as administrator, while /J does not need admin privileges. But I don't know the actual difference between the two. I got it working first with /J, but /D also seems to work.

Edit: Looked it up again. Shouldn't make any difference for what we're trying to do, but you can check it out here:

http://technet.micro...istakernel.aspx

Ok, thanks.

Described like this by Microsoft -

"A major difference in the way Windows resolves symbolic links (/D) and directory junctions (/J) is where the processing takes place. Windows processes symbolic links on the local system, even when they reference a location on a remote file server. Windows processes directory junctions that reference a remote file server on the server itself. Symbolic links on a server can therefore refer to locations that are only accessible from a client, like other client volumes, whereas directory junctions cannot. To address this, Windows Vista supports the new symbolic link type for both files and directories"