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Aren't we past the age of scheduled sync?


Scotto74

Idea

Too many times, I've been caught out by quickly adding / editing a note then putting my Mac to sleep without manually clicking the sync button.

 

Later when I pull up EN on my phone, tablet or other laptop; those last minute changes aren't there  (because sync never had a chance to run before the machine was put to sleep).

 

I already have my sync frequency set to the lowest setting (5 mins); and yes, it is entirely my own fault for not remembering to manually sync...but it's still frustrating.  Software, after all, is supposed make our lives better; doing things automatically so that we don't have to.

 

Two years ago, in 2012, when OSX 10.8 (Mountain Lion) was announced with its "Power Nap" feature, I posted a suggestion here that EN for Mac could possibly mitigate this by attempting a sync during one of the OS "DarkWake" events;  but it seems unlikely that's ever going to happen.

 

Recently I've been toying with the idea of an AppleScript, i.e.

tell application "Evernote"  synchronizeend tell

...in conjunction with a 3rd party utility such as SleepWatcher, Scenario or ControlPlane;  that will trigger the script automatically when the OS is entering sleep (to force a sync).

 

 

But it occurs to me that the root problem isn't really sync frequency, or detecting a sleep event, or even me forgetting to click the sync button.

 

The problem is that the sync still runs on a schedule, rather than automatically whenever changes are made.

 

The mobile apps don't have this problem, simply because they don't sync to a schedule.  When you edit a note in the iPhone app (assuming you have an Internet connection); those changes are synced automatically as soon as you exit the note (perhaps even while you're still editing the note too?  I haven't actually paid much attention, as it all "just works").

 

So it begs the question:  why don't the desktop apps also do this?

 

Obviously one issue on the desktop is that there's no "< Back" button to exit from a note back to a list;  so there's no clear trigger to indicate that the user is "done" making changes.   But is that, too, actually necessary?

 

If I'm typing away in a note, and I stop typing for say, 5 seconds (or whatever);  shouldn't that be a trigger for EN to sync (at least that one particular note)?   Or if switch to a different note, any pending changes to previous note should be automatically synced there and then; rather than waiting for the next 5 min cycle to elapse.

 

Clearly there's a balance to be found, between being too "chatty" (ie. syncing on every keystroke), and not enough.  But think about how Google Docs works.  When was the last time you ever missed an edit in one of your Google Docs because it hadn't synced? Me neither...

 

The underlying sync architecture doesn't need to be completely replaced either.  I'm assuming that, today, notes that are 'dirty' (i.e. have unsynced changes) are held in a queue somewhere, and the sync process works off that queue.   That wouldn't change;  it's just that instead of the only sync triggers being manual (clicking Sync) or scheduled (based on a frequency); there would be an additional set of sync triggers associated with editing/navigating between notes.

 

It just seems odd to me that the mobile apps have this problem perfectly solved (and have had for a number of years now);  while the desktop apps are still subject to notes been held hostage by a sleeping computer.

 

 

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