[Freedombox-discuss] BitTorrent Sync

Philip Hands phil at hands.com
Tue Jan 29 13:44:26 PST 2013


Jonathan Wilkes <jancsika at yahoo.com> writes:

> ----- Original Message -----
>
>> From: Philip Hands <phil at hands.com>
>> To: Chris Troutner <Chris.Troutner at PACCAR.com>; freedombox-discuss at lists.alioth.debian.org
>> Cc: 
>> Sent: Tuesday, January 29, 2013 8:02 AM
>> Subject: Re: [Freedombox-discuss] BitTorrent Sync
>> 
>> Chris Troutner <Chris.Troutner at PACCAR.com> writes:
>> 
>>>  I ran across this article on Slashdot about the new Sync platform in
>>>  alpha test by BitTorrent. Apparently it's 'like' Dropbox, but 
>> it uses
>>>  your own machine. It allows file synchronization between two (or more)
>>>  computers, like your laptop and personal server.
>>> 
>>>  http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/13/01/25/1941226/bittorrent-launches-
>>>  dropbox-alternative
>>> 
>>>  Does anyone know more about this?
>> 
>> I don't, when I read about it I thought that if I wanted such a thing,
>> I'd almost certainly use git-annex instead (and 'git annex 
>> assistant' in
>> particular).  See:
>> 
>>   http://git-annex.branchable.com/assistant/
>
> It's like bittorrent sync, except it doesn't scale and doesn't use
> encryption out of the box.

Well, since you put it like that, I guess I have to set you straight:

It uses ssh out of the box -- so there's your transport encryption, and
it optionally uses GPG encryption for special remotes (i.e. dumping your
files in Amazon S3, or a USB stick, say), so yes, it does do encryption
out of the box in the places where one might actually want it.

  http://git-annex.branchable.com/encryption/

As for scaling, it depends what you're after, but since (if using the
assistant) you can nudge remotes into attempting to pull from one
another via XMPP, I think it's got quite a few of the real world use
cases covered for scalability too.

The big win for me is that it builds on proven technology, that is easy
to trust.  I know I'd much rather trust the crypto in ssh and GPG than
something alpha from bittorrent.

Git's had a fair amount of testing too (as has git annex).

Bittorrent sync on the other hand is currently in an invitation-only
pre-alpha phase, it seems.

Cheers, Phil.
-- 
|)|  Philip Hands [+44 (0)20 8530 9560]    http://www.hands.com/
|-|  HANDS.COM Ltd.                    http://www.uk.debian.org/
|(|  10 Onslow Gardens, South Woodford, London  E18 1NE  ENGLAND



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