(Archived) Why is sync necessary on first run?

[EP2008 17]

I've loaded Evernote 2.0b4, and while it syncs (long time now), I'm wondering even why it needs to sync my entire database.

The way it should work should be strictly online with the OPTION to sync if I choose so. The behavior of the previous Evernote was great as I can install a new version, log in and I'm good to add and edit my notes. Now, I have to wait several hours to do that.

What's the logic behind this?

[engberg 89]

It now builds the scrollable list of notes directly on the device (just like the Mac client, Windows client, iPhone client). To do this, it needs to load the major information about the notes.

[EP2008 17]

It now builds the scrollable list of notes directly on the device (just like the Mac client, Windows client, iPhone client). To do this, it needs to load the major information about the notes.

The behavior in loading notes was much preferred in version 1.5. It instantly loaded all data with no long syncs.

I think if a user wants offline syncing, this should be done as an option.

[engberg 89]

We don't pull down all of the contents of your notes unless you specify notebooks as "offline" in the Settings page, but we do pull down the listing of notes and their thumbnails for fast local operation.

[EP2008 17]

"...but we do pull down the listing of notes and their thumbnails for fast local operation."

But that's what I don't understand. Version 1.5 was super-fast in loading my data (5000+ notes) and 2.0 requires several hours of downloading headers before I can use recent notes. I wish there was an option to keep things completely "online" to mirror v1.5. 2.0 has some great features when it comes to creating and editing notes, but to me the syncing part is a real pain.

[Ah_Fan 23]

One thing is that if we don't downsync your notes information, there is not much you can do with just the Android client (like you can't associate any existing tags, notebooketc). As you see that Android 2.0 has added a lot of features (as well as in the background, like its database), it needs to download the note's meta-data resource, as compared to Android 1.5 which only getting count information from the server.

However, we are trying to make better improvement to reduce the downsync time when first login, like skipping the thumbnails or other header stuffs if it works out OK.